More food porn

I have been accused on a number of occasions, unfairly of course, to be inordinately interested in food and wine, and in particular the consumption thereof. For the record, I would like to correct the inaccurate nature of this perception and point out that my ongoing research is solely in the interests of disseminating good advice to friends and clients alike. In an earlier life I'm quite sure I was the guy who tested the monarch's food for poison. I regard what I do now in a similar vein, albeit slightly less hazardous.

That settled, I'd like to relate a very recent experience which will be filed in my top drawer of dining experiences.

I have eaten at Meredith's in Auckland on three previous occasions and have had wonderful experiences each time, so naturally expectations were high but I had a slight nagging feeling that I was setting myself up for disappointment. That was allayed almost immediately by the warmth of the welcome and the swift appearance of the champagne I seemed to have inadvertently ordered instead of saying hello to the waitress. The restaurant, although small and with no outlook, is a very pleasant place to be with subdued decor, lighting and music and happily plush carpeting which seems to keep noise at the right level.

Our waitress was friendly without any fawning and was extremely well-informed on both the wine list and the menu. The menu is reasonably short but has a very good range of seasonal flavours, but its length served to leave both my wife and me in the happy position of wanting to order every single dish, they sounded so good. After a couple of questions, our waitress was able to steer us both in what turned out to be the correct direction. She picked my wife would enjoy subtle flavour combinations whilst she had me pegged in an instant as a sybarite and glutton. Suffice to say, the smoked eel with scallops and jamon, and the quail with peanut, enoki and paua were inspired starters and I again began to worry, how could the mains live up to such a great entree (By the way if you have the chance to taste New Zealand smoked eel, take it immediately, I think it should be established a national flagbearer dish).

Happily, if anything, the mains were another step up. I had the sous vide beef with oxtail ravioli, chlorophyll and snails , my wife the chicken breast with crayfish tail. I won't prattle on save to say that both were extraordinary dishes in their balance, depth of flavour, contrast of textures and sheer cooking expertise. But follow my advice, don't try these at home. My real measure of a restaurant, as a keen cook myself, is to have confirmed that I wouldn't have a hope of replicating what I have just been served. Meredith's is firmly in that category. Also, as a wine loser of some pretension, I have been known to try to show up the sommelier or waiter with my superior knowledge. Out of luck Palmer; I was steered in directions outside my experience and the score eneded up something like Meredith's ten, Palmer nil.

As far as my limited means permit, I am gradually trying to work my way through experiencing as many of Restaurant Magazine's Top 50 Restaurants of the World as I can manage. Whilst Meredith's does not (yet) feature on this list, take my word, it belongs there. Fabulous.