Reviews for The White House Restaurant

by Dion N.
23rd January 2011

This business is a MenuMania SponsorOne of the Business' Favourite Reviews

Excellent food, service, menu and wine selection, highly recommended! As a self appointed food critic with International hospo experience, I would rate this a 10/10.

Fantastic and I should also say beats Logan Brown in a heart beat!

by DenisDenis C.
15th May 2012

Mothers day lunch and for the mother it was a wonderful day so mission accomplished.

The service was good and they catered for our gluten free guest with ease

The food was tasty and presented well

What we did not like was being asked if we would like to start with a glass of bubbles and without choice, being served a $25 option

Might go back if the occasion arose and finances allowed

by Clark C.
25th April 2012

Amazing! Great food, great service, and great ambience!

Excellent restaurant for a special occasion. Also in the entertainment book but once you’ve dined, you don’t want to use the voucher, you want to pay the full price!

by Frank
15th February 2012

This was our third visit to The White House, but the first time trying their degustation menu.

What a treat!! Our absolute favourite course was the pork belly with ginger and lychee jelly!! YUM! They were all good, but the pork … mmmmmm We didn’t go for the wine match for all courses, but were able to sample for a couple.

Such a great night. Great food and service, topped with comfy seats and stunning views.

by Briony D.
3rd February 2012

My girlfriend and I just had the new set menu lunch on the balcony in the sun watching the Seven’s fans go by.
The location is great, close to the CBD, but right next to the golden sand beach on Oriental Bay, with plenty of parking. The food was fantastic – 3 choices per course, a choice of 2 courses for $35 or 3 courses for $50 (bargain). 5 star quality meals, exquisitely presented. I had the pork belly, followed by the snapper, then the amazing panacotta. My friend had the fish cakes, then the chicken breast, followed by french cheese. Great cocktails and coffee too. Lovely, attentive and knowledgeable staff. We highly recommend it!

by Sarah
30th January 2012

My partner and I took my little sister and her new husband who were in NZ on their honeymoon for dinner here the night before they left the country as I’d heard great things about The White House and wanted to give them a fine dining experience on their last night here…..

The food was nice but the portion sizes were too small… I don’t have a huge appetite and get embarrassed when I have left overs on my plate so I didn’t order an entree but I was still hungry after the amuse-bouche(very tasty though!), bread, main , cheese course ,dessert and coffee even at a fine dining restaurant I still expect to go away full, especially given the price of their mains and although the food was very nice it wasn’t amazing…. The service was ok, the staff were more attentive at the start of the evening making sure our glasses were filled etc but once the restaurant started to fill up the service went downhill.

I’ve been to a number of fine dining restaurant and unfortunately I’d rate the service at the White House at the bottom of these, the service was ok but around the level I’d expect at Lone Star or Speights Ale House. (We possibly also lucked out with the waiter we had because he seemed a bit grumpy some of the others in the dining room seemed quite good).

We ordered a bottle of wine around the time our mains came out but even though I attempted to eat slowly the bottle didn’t come out until we’d almost finished the mains.

Views for the two people facing the window were great but not for the two of us facing with our backs to the window, it’s a shame the orientation of the tables are that way. The set up of the table we were at was booth style so the waiters couldn’t properly serve one half of the table.

The coffee was possibly the worst I’ve ever had.

At the end of the evening we waited for quite a while assuming they’d bring us our bill, we then went up to the counter to pay and waited quite a while for someone to serve us.

Overall it was quite disappointing. The motto on their menu is “Unashamedly first class” I think they need a refresher course on what a first class experience is meant to be like, the bill at the end of the evening was first class but the experience was not.

by Caroline
31st December 2011

Great attentive service. View magnificent (although requested a window seat that only 1 of us could see out of!?!). Food was good. Flavour of Ravioli starter great, although pasta was hard as nails! Duck confit was melt in your mouth delicious, although duck breast a bit overdone. Venison sauce a bit too overpowering. Pumpkin side nice but too garlicky but salad good. Snow egg dessert a great novelty. Wine matches superb. Overall, a good night out but not as first class as they promote. Would go again though.

by Sean
16th August 2011

Superb food, great wine list and very attentive staff. What more could you ask for?

by AJ B.
7th August 2011

I have to say the White House has been one of the restaurants in Wellington that I have always wanted to go to, and going during Wellington on a Plate gave me the perfect excuse to go with some friends. My mates have been before and assured me that I was in for a treat. I found the waitresses to be pretty inattentive, we were left waiting for ages so we could order and bizarrely when they came to top up one of our waters, they only partially filled the glass and didn’t bother topping up anyone elses drink! The food was nice, which surprised me. I was expecting fantastic, amazing, but it was OK. Value for money? I didn’t think so. When it came time to pay, they got what we had wrong and we had to wait quite a while before being able to pay. Overall, really really disappointing. Whether we were there for Welly on a Plate or there for anything of the standard menu, the service for somewhere like this should have been first class, and it wasn’t.

by Amelia D.
20th July 2011

I’ve been here four times now, and I love the consistency of the food and just really good flavours that don’t wreck any of the ingredients. The only negative is the dessert menu. Two or three years ago it was peeerrrrfect – however I’d love to see the amazing hokey-pokey ice cream back on, and the chocolate selections. I’m not sure if they’re back on yet, but please please bring them back if not I did have an amazing chocolate cake recently where the hot chocolate sauce was brought out and poured on top of the cake – and it melted through the middle – bliss!

by Selective
19th February 2011

Enjoyed a lovely dinner with my husband here. Window seat was a lovely bonus to the night. Service was attentive and our entrees and mains were stunning.

