Strawberry Tree Kaikoura Ltd. — Restaurant in Kaikōura

Was attracted to the place because of the wonderful aroma of bbq! Entered the shop and was greeted by a chaotic queue at the bar. It was unclear if people were awaiting to order food, waiting to order drinks, or waiting for their orders. The barman kept shouting out "anyone just ordering drinks", but no one was. Instead of helping the guy taking the food orders, he just kept looking for drink only orders.

The guy taking food orders was not really in the mood to do the job. He was rolling his eyes and shaking his head at the people before us because they were unsure of their orders. When we approached, he gave the most fake smile I have ever seen.

We ended up waiting for about 45 minutes for our food. We ordered a pulled pork sandwich and a brisket sandwich. As the brisket and pulled pork are cooked on the smoker, this order should have taken about 10 minutes - the time it takes to cook the fries as all you have to do for the sandwiches is top them with pre-cooked meat and the salads. When our food arrived, the fries were cold (not even heat lamp warm - cold). No restaurant should EVER serve cold fries!

The brisket and the pulled pork was nice, though some extra sauce would have taken it to the level I was hoping for when I smelled the bbq on the street. Turns out you could have ordered it as sauces are posted at the bottom of the menu, but we missed that in the chaos of the ordering line and no way in hell was the food taker making any suggestions that might improve the dining experience as that would mean more work for him.

I would give this place another shot as the brisket and the pork were very nice. But if I walked into the chaos at the bar again (by the way, this was around 2:30 on a Tuesday, so not a particularly busy time) I would...

We were there on 14th April 2023. We ordered Crayfish as suggested there were 3 pricing (105, 99, 90). 3 of us ordered 105, what we've been served are much smaller size comparing to our friend who had a 90 is much much bigger. Of course their explanation was the crayfish doesn't measured by size infact by weight. But logically, if you look at the crayfish head much bigger and the body much bigger isn't it heavier? The crayfish head were all black internally, obviously not fresh....other tables were all fresh and look really good. That was really very obvious of a discrimination going on...we will never step in to this restaurant and never never will recommend to any of our friends. Not that we can't afford to pay, we were there to contribute to your economy! Other restaurants in the New Zealand we do not feel it, they were very welcoming, friendly and served us equally!

Their service recovery of course offset 2 soups that we ordered..but that's not what we wanted...what we pay you must delivered! If the crayfish is not fresh do not serve it to...

We visited this place based on a recommendation and thought we’d give it a try. Unfortunately, the experience didn’t quite live up to expectations. We had a 55-minute wait, which set the tone early on.

We started with the crab and corn empanadas, which were absolutely delicious and easily the highlight of the meal. However, the mains were disappointing. We ordered the fish and chips and the BBQ chicken—both were overcooked, dry, and lacked flavour. I didn’t think you could go wrong with fish and chips, but sadly, they proved otherwise.

The BBQ chicken was deep-fried in an overdone batter that tasted bitter. It had an odd, chewy texture—like chewing gum but with meat.

We skipped dessert after that, as we didn’t want to risk another letdown.

While we can't speak for the rest of the menu, based on the three items we tried, only the empanadas are worth mentioning. Unfortunately, we won’t...