156 Hurstmere Road,
Takapuna
Auckland,


(09) 488 0678

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2 out of 5

They don’t exactly make it easy getting in to Diakoku.

Although a glowing ‘Daikoku’ sign beams over Hurstmere Road in Takapuna, the restaurant is actually on a wee side street, up some slippery stairs and then through an easily overlooked door.

Once inside, the floor area feels as large as a rugby field—and almost as mucky—yet every table is packed. The room looks worn and in need of a serious spruce up; the carpets are stained and no one has scrubbed the basins in the bathrooms for a long while.

Daikoku serves teppan-yaki; a style of Japanese cuisine that involves having the chef cook your meal on a sizzling cooker right in front of you. Meals start at $23.50 for the vegetarian option and go right through to $72 for crayfish, scallops and fillet mignon.

Sitting at a shared table (if you want a private table you’ll need to come with a group of eight or more), we watch our talented, but sweating, chef prepare prawns (delicious, but served with far too much mayonnaise); egg fried rice (if you pay extra); steak, chicken, scallops and fish (again, too much mayo).

There is a display of skill when the chef starts flipping pieces of fried egg into people’s mouths, but I am less than impressed when one piece bounces off a diner’s lip and back onto the tabletop stove.

The food is all very tasty, but the amount of oil it is cooked in and the creamy toppings it’s slathered with have me worrying about my young arteries.

Full but unimpressed, we slip out before desert arrives.