Restaurant Sasa

We had high expectations of this place based on the reviews as we both love this type of cuisine and eat it regularly in the UK. It's an odd restaurant - attached to the swimming pool area of a hotel and lacking much character. Busy though for a Thursday night so we were lucky to get a seat. None of the sakes on the tasting board really jumped out, and the waitress wasn't great at explaining them. We shared the pork gyozas, aubergine and tofu dish, spicy squid and salmon and avocado rolls. All of it tasted fine but none of it was memorable. The rolls were also made with super tough seaweed paper so it was really hard to bite through and they were too chewy. They have detailed gluten free menu though which is nice. At the end we were asked to tip which took us by surprise as our understanding in NZ is that you don't tip. We ended up paying something which I regret as the service was equally only fine.

Delicious food, excellent service and cheerful staff. It's a little bit noisy at times, but it was busy and not a big place so that's to be expected. While I'm neither vegan or gluten intolerant, I think the separate menus in an different colours is a great idea for people who are.