It was full on Thursday 7pm. We had to sit outside first. But the service was so good we actually felt happier to wait. The waiter was so patient with us to pick the right wine(sorry being picky). Food is sooo good that I would like to try all other dishes next time. After we finished our glass we ordered another bottle of Italian wine. This place made me fall in love with Italian wine!
Given how often it’s named as one of Auckland’s top Italian restaurants, I was very excited to try out Baduzzi for myself. I adore the super classy, old-school vibes of this restaurant- made me feel like I’d been transported to Europe! We started our meal with piadina (flat bread) topped with stracciatella, eggplant and candied walnuts. I’m not normally a fan of smoky flavours but I can’t deny that the smokiness of the eggplant came together delightfully with the creaminess of the stracciatella & sweet crunch of walnut. 8/10 Baduzzi is known for their polpette (or Italian meatballs, for us uncultured souls), so was very thankful they did a vegetarian version. These ones were made with summer vegetables and cows ricotta. The balls were packed with flavour and simply melted in your mouth. Was thankful for the chunky tomato sauce on top as without they might have been a little dry. 8/10 For my main I ordered the saffron and potato tortellini with goats curd, brown butter, almonds and fig confit. It came out beautifully presented as four perfect pieces of tortellini. The modest serving size may have disappointed me if I wasn’t already full of entrees. This flavour combination is normally a winner for me, however, I surprisingly found the goats curd filling a little too rich, especially with the intense sweetness of the fig confit. It was still a well-executed dish however the flavours just didn’t quite do it for me. 7/10 Being at an Italian restaurant we had to order Tiramisu for dessert. It came out in a rather untraditional yet aesthetic wafer cylinder, filled with a lot of mascarpone and topped with hard biscuit chunks and a moist cakey layer infused with Baileys & amaretto. Each element of the plate had a strong texture and taste, however it was difficult to get all the different elements into one bite it didn’t blend very seamlessly together like in a traditional Tiramisu 7/10 Definitely willing to give @baduzzi another go in the future and try some more menu items as I can see the standard of food here is evidently very high, just didn’t pick all the right menu items this time around!
High expectations, so excited to eat here. We weren’t disappointed.....the food & wait staff were amazing, I woke up this morning still thinking about the tortellini 🥰. What ruined our night was the head chef. Our table was right next to the glass window which gave us a primo behind the scenes look into a working kitchen. Shockingly we witnessed work place bullying at its best.....a 6foot man constantly berating a 5foot-nothing pastry chef & reducing her to tears at least 3 times. Try enjoying your meal while watching that! Our birthday celebration was reduced to silence. The manager personally apologised to our table but we won’t be back. #unprofessional #peoplefirst