Adventure West

Here's the thing about WestSide after dark. Everyone knows lunch. The whole strip runs on it... the sandwiches at Dax, the rolls at John's, the queue up the street for chicken and chips. But dinner is a different animal. Dinner is when the four blocks west of the railway quietly become one of the most exciting places to eat in the whole of Hawke's Bay, and most people don't even know it.

Eight dinner kitchens. Vietnamese and Thai. Two kinds of Indian. Malaysian, Indonesian and Chinese. A fish and chip shop that also does paua. All within a few minutes' walk of each other, most of them run by the people who grew up eating this food in the country it came from. That's not a food court. That's a passport.

And here's the honest truth we're going to keep coming back to. Most of us order the same three things. The pad thai. The butter chicken. The sweet and sour pork. Safe. Delicious. Familiar. Nothing wrong with it. But every one of these kitchens has a dish or two that the owner actually wants you to try... the thing they cook for their own family, the thing that tastes like home to them and like a revelation to you. This guide is a nudge toward those.

Set your mood, your spice tolerance, and how adventurous you're feeling. It'll tell you exactly where to go and what to order, with a plain-English line on what the dish actually is so nothing feels scary. But first... let's walk the strip.

Start here, because VietThai is where the whole idea of this guide comes to life. It's a Vietnamese and Thai kitchen just off the strip on King Street North, run by chefs who cook both traditions the way they were taught at home. Click and collect, dine in, whatever suits. Closed Tuesdays.

The regulars. The pho is the gateway and it's a good one... flat rice noodles in a beef bone broth simmered long and slow, meatballs and rare beef, the herbs and sprouts on the side to build it your way. The spring rolls, the chicken satay, the pad thai. All the comfortable classics, all done properly.

The hero. Now the one they actually want you to try. The Bun Bo Hue, listed as Pho Plus. This is pho's fierier, more complex cousin from central Vietnam... a lemongrass and chilli beef broth with pork belly roll and Vietnamese ham, deeper and spicier than the pho you know. Almost nobody outside the Vietnamese community here orders it. That's the exact dish this whole guide exists for.

Go braver. The Thai Larb... minced meat bound with toasted ground rice, sharp with lime and herbs, a proper hit of sour and fresh. Or the Beef Luc Lac, "shaking beef," seared cubes in a buttery savoury sauce. Unfamiliar name, totally crowd-pleasing flavour. No heat, all richness. The perfect first step off the beaten track.

The owner's from Phuket, on the Andaman Sea. Learn your pleases and thank yous in Thai while you're there... it'll get you a better table next time. Thai Orchid is the most ambitious Thai menu on the strip, and dinner runs to 9:30. This is the treat-yourself end of FoodWest, and worth every dollar.

The regulars. The classic green and red curries with coconut milk and fresh vegetables. Pad thai, cashew stir fry, the massaman with its cashews and potato. Beautiful, dependable, the reason people keep coming back.

The heroes. Two of them, and they're showstoppers. The Chicken Volcano arrives flaming, on a reverse skewer, paired with punchy green papaya som tum and a spicy nam jim jaew. It's the most theatrical plate in the whole precinct. And the Massaman Lamb Shank... a whole shank slow cooked four hours until it falls off the bone, in a massaman curry with kumara and cashews. Gentle spice, huge reward.

Go fully adventurous. The Laab Duck. Minced duck seasoned with lime, chilli, mint and toasted rice... about as authentically Isaan as Hawke's Bay gets. Or the Jungle Curry, the one with no coconut milk to soften it. Green peppercorns, rhizome, pure fire. This is the hottest thing on the menu and it does not apologise. Chilli-heads, this is your dish.

Charm anchors the evening at the Market Street corner, a few doors from Thai Orchid, and it's a Thai kitchen with its own personality... halal-friendly, big on duck, and home to a house-made dumpling that's worth the trip on its own.

The regulars. Those homemade pork dumplings, twelve to a plate, steamed then pan fried with a chilli oil that's the whole point. The crispy chicken with caramel sweet chilli. Pra Ram satay. Familiar comfort, done with care.

The hero. The Sleeping Duck. Roasted duck laid over a bed of bean sprouts with sesame oil and a rice-wine house sauce. The name does half the discovery work and the flavour backs it up. If you order one thing at