The Puketapu — Restaurant in North Island

Unfortunately a mix of good and bad for this review, firstly the service was great from our friendly waitress, and the atmosphere of the place was also great. My wife ordered an entrée and I ordered a main, there was about 15 mins between the 2 dishes being delivered, which meant we both had to sit there watching the other person eat, not ideal. My wife got the "Lamb shoulder croquettes with pea puree and mint salad". 3 croquettes in total, only one had lamb in it, the other 2 had mashed kumera in them, the menu didn't say anything about kumera croquettes and had she had known this would have picked something else. The mint "salad" consisted of 2 small pieces of mint leaves and that was it, the pea puree was tasty although the whole dish was over-seasoned with salt. The Puketapu burger was yum, I couldn't fault this, the chips it came with would have also been yum if they weren't over-seasoned also with salt. We shared the "cinnamon apple fritters" and overall they were nice, it just would have been better if they have had some apple in them, only managed to find a couple of...

My husband and I did the cycle trail and stopped off for lunch here. We ordered fish (pan fried) and chips with salad. We got the wrong order. Then they sort of forgot about us but eventually almost brought us the right order (forgot the extra tartar sauce) and we didn't eat until about an hour after we got there. I think the girl who took our order was fairly new. So, you may wonder why we still gave it 5 stars, right? Well, there's the service, which was excellent and delivered with a smile and a lot of professionalism. We were comped a couple of free drinks when they realised they had forgotten us. The girl serving us had a great attitude and knew how to handle the situation. The food was excellent. We'd eaten a similar meal from a place the day previous and it wasn't even close in terms of quality and taste. The location is gorgeous, and the outdoor setting is very pretty. Everyone makes mistakes, so that didn't bother us. The rest of our experience was fabulous, and we will definitely go back next time we're...

My daughter and I went to celebrate her birthday at the Puketapu Pub on a friend's recommendation, but we won't be returning any time soon. We arrived on time at 1pm today (26 July). The restaurant was busy, but not overly so. Once the waiting staff had taken our order, we sat for thirty minutes before it arrived. My daughter's salad was just about edible but mine (open steakwich) was luke warm and consisted of a hard cooked piece of tough steak over a flabby piece of bacon which covered two small squares of slightly warmed, sweating cheese sitting on two thin slices of anaemic tomato on top of some soggy bread. We called for the bill. The waitress saw the barely touched meals and half finished drinks, took my card, deducted $52 from it and returned it to the table with a receipt. At no time during our meals were we asked how we were enjoying them. At no point during the bill payment process were we asked if there was...