Renkon is one of the first Japanese restaurants in New Zealand to introduce donburi (short-grained “pearl” rice topped with a choice of meat or fish and vegetables). The eatery takes special care in the choice of ingredients and ensures that they are of a high quality and cooked to perfection.
Renkon sells yummy Japanese donburi
The result is a tasty and yummy dish of donburi – and is one of the best ones in Auckland.
Good Food Selection
The menu at this eatery consists of a selection of either rice or udon and the type of topping that you want. The choices that you can have are chicken, salmon or tofu, cooked in either the teriyaki, katsu, curry or tempura styles.
There are also side dishes that you can order, such as Japanese agedashi tofu, lotus root chips and katsu chicken.
I selected the teriyaki chicken with rice. My eating companion had teriyaki salmon, with udon noodles. We also had an agedashi tofu and some lotus root chips as a side dish to share.
Teriyaki Chicken With Rice
Teriyaki Chicken with Rice
I absolutely loved this dish. I thought that the restaurant was really generous with the teriyaki sauce, which made the dish so tasty.
The chicken was soft and moist and full of flavour. It was so good that I literally found myself lapping up every morsel of the meat with complete relish.
I loved the rice, which absorbed the yummy flavour of the teriyaki sauce really well. It was tasty and I thoroughly enjoyed eating it together with the chicken.
The amount of vegetables given was also very generous and included carrots, lettuce and broccoli, which added a really delicious crunch to this tasty meal.
Teriyaki Salmon With Udon
Teriyaki Salmon with Udon.
This dish seemed to be quite similar to mine, in terms of the flavour of the teriyaki sauce.
According to my companion, the salmon was absolutely delicious. The meat wasn’t fishy at all and no bones were detected in the salmon – another plus point for this eatery.
My companion enjoyed the udon noodles. According to her, they were soft and moist and went very well with the teriyaki sauce. However, she did remark that the noodles didn’t soak up the flavour as well as the rice would have. But she still enjoyed it.
Agedashi Tofu
Agedashi Tofu.
This item was probably one of the better agedashi tofu dishes that I have eaten. It was served with plenty of soya-based sauce and the tofu was crunchy on the outside, but soft and piping hot on the inside. In fact, the dish tasted so good that I found myself eating more than my fair share.
However, the tofu batter was a little bit thick for my liking.
Renkon Chips
Renkon Chips
These were lotus roots cut into rings and deep-fried.
I thought they were really delicious. When I bit into one, it reminded me a little of potato crisps – they were slightly crispy on the outside and hot and moist on the inside. However, it was perhaps a little bit on the thick side. But it was nevertheless a healthy substitute for the usual potato chips.
Overall Impressions
As a whole, this was definitely one of the better Japanese restaurants in NZ that I have eaten at. I would definitely return, possibly to order their other donburi versions, such as the tempura or the katsu dishes.
Main dishes cost NZ$12 each.
Renkon
211 Parnell Road
Parnell, Auckland City
Auckland 1052
New Zealand
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