The Stoaker Room Cromwell — Restaurant in Cromwell Community

My initial plan was to have lunch at Mt Difficulty winery, as I love their wines and wanted to pair it with the food from their kitchen. Due to the fact that I didn't make any reservation - I didn't know what time that I'd make it to the restaurant anyway - the earliest available slot was 3pm and I arrived at the winery around 12pm++.

Plan B - always have a backup plan just in case because popular winery is always packed. Located in the township of Cromwell (not Bannockburn), we quickly order the food. The waiter told us that it'd take at least 20-30 min to prepare the food, we walked to nearby Wild Earth (who also own Stoaker Room) to get a glass of their Pinot Noir 2010.

◾finger licking Stoaker chicken nibbles NZ$14 - lovely smoked taste with juicy meat.. the kids loved the chicken wings so much ◾Stoaker Grill pork ribs NZ$25 - fork tender and juicy meat texture. They didn't need any more convincing work to do... I believe that the grilling technique has been perfected here. ◾side of smoky grilled vegetables for NZ$10 - it turned out that we loved this dish the most. If there's a reason to go vegan, it'd be this dish! ◾Wild Earth Pinot Noir 2010 - pampered myself to a good glass of Pinot before continuing the journey to Dunedin.

It turned out to be one of the best smoked and grilled foods that we had in a while. We didn't have any expectations and therefore were wowed by the quality and taste of the dishes. After that, we went to have a wine tasting at Misha's Vineyard Tasting Room before leaving for our final destination - Dunedin.

The Stoaker Room 180 State Highway 8B, Cromwell 9310, New Zealand

Business hour: 10am-9pm

Disclaimer:

1. I'm not paid to promote/endorse any particular event, restaurant or person in this blog. ALL are based on my unbiased personal opinion, and I paid for MOST (if not all) of my food, unless it was a treat from my friend or family member.
2. My reviews are based on my personal taste and preference and therefore may vary for others.

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watched Mark Weins video of this place and had my hopes up as we were here for the Light up Winter festival so why not go to the place he raved about.... wasn't the best experience for the price. 3 families (13people) costing over $200 each.

service was average and food was 50/50between everyone.

we got there at 5pm. only one other couple seated when we got there. we ordered up pretty quickly as we had places to be. the food took over an hour. Kids were hungry and trying to keep them claim was a mission. would of been good if they got there food out of the way first but I understand they were trying to serve us all at once. my kids love ribs and Mac & cheese. they did not want a bar of it, they had no flavour and potatoes on the platter tasted old and stale then reheated. some positives mushrooms were good the wife finished hers and so did my friends wife. the chicken and lamb on the platter were the best parts juicy and tender. but that's all there was.

overall looked promising but just missed the mark. wasnt a bad experience but wasn't good. Just wish I got that mark...

We've been here a few times and generally pretty good. The platter is always delicious. But tonight we had a terrible experience. Ordered 3 different meals. One of which was a burger with no dressings (person is allergic to aioli etc). Burger comes smothered with it. Returned it to the waiter who apologized and said it will be 10mins. About 30 min later I went to the kitchen to see if they'd forgotten about it and they were just about to make it. They made all the other meals before bothering to remake the one they stuffed up. Meal comes to us, with about half the amount of potato chunky fries on the plate as last time, only 4 pieces of potato alongside the burger. Food was all nice enough but nobody should have to wait that long for their mistake to be fixed. Will make me think twice about going back. I did complain at the end as I paid $182 for our meal. Got another sorry from the same young waiter who served us, but honestly, that...