Phone: (09) 974 2895
Cuisine: Vietnamese tapas
From the menu: Goi cuon (rice paper rolls, $12); nom du du xanh (green papaya salad, $14); bun cha (barbecue pork belly and pork mince, $15), ngo nuong (barbecue corn $8); tom nuong (barbecue prawns $10); bo cuon la cai (barbecue steak, $16); nem ran (deep-fried spring rolls, $8)
Drinks: Fully licensed
Rating: 6.5/10
It seemed to take forever to tart up Fort St but the painful roadworks are long gone. In their place is a pedestrian-friendly destination ideal for street-side dining which brings a sense of urban cool to an area once better known for its less than salubrious residents.
The massage parlours and backpackers that have inhabited it for decades are still there, but the Fort St of 2015 is vastly different from the 2005 incarnation, and these now sit comfortably alongside a growing enclave of restaurants, spearheaded by the excellent Ima Cuisine.
The street's latest resident is Indochine Kitchen, which sits almost on the corner of Fort and Gore, and offers authentic Vietnamese tapas and an interesting drinks menu.
We visit during the first week back after the holiday break but the city remains deserted. It's a little hard to imagine Fort St as the vibrant inner-city precinct our city's masters have decreed it to be but we're sure that when the year starts cranking up again the area will be full of life.
The exterior of the block Indochine Kitchen sits in is not particularly interesting, so the restaurant's owners have stamped their identity on the inside, with a huge mural of a Vietnamese woman smoking on one wall, and black and white photographs of street scenes and landscapes on another. Behind the counter an exposed brick wall opens up to reveal the kitchen, and a gaggle of bulbs dangle from wire netting above.
At 7pm the sun is still beating down so we perch at one of the tall outside tables under an umbrella.
Here the drinks menu comes into its own - the reasonably priced cocktails ($12-$16) come in short tumblers and are delicious. We try the Hanoi Twist ($12) - Belvedere Vodka, fresh apple juice, ginger, lime and mint - just the thing to ease us into the first week back of the working year, as is the non-alcoholic Indochine Juice cocktail ($6) - fresh apple, ginger, orange, pineapple and lime juice, topped with soda and fresh mint.
On tap are Leigh Sawmill Brewery's Pilsner and Pale Ale ($9).
The restaurant's dinner tapas - actually a Spanish term for small, shared dishes - rely almost entirely on the Asian street food-style of cooking on a charcoal barbecue. The thought of that smokey flavour combined with fresh ingredients and traditional Vietnamese sauces makes our mouths water in anticipation.
We start, though, with fresh prawn and pork rice paper rolls - you can tell the calibre of a Vietnamese restaurant by the quality of these menu staples, and Indochine Kitchen delivers.
We're off to a good start, which is slightly marred by having to ask for plates. Being served food on boards is all well and good, but you still need your own plate or bowl to catch any drips, shed the shells or split the salad.
The dishes arrive at a reasonable pace from then on: peppery succulent king prawns spread in half which we're not quite sure how to eat and end up digging out with our fingers; individual dishes of bun cha - pork belly and mince served as a patty on a bed of vermicelli noodles, fresh herbs and a flavoursome broth; an excellent green papaya salad with prawns; deep-fried spring rolls which are as successful as the fresh ones; and bo cuon la cai - little parcels of tender sirloin steak and herbs wrapped in lettuce with sticks of pineapple tucked inside - an interesting contrast of sweetness to the smokey beef.
Our favourite though, hands down, is the simplest dish on the table - thin strips of sweet barbecued corn, served with salt. Yum.
Everything is beautifully presented and all the flavours that should be there are abundant - coriander, lime, fish sauce, garlic, lemongrass, mint, and everything has plenty of chilli.
The prices of most items seem a little on the high side. Three prawns for $12? Ouch. One piece of corn (split into four) for $8? Steep, even for central Auckland.
Prices aside, Indochine Kitchen's few teething problems seem surmountable, except for the rather alarming toilets shared with the rest of the block. The wait staff seem a tad inexperienced but are very attentive, and it would be great to be given the option to tailor your serving size to the number of diners (ie, an extra spring roll or skewer so everyone gets a decent taste).
Overall we're happy to see Auckland's inner-city rejuvenation continue, and we're pleased to have another solid option for after-work drinks and snacks.
