Address: 472 Richmond Rd, Grey Lynn
Phone: (09) 360 7590
Web: delicious.co.nz
Cuisine: Italian
Rating: 8/10
Who can resist an Italian eatery? Not me. When Delicious first opened in Grey Lynn a decade ago, I went too often, indulging myself with their gloriously hand-made pasta, then a few times I got such drastically unwelcoming service that I stopped going altogether. But that was years ago and since then there's been a change of ownership and then another, and now this local eatery is in the hands of Anthea Potter, so I braved it again.
It's exactly as I remembered, with its two street-level dining rooms, and one upstairs, decked out in dark wooden furniture, bustling open kitchen and counter cabinet of gooey, creamy-looking Italian desserts oozing rustic charm. The menu is exactly as it has always been, with a strong focus on pasta, all of it handmade on the premises.
We started by sharing zucchini ravioli and a caprese salad. There's no other way to say it, the ravioli were exceptional. Large handkerchiefs of tender pasta sandwich a filling of finely grated zucchini, torn basil and that gentle cheese, ricotta. The whole lot brimmed with the herbaceous flavour of a sage butter sauce, freshened up with the zing of lemon juice. It was the taste of summer in Italy on a plate.
Caprese salad has to be one of the most stellar flavour combinations on the planet and at Delicious they do the right thing in using small, very ripe cherry tomatoes, ensuring blasts of flavour, and generous amounts of basil. A little more of the fresh milky mozzarella would have been nice but we're not in Campania now, I suppose.