Herald rating: * * * 1/2
Address: 1 Solent St, Mechanics Bay
Phone: (09) 309 9514
Web: www.mikano.co.nz
Open: Sun-Fri lunch and dinner, Sat dinner
Cuisine: International, seafood
From the menu: Veal, ricotta, spinach tortellini with wild mushroom sauce, parmesan $18.50; Scampi grilled with garlic parsley butter, watercress and lemon $45; Peanut butter and jelly sandwich: peanut parfait, cocoa wafers, strawberry jelly $15
Vegetarian: Own, serious menu
Wine: Serious, light on glass choices
KEY POINTS:
Cheema, Craft, Pompino, Habanero, C'est Fromage, Couleur and more. Noticed how many food places have closed the doors lately?
The average life of a new eatery in Auckland is said to be 16 months. Some respect, please, for the few like Mikano, now a stroppy teen of 14, and where the head chef - John Flack - has been in the kitchen for a decade.
Not that Mikano always had pretensions to fine dining. Jude remembers a long-ago family occasion when the claim to flame was pizza.
Today's menu is what was called Pacific Rim. Now it is "international". To which add "tending towards seafood". Good idea at one of the few restaurants on "our" waterfront.
We arrived early enough to bag a window table for a grandstand view of the container wharf. Nice to see that Ports of Auckland has put up another red fence, possibly longer and more grotesque than last century's Quay St barrier.
Happily, that's off to one side. We overlooked the helipad and lapping waters and breakwaters and gulls to Rangitoto. Among the fast-ferries and seabuses and container hulks, possibly the last one-man fishing boat in Auckland chugged to port. "I'm having fish tonight," I declared, feeling the call of the running tide.
First, "Freshly baked bread from Il Forno", the Ponsonby bakery. It was warm, but possibly not freshly baked. Certainly a high-profile restaurant should not have laid a chipped plate.
Jude tucked into the evening's special entree, a decent rendition of the Kiwi whitebait fritter. Bread-and-butter plate (oops) size, and thick. Packed with the little blighters and a dense, lemony hollandaise. The right fishy smell and strong taste.
My "rare roasted" ostrich was, rightly, almost blue. Which would have been more digestible if the slices had been a tad, or even two tads, thinner.
The beetroot and goats' cheese tart had a decent pastry and tang. Then my snapper, crumbed and lemoned. Over, around, and underneath the fish, a healthy - or to the cholesterolly challenged, unhealthy - dollop of lemon butter, close cousin of Jude's recent trip to hollandaise.
Beside the seaside, one hopes the fish will be fresh. As Jude pointed out: "Fish doesn't smell fishy when it's fresh. It gets that way after a day or so." We should excuse previous company - the whitebait - from that comment, but she was right, something smelled very fishy.
Jude's main sounded Italian: "pan-fried veal scallopine with prosciutto, ricotta gnocchi, roast cherry tomatoes, basil and garlic crumbs". She gave it away after a few mouthfuls. Too much tomato flavour knocking out delicate meat. The only word for the gnocchi is the one Italians use for "gluggy".
The restaurant filled. Mostly older. Mostly well-heeled.
Our 45-minute wait for dessert didn't help my chocolate pistachio torte, for it was as dry as the bread had been. The roasted peach was excellent. Jude applauded her cinnamon-flavoured brulee, with suitably tart notes of spiced apple and a green apple sorbet.
There's a reasonable wine list, in the upper reaches of pricing, but it could do with more "by the glass" opportunities.
Someone should write - I might do it myself - to Gordon Ramsay and suggest he shoots an episode at Mikano. There's a good restaurant in here, trying to get out.
Our meals betrayed a dated style. Heavy on the sauce. Over-elaborate. Bland flavours.
Staff training leaves some things to be desired: knowledge of the menu beyond repeating the specials, any understanding of wine, interested - not intrusive - service. Personality.
If I go down to the sea again, to the lovely sea and the sky ... all I'd ask is that Mikano tweaks its act.
