Eating in New Zealand

On a lazy Sunday morning, me and my friend decided to take our lunch to the streets of Newmarket. Now there are two streets filled with food, one is Khyber pass (and the adjacent food block of Italian, Japanese and other eateries) and the other is Nuffield street. And its the latter that we decided to visit upon today, at Olive Cafe.

We started off with a Mocha for myself and Espresso for my friend. While I didn’t take a photo, the fern motif on my friend’s espresso told me that the coffee here is made with passion and should be alright. I was pleasantly surprised by the aroma and boldness of the coffee within my mocha - though it’s not as sweet as how I like my mocha’s, the blend of the coffee beans they used (they roast their own beans apparently!) and the care they took to make the coffee makes this a treat I’ll be reserving for myself sometime in the future!

I opted for a light meal (and in anticipation of my friend not being able to finish her burger) and got myself the soup of the day, which happened to be spinach and Brie. The first few sips were great; the spinach cream and the smoky overtone of brie made it an ideal soup to go with the bread, which was crispy after being lightly toasted. However as my palate adjusts to the flavor, what was once great soup has now evolved into a less-appealing creature; it wasn’t what a few sips of water and coffee couldn’t resolve though. A solid soup.

My friend, being her first week in New Zealand, wanted something that showcased what New Zealand has to offer - so I suggested the steak sandwich, figuring that the beef in New Zealand is pretty decent. Since there were better places to try fish and chips, this was in my opinion the next best thing to try.

And it wasn’t too disappointing at all! As you can see from the close-up photo above, the steak pattie is moist, the bacon crispy, and the cheese, beetroot and half cherry tomato sitting nicely on top of everything. It tasted almost as good as it looked, except that the bacon was a tad too crispy and the toasted foccacia slightly chewy (or stale), having to rip a little with each bite. Not entirely certain whether the chips were hand-cut or not, but at least they fried the chips with fresh oil.

Overall a good venue to hangout in Newmarket for those after a good coffee and a meal for around $20 per person.

Appendix menu

Steak Sandwich char-grilled 120g sirloin steak, vine ripened tomatoes,
caramelised onion and aioli served open on toasted focaccia with hand-cut chips

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