Herald rating: * * * 1/2
Where: 5B Lorne St
Ph: 300 6381
Open: Dinner Wednesday-Saturday; Lunch Monday-Saturday
Wine list: Avoids the obvious
Vegetarians: Remarkably few choices for Asian-inspired cuisine.
Watch out for: The table by the kitchen.
Sound check: Conversation-friendly
Bottom line: Individuality with an Asian twist.
KEY POINTS:
For a while there, it looked like a distinctive New Zealand cuisine was emerging that defined this country as part of Asia - a style of food that relied on fresh ingredients, minimally interfered with and subjected to a subtle use of spices that elicited flavours rather than swamped tastes.
Nowadays it sometimes seems that Auckland is located somewhere between Tuscany and Umbria. It's hard to get a cup of tea and a lamington that haven't been drizzled with balsamic vinegar and extra-virgin olive oil, and pizza has become fine dining. Is there a non-Asian restaurant between Orewa and Pukekohe that doesn't have pasta on the menu? (Incidentally, is there a waiter or waitress in the same area who knows that the "sch" in bruschetta is pronounced "sk" not "sh"?).
The exceptions to this Italian invasion are mostly Asian-inspired. Pan-Asian joints such as the excellent Monsoon Poon in downtown Auckland, which offers food from India, China, Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia on a single menu are among Auckland's best eats.
Conversely there is the deracinated gastronomic experience offered by East, Chow and Wagamama, which seems like Asian food for people who don't feel that comfortable around Asians.
Jimmy Wong's stands apart from both because it does strive for a specific culinary identity. The dishes are Asian-inspired in the best way: the pork belly has a wasabi dressing; an eggplant dish decorates a very Thai red curry with Chinese touches - water chestnuts and lychees. There is, in short, a sense of an organising intelligence at work and it is nice to escape the sense of having food-hall tucker where they charge you double because neither the plates nor the chairs are plastic.
Among our choices was a whole snapper - steamed, fragrant with shredded ginger and extraordinarily moist - preceded by rice paper rolls full of spiced duck, a dish of grilled and sliced chicken whose peppery taste was cleverly offset with snowpeas, and a delicious selection of tempura vegetables, prawns and oysters.
The restaurant has just started a winter menu - heavier on the broths and the hotpots than the one we tried and also, I see, a dollar or two more expensive here and there. The slight inflections of the changes - the duck is roasted in plum and star anise rather than orange and cinnamon and the whole snapper has been replaced by crisp-skinned fillets - suggest they are sticking with a winning formula.
Our banquette, with a ringside view of the kitchen, seemed a bit of a design error in a room that is otherwise nicely divided by attractive wrought-iron screens. And the experience was somewhat marred by chaotic service, which culminated in a bill that left off more than $50 worth of what we'd eaten; in hindsight I regret mentioning this fact to a harried passing staff member as I got no thanks for it. I wish I'd kept the $50.
These matters aside, Jimmy Wong's is definitely a cut above the competition.
With main courses priced at $28 maximum, it's also not wallet-busting. Five of us ate there for less than the three of us paid at Chow. Good food at reasonable prices - how often do you find that these days?
