“For relaxing times, make it Suntory time.” – Bob Harris
We love Kappa. I haven’t been to many other Japanese restaurants in Queenstown, but that’s because the Kiwi says he won’t take me anywhere else. We’ve been there probably more often that we should since I arrived here, but it’s an excellent meal. The Kiwi has been eating there for ages – he knows the staff and the owner pretty well, so it’s familiar and comfortable and reliably fantastic. So when we want a night out, we often go to Kappa.
At the Gibbston Wine & Food festival the other week, we spent most of our afternoon with the owner of Kappa, along with his waitstaff, some wine makers, and another restaurant owner (who happens to be next door to Kappa). There’s something about socializing with foodies outside of the restaurant that changes the dynamic and creates a certainly “friendliness” that hadn’t existed previously. It’s really nice for me especially, since I don’t really know that many people and I am fairly anonymous around town. Anonymity is good when you’re a trouble-maker, but I’m pretty well behaved around here. I could use some familiar faces.
We had dinner at Kappa the other night, after the Kiwi’s haircut in town. (If you’re going to go through the hassle of driving into the CBD and parking the car, might as well make it worthwhile.) It was nice to catch up with the staff and laugh about how much wine we drank that afternoon. Most of us went on a detox afterwards – a few days of no booze is good for the body after a day like that – but it didn’t last long. Before we even sat down, the owner was offering us a glass of wine. We accepted, but only if he drank some with us. And he did! (He likes to partake while he’s sushi-ing, and while I wouldn’t trust myself with a knife that big, he’s a pro.)
He’s also incredibly generous with his food. He gave us a pre-dinner plate, of seared wagyu beef with radish and micro-greens.
We hadn’t ordered yet, but he started preparing that for us, and DANG it was good. The beef was extraordinarily tender and tasty, and the radish gave a bit of crunch to the dish. I happen to love that charred flavor, too, so the searing with a blowtorch was pretty special. Another benefit of sitting at the sushi bar!
One of our favorite plates at Kappa is the sashimi platter. He usually chooses 3 fish that are fresh and in season, but for us he presented 5:
From left to right, that’s scallop, blue fin tuna, salmon, bigeye tuna, and blue cod. There are no words to describe how fresh and bright the fish are – and we certainly didn’t expect an expanded selection. Each piece may only be one bite, but we talked about each one for about 7 minutes after eating it.
We try to order soft shell crab when he has it. He makes a gorgeous sushi roll with it, and it’s something to savor:
I have no words.
We got so excited about our food that we forgot to take pictures of our other dishes: Bluff oysters (coming into season now!!), venison carpaccio, and blue cod tempura. We never leave Kappa hungry, that’s for sure, and we always enjoy every bite. We bought our chef/owner/friend some sake as a thank you, which he thoroughly appreciated and drank with relish as we left.
I just hope he didn’t cut off a finger at any point with that monster knife.