SAN RAY
Address: 118 Ponsonby Rd, Ponsonby
Phone: (09) 360 0486
Bookings: Accepted
Drinks: Fully licensed
From the menu: Tuna crudo $29; tortilla soup $26; grilled koji cabbage $24; mushroom skewer $28; roasted carrot $28; venison tartare $29
Rating: 18/20
Score: 0-7 Steer clear. 8-12 Disappointing, give it a miss.
I’ve had some good nights out on Ponsonby Rd but I wouldn’t say there often feels much heart to the place. It’s fast, it’s noisy, you’re wrestling with the bridge-and-ferry crowd just to order a drink and once you’ve paid your bill you know the person at the counter will never think about you again.
That all changes with the arrival of San Ray, where you can feel the warmth as soon as you walk in. The wonderful Orphan’s Kitchen had a great run but now that business has closed and been replaced by the team from Cazador, a blue-blood Auckland hospitality family who are in it for all the right reasons. They’ve toned down the masculine elements of the design, bringing in soft pastel cushioning to the chairs and lowering the tables to encourage longer stays. There’s a fresh coat of paint and a new ceiling-mounted structure above the coffee machine that holds wine bottles and masks the kitchen – suddenly, this feels like a restaurant.
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Advertise with NZME.Owners Dariush Lolaiy and Rebecca Smidt are Auckland’s most lovable hospo couple. To meet them is to wish them success – to want to bestow praise and prizes upon them to reward their investment in your happiness. At Cazador they took a family business and made it future-fit. At San Ray they’ve been able to start from scratch and the effect is something equally charismatic, but very different from the Dominion Rd restaurant.
“There’s less taxidermy, which I am okay with” observed the French sommelier, diplomatically. He moved over to the deerhead-studded Cazador after 12 years at The French Cafe and, along with various other staff members, joined the owners on a research trip to Mexico last year, which shows up in the food here at San Ray. Previously the whole team went to Spain on a sherry-drinking mission and you wonder how much better life in hospitality can get – a restaurant job where your employers are people who value you and your choice to devote yourself to this industry; who see culinary travel not as something they’ll do when the kids grow up and the restaurant is taking care of itself, but as a crucial part of professional development and job satisfaction.
Freed from the boundaries of Middle Eastern game cuisine, Dariush’s cooking has become even more distinctive. I think I could pick one of his dishes out of a blind lineup now, and there aren’t many Auckland chefs (and certainly not at this price point) you could say that about. His food is deeply savoury, with Mediterranean but now also North American influences. He’ll do whatever it takes to add one extra interesting layer of flavour – even the creme fraiche that comes with the potato chips has a little fino sherry whipped into it. Those chips are kettle-cooked out the back using a trial-and-error technique they’ve recently perfected. Why not just open a bag of crisps from the supermarket? Because once you’ve eaten them warm from the fryer it’s difficult to go back.
You’ll find Wapiti venison on the menu – a bright, lightly gamey meat fed on Fiordland’s native forest floor. It’s chopped with some classic tartare ingredients here and served with shaved Comte “because I love Comte and I finally found a place I could use it”, reports the chef. Tuna crudo is next level - while other restaurants focus on making it even more indulgent with creams and sorbets here the kitchen are loading up on savoury, with a coriander-based leche de tegre, makrut lime oil and a sprinkle of fried shallots that puts the dish somewhere between Mexico and Southeast Asia.
We saved the grilled meats and fish for another visit and doubled down on the vegetable dishes. Instead of waiting out the lean winter months, scanning the market for the first green signs of spring, Dariush makes you feel as though you’ve lucked into the best season of them all. Carrots, cabbage, beetroot and mushrooms are treated like stars on this menu, and I encourage you to go large on them.
Try the metal skewers of shiitake, portobello and button mushrooms cooked over fire with a little brush of duck fat but otherwise no seasoning required to turn them into plump, chewable protein gems. They’re served with more mushrooms, pureed with toasted cumin oloroso sherry, another favourite ingredient from the Cazador kitchen.
“I’m not sure if he wants this made public, but Dariush makes the mole with [redacted]” said our waiter, of the deeply spiced, only barely sweet sauce that comes with the roasted carrots.
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Advertise with NZME.“Here it is, the [redacted] mole” said Rebecca as she dropped it off. What were they thinking? They must have known they were talking to a reviewer who will shamelessly reprint anything somebody tells him over dinner. Unless they have friends in high places who will, I don’t know, go over my head and order NZME to redact this secret ingredient before publication I’m afraid the cat is out of the bag.
There are plenty more secrets on this menu and I look forward to returning and discovering them. In the meantime, the owners are enjoying bringing their unique flavour of neighbourhood hospitality to Auckland’s most famous city strip.
“The other day some American tourists asked about our art,” said Rebecca, pointing to a beautiful, bird’s-eye-view photograph of a swimming pool by Petra Leary on the north wall. “So I walked them out of the restaurant and down to a gallery and said ‘Look! You can buy one for yourself.’”
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