Te Whau Vineyard Restaurant, Waiheke

We had a magnificent evening out at Te Whau Vineyard Restaurant last night.  Located in a setting with majestic views looking back to Auckland and over Waiheke, the décor of the restaurant itself is clean and functional but it feels a bit lacking in terms of quality.  The crockery, cutlery and glasses however were of a high calibre.

For entrée, I had a lovely Seared & Spice encrusted tuna and Jane had an exquisite Paddle Crab salad on a Wasabi Mousse.

The Lamb Loin was very flavoursome with a strong pistachio and olive sauce.  The Beef Eye fillet was also ridiculously tender and beautifully cooked.  To accompany my main course I had a Te Whau 2007 “The Point” Bordeaux blend and it was magnificent.

For dessert we shared a Chocolate.Truffle Tart with a Coffee Panacotta and Fresh berries, and a Washed rind cheese.  Both were excellent, however the chocolate tart dessert was as Jane described “Perfect”; all components contributed to a beautiful balance.

It’s not a cheap evening out but the meals are superbly executed, service excellent and a magnificent vista.  Thoroughly recommended.

Saturday at Waiheke - Sculptures, Olives, Stony Batter tunnels and more

We spent a lovely day at Waiheke on Saturday.  This island has so much to offer that there was no shortage of things to do and we ended up doing quite a bit.

After an excellent breakfast at our accommodation we set off to explore the Sculpture trail.  This is a free outdoor exhibition that runs for a couple of months around the headland of Waiheke with magnificent views to be seen along the walk.  There was also a nice touch of sun umbrellas along the walk you could pick up and make use of and drop off at another location.

After the sculpture walk we headed to the middle of the island and sampled some lovely Olive Oil at Azzuro Groves (where we purchased a Greek Olive oil) and then had some excellent Herb Spread from Rangihoua Estate.  We then continued across the island (it’s a lot bigger than you think!) to Passage Rock for a magnificent lunch.  See previous blog post for further details.

We then went in search of a couple of geocaches on the far eastern side of the island and found one of them, but more importantly got to see some of the island’s beautiful scenery and go to parts of island we have never ventured to before.

The fort at Stony Batter was our next stop where I did a self-guided tour through the tunnels (pitch black without a torch) and emerged via a ladder at one of the gun turrets.  There is an $8 entry fee to the tunnels and you can hire a torch for $5.  Thoroughly recommended, although getting out of the ladder at the end won’t be for everybody so you can opt to return via the tunnel.

For dinner we had a lovely meal at the Te Whau vineyard restaurant.  Another blog post will detail this.