FISH

We started downstairs at Bellini for a 'to die for' cocktail.
Fish restaurant has great décor, I love all the white furnishings and vases of gorgeous flowers and the views of the Cloud are impressive.

The service is fantastic, the staff really engage with the customer without being intrusive. Our waiter BJ was sweet, funny and tentative.

But stripped of the frills, is the food good? Yes absolutely. We had a 5 course Degustation, we started with Tomato & Crab Cappucino with roasted garlic cream in a tiny espresso cup & a glass of Daniel Le Brun Brut.

The second course was Tuna & Beetroot Tartare, fasinating with the buttermilk marbles and horseradish. However the beetroot we all thought over powered the tuna so that you wouldn't even know you were eating tuna, no fish taste in sight. The presentation however was pretty.

Pan fried Atlantic Scallops with califlower puree and chorizo was yummy.

Then we had the choice of Fish or Lamb. I had the Lamb rump with confit lamb belly, onion charcoal (which without looking at the menu I knew exactly what it tasted like) and carrot & cardamom puree
Shane Yardley of Simon Gault's Nourish group is the Head Chef at Fish and did us the honor of personally visiting our table which was a really nice touch. We were able to chat to him about the technique of Sous Vide – bathing the lamb in a hotwater bath, this made the lamb soft and melt in your mouth much like marshmellow. I never would have thought I could have likened lamb to marshmellow.

To finish for dessert we had Dark chocolate and popcorn - dark chocolate marquise, popcorn ice cream and chocolate popcorn wafer with amazing caramel spread on the plate and hokey pokey crumbs. I saw shades of Heston Blumenthal with the foam. Dreamy!!

I had a superb meal at FISH last night. A lovely space, really excellent food, and fantastic service. Would certainly recommend this place.

I think these two top chefs need to come to my house for lunch as I can certainly do much better than what I experienced yesterday!

Decided to take advantage of the Auckland Restaurant Month menu that Fish was offering - $31 for 2 courses or $39 for 3 courses and were pleased to find a very nice wine for $45 a bottle, so all good so far.

We started with bread and dip (an extra cost) and this consisted of 3 small buns and an interesting tomato mousse style dip.

I then opted for "Corn chowder / bacon / crab / pesto crouton" - what a joke this was. Basically it resembled Watties mixed vegetables in some thickened, unseasoned water with bits of bacon and a few shreds of crabmeat which looked like the tinned variety. The pesto crouton was a half of the buns served with our bread and dip and the topping was certainly green, but that's where it's similarity to pesto ended - it had no flavour at all - absolutely dreadful!

For the main I selected "FISH pot pie / selection of seafood / scallop / prawns / market fresh fish/ crayfish cream sauce / parmesan potato top". This was nicely presented with a leaf salad on the side. I did find one nice juicy prawn (certainly not prawns plural) and a couple of pieces of fish, but think the scallop must have escaped along with the crayfish cream sauce as the bulk of the pie was a rather bland white sauce, but there were plenty of peas (which I detest). This would be the sort of thing I'd serve up for Sunday dinner, but mine would have more seafood and flavour - very ho hum!

I felt no urge to give the desserts a go based on the entree and main course, so we moved on elsewhere for coffee and certainly won't be in a hurry to return.

With Shane Yardley as Head Chef Fish will be the only place to go for a true Seafood dining experience.

Went to the opening of FISH at the Hilton and wow, this place is going to be fantastic. I never really rated White as I thought the food/service didn't quite stack up to the amazing setting (Auckland's best in my opinion). FISH has got a lot of competition with Britomart and now Wynyard Quarter doing very well but with Gaulty behind things should do well.

Can't wait to try out Fish at Princes Wharf. It's tipped to be the BEST Seafood restaurant in Auckland.