My dessert was not fully cooked, staff handled it well in apologising and having the kitchen rectifying it but must stay but the time it came back out my partner had finished his dessert and I then had to eat on my own.

Good wine selection.

by Andre
20th October 2010

For a long, long time this has been our most favourite restaurant in Wellington. Food is very innovative, service impeccable. The location is good as well. We will be frequenting this highly regarded establishment.

by dc900
2nd August 2010

The White House Restaurant I have been for the best high-end restaurant. Pork crispy but not greasy, taste fresh and delicious lamb chops, chocolate desserts new style, taste slippery. Delicious food coupled with unbeatable sea views, romantic candle light in a glass of red wine, enough hard to forget. Highly recommended

by Therese F.
6th June 2010

In one word – DEVINE!!!!! The best food I have ever tasted in a fine dining restaurant. Had the crab ravioli, pork belly entrees; venison main and the variation on chocolate and creme brulee. Coffees to finish were great as well. Waiter was awesome – attentive but not obtrusive and a friendly guy as well!!

by j w.
10th December 2009

How disappointing, we were return diners thinking we would enjoy guaranteed quality cuisine by dining here. But alas, it was dreadful. The ravioli entree was much better suited as a desert, the whitebait entree tasteless. My duck had surrounding embellishment that simply killed it, a far too sweet juice, very inappropriate. The salmon main OK but the vegetables bland. Suffice to say we didn’t stay for deserts, an experience not to be repeated.

by Nick
20th November 2009

On Tuesday night this week I took my lovely lady out (for her birthday) to what can only be described as one of the great jewels in the crown of Wellington – having been to many restaurants of this calibre in New Zealand you expect great things, and this was no exception!

When a restaurant is able to provide an experience of this standard with the most amazing food and wine to match, with wait staff who just appear when you need them it deserves singing from the roof tops. I don’t write reviews, I’m like most kiwi’s who tend to only speak up when things don’t go well… for The White House though even I am willing to make an exception because you should enjoy it liek we did.

by pcam
22nd August 2009

We dined at The White House recently on a thursday night. The food was absolutely delicious. But we felt the whole experience was seriously let down by our waitress. The evening we were there there were two waiting staff on duty. The guy was everything you would expect in top restaurants like this: professional and friendly service but slightly aloof, so we did’t notice him too much. But the woman working there was terrible. Every time she come to our table (to take our orders, bring food or drinks, clear plates, check if everything was ok) she would start by saying “my apologies”. It was really annoying. She also blanked out when trying to remember what the evening’s specials were. And we overheard her making some very embarrassing comments to the couple next to us who were from Luxembourg. (“where is luxembourg? In Europe? Oh – Europe is such a beautiful country”). She wouldn’t be too out of place at your more average NZ restaurant. But she was too provincial for a top restaurant. And it was enough to put me off going back there again.

by Michael H.
27th June 2009

We had an amazing experience. Service was very attentive – we let them know about my wife being pregnant and they catered the meals to her needs and provided a fruit cocktail on arrival. The staff were extremely knowledgable (the waiter had been a chef for nine years before moving to White House).

Apart from the service the entrees were probably the best part, but we loved every course all the same. Will defintely be going again when we can.

by Sashan
13th April 2009

My husband and I dined at the White House recently, it was a Saturday night.

We had been told to book a table by “a window” which we did. When we arrived, the waitress attempted to seat us at a table in the middle of the room. We explained that we had been promised “a window table”, so they asked us to take a seat in the foyer while they prepared a table for us.

Half an hour after arriving, we were eventually seated.

The dining experience was below average. The waiter seemed anxious, and the reason became evident after we finished our entree. Shortly after the plates were removed, the waiter approached us and explained that we needed to order our main as “the kitchen was closing”. The time was 9:15pm!!! and were in no mood to shovel down more food.

Reluctantly, we ordered our main which arrived within ten minutes. The steak my husband was served, at 42 dollars, was the worst steak either of us have ever tasted. It was ordered medium rare, and was served over cooked on the outside and bleeding in the middle. It had all the hallmarks of a steak fresh out of the freezer and cooked too quickly. It had no taste and the plate looked disgusting once it was cut open.

The problem was explained to the waiter, and he said they wouldn’t charge us for it. No offer was made to redo the steak or offer an alternative, so my husband left hungry!!!

The restaurant was rated as one of NZ’s best, and that is a bad joke. We don’t know who decides those ratings, but from our experience.. it was not deserved. They are far from NZ’s best, they are typical of a second rate Wellington restaurant.

by Toni Wilson
3rd October 2008

i loved this place. i went here for my dads birthday and the food was great (perfect sized portions and flavours) and the staff were very friendly and patient. the place is very expensive but its worth it.

Write Review