The French Cafe

Hardly a cafe, Auckland's prized French Cafe was touted the best restaurant in town before and even more so when I arrived in New Zealand. With reservations later on in the week, each restaurant seemed like a prelude to the eventual masterpiece we would encounter. Finally, on Thursday night, charged by a day of rehearsals and approvals, we made our way.

I kicked things off with a champagne cocktail at the bar, infused with rhubarb syrup that made the smell odd but the taste delicious. Once at our table, our producer ordered some rich Cabernet that led me straight to the lamb main course. In fact, nearly the entire table ordered the butternut pumpkin cappuccino.

I need to go on a tangent here. There's something you should know about New Zealand. They are OBSESSED with foam. Need to special-up some pancakes? Foam. Flavor the scallops? How about foam. Bean puree? Old news. Foam. Seriously, kiwis, enough with the foam already. Isn't that so 2006? Yes, it's nice when it's one foray on the entire menu for seafood so delicate only the barely-there addition of foam needs complement. Dehydrated passionfruit foam is overboard. Do I even need to point that out? Apparently, yes.

Back to the butternut pumpkin cappuccino. We're talking silky, wintery squash soup (I think it was "custard" on the menu) with salty smoked bacon and, you guessed it, maple-hazelnut foam! At least they're calling it a cappuccino so you know what you're getting. The soup arrived in stemless O glasses which pretty much forced us to sip the soup rather than jam a spoon in there.

For my main course, the pink lamb, I was floored by the presentation. The plumpest lamb cutlets I've ever seen were glazed with red wine sauce over a dollup of—this is impressively fresh—soft white almond polenta. This was to die for. I'm already a huge polenta fan, but give me soft polenta with its unique smooth-yet-granular texture and add to it the vanilla-nutty flavor of blanched almonds and I'm nearly in heaven. I literally would have licked my plate had I not been entertaining clients.

A perfectly roasted tomato and deep fried buffalo ricotta dumpling rounded out the display. Never underestimate the power of these perfectly-selected sides. I have chosen many an entree by its show of complements. In this case, I chose superbly for both. The lamb was tender, pink, and again, not like the lamb I've had anywhere else in that it lacks the overpowering gameyness I often associate with lamb.

I would highly recommend this being your first dining choice in Auckland. If you've gone once, I wouldn't be surprised if you chose to return every night visiting! It really was amazing, even better than everyone kept insisting.