mister d dining

the highlight of last weekends visit to napier was finding this establishment.discovered it friday afternoon for a glass of wine and bar snacks,so impressed we enjoyed another 3 visits!
breakfast 2 days running,dinner and morning tea with local guests.their daughter loved the sugar donut experience.
fabulous and well priced menu promoting local foods and wines.exceptional service from the many staff who are helpful,courteous and and professional.
chefs have stamped their personal touch on the dishes includinggreatdesserts.
just wish you had opened in auckland......pb + sb

we visited mister ds on a busy sunday with our 9 month old. the staff were really friendly and accommodating, finding us a table and highchair.
the food was good, but unfortunately it took over an hour to come out - it would have beengreatif the staff had let us know the wait time on food, there was no communication on this at all.

wow what a find on our last night in napier! got here on there second night of opening,greatservice, friendly staff, food even better andgreatbeer to match, value also outstanding. highly recommended by a seasoned diner and traveller, thanks for agreatnight out!

eagerly awaited the opening of this trendy new all-day dining spot in napier...
took mum and dad for an impromptu mother's day lunch and prue warmly welcomed us at the door and led us to a spare table, despite a blackboard stating "20 minute wait"...greatbuzz in the room, wait staff efficient and slick open kitchen... loved the table settings, complimentary bread and olive oil. mr d house white (chardonnay) was delicious and the stoke beer on tap was refreshing.
ordered the braised duck risotto, pulled pork with white polenta and spaghetti with clams and pesto. a real taste treat! mister d is full of personality and we look forward to our next dining experience... well done!

let’s start by saying these guys have the best donuts i tried so far to this date, it’s just a masterpiece on its own, perfect size, perfect texture and flavour, even without the syringe that accompanies it i bet you this will be the best donuts you will ever try in your life. where we visited napier several weeks back i was looking forgreatrestaurants and i discovered this place. looking at online reviews people are raving about the donuts they sell. at first, i was sceptical as i had tried a reallygreatone and i swore it was the best i tried then this happened. though i tried al’s delis donuts at room temperature, with mr d’s i tried a freshly cooked one, still hot of the kitchen so it’s quite hard to compare both, like comparing apples and oranges. will als’ delis doughnut be good when it’s hot or will mister d’s doughnut will be good when it’s cold, i haven’t tried but what i know they are good as they are served.

we came by for a lateish lunch after a few drinks. the menu looked very interesting and it was open from the morning. it wasn't busy so we were able to get a table easily. they also do takeaways, which one of our friends did with the doughnuts. the decor around the place was quite interesting with bits of art and other interesting items, like a skull with the bottles of wine.
we grabbed a few things to share to start and then a main each. i am a sucker for octopus and i enjoyed their rendition with the tender octopus, potatoes and creamy sauce. the fried bread was quite interesting as it was literally a bowl of fried bread. i had the bone marrow raviloi and that was delicious. the beefy broth gave the entire thing agreatflavour. my friend had the souffle and that was also quite delicious. i thought that the smoked fish cake bene was a bit on the smoky side but it was still tasty.
of course, we tried their fresh made doughnuts afterwards, all generously coated in sugar. the only difference between them is the different flavours that you inject in. i had the coconut and lime one and thought it was a bot too heavy on the kaffir lime since that dominated the flavour. the manuka honey one was good if you like honey since that was the dominant flavour. the baked sugar was also quite nice since the vanilla in the cream and custard was really nice, which went well with the crispy flaky pastry.
there was a wrong drinks order (coke instead of coconut water) but it was an easy fix. the toilets are located outside the building past the kitchen. if you were lucky you could watch them make the doughnuts on the counter.
it was on the pricier end but i really enjoyed the dining experience here with the delicious food and nice staff.

visited mister d's twice during our stay in napier. the first time for dinner, and my friend and i were so pleased with the food and service that we returned for breakfast the following day.greatinterior, and equally as nice courtyard for a warm day.

the food is good but service unfortunately terrible! we ordered our dishes at 8.30pm and we needed to wait until 9.40pm to get our food. i am aware this sometimes happens on busy nights but what makes the distinction between a good and bad restaurant, is that someone comes to see you to inform. at mister d, no one came to see us to inform the food was going to be late, no apologies, no complementary drink/coffee. although the food and taste aregreatthere is still a bit of work for the owner i would say!

i came here for breakfast as the hotel dining didn't appeal.  it was a very good call!  a welcoming atmosphere; interesting food choices andgreatcoffee!  it was so good i returned for lunch.

delicious food,greatvalue, nice ambience.
the duck risotto was great.  

we had the salmon sashimi salad entree and it was probably enough to feed two people by itself.  we were so very impressed with the freshness, flavours and size of this dish.

the portion sizes are very generous - something that you don't often see in upmarket restaurants anymore.  

the ambience is very nice - upmarket without being pretentious.  great place for dates and family dinners alike.

the maitre-d was very friendly.
overall, a very enjoyable experience.  a gem in napier.

consistentlygreatfood here, service is mostly good. favorite dish... duck risotto! very highly recommended. pulled pork also great. tried the paua and pork sausage today which was outstanding.

we just had the most deplorable restaurant experience any of us have had at mr. ds. it pains me to say as it could have been agreatexperience and so many others have obviously enjoyed their experiences here. but we left this restaurant with the worst tastes in our mouths, both literally and figuratively.

a group of 11 of us, which included 4 children and 1 infant, made reservations for lunch at 12:30 on a mildly busy saturday. we ordered straight away, some mains, a few entrees, some starters for the kids to share, including bread, and some coffees and bloody mary's for the adults. when the coffee and bloody mary's didn't arrive until 1:15, we were already 3 inquires deep into repeatedly asking "how is the food tracking for the kids". after being assured each time "the bread is being plated now" we proceeded to watch table after table receive their bread, their meals, their desserts, and in some cases even leaving after having arrived later than us.

the bread finally arrived for the kids at 1:45, with nothing more than a sorry and no further explanation. the 7 year old in our group, who was miserable with hunger along with all the rest, put it most appropriately when she then said "it took this long just to get the bread?"

the entrees and starters arrived shortly before 2:00. the mains and the kids donuts around 2:15, at which point we had already settled the bill, with a pathetic offer of reimbursing us for our donuts for the troubles. yet still after many direct inquiries, there was no explanation given for the catastrophic delays.

we finally left after 2:30, having to take our donuts as takeaway since everyone's day had now been disrupted by the laboriously overlong ordeal.

when inquiring one last time upon leaving about what went wrong in the kitchen, we were told "i'm sorry, we didn't realize you were in a hurry". we weren't in a hurry until we realized we were going to spend all afternoon against our will in this place.

if a restaurant believes that waiting over an hour for bread, and nearly 2 hours for mains is "normal pace" then they don't deserve our or anyone else's service, and they need to take a good long look at their service and training.

mr ds for us stands for mr delays. save yourself a few hours and a lifetime of frustration, and some money (the bill was still over $400 with our measly donut discount) and go to bistronomy around the corner.

nice place with agreatatmosphere.  staff were chatty and helpful.

had afternoon tea of a hot drink and donut.  drink was good, but i don't see the fuss about the donut.  pretty tough and flvourless, the small amount of flavouring in the syringe wasn't enough to take away from it being just a hunk of dough.  was expecting better for the cost of them.

great breakfasts! the cheesy eggs are to die for! we can't wait to return for lunch/dinner on our next trip to napier.

the staff are friendly and accommodating.
the interior is beautifully decorated, with large pieces of art and guitars in the walls.

my only suggestion would be that they continue to serve breakfast past 11am. it would make agreatbrunch spot - i'd love to pair their cheesy eggs with a mimosa or three!

we had our breakfast here. the restaurant was very spacious and the atmosphere was very relaxed.

we ordered cheesey cheese (porch eggs bake with spinach and full of cheese), cinnamon doughnut with bacon, toast and jam.
i love the cheesey cheese so much!
coffee wasgreattoo.

please book for dinner and take note that they don't open every weekday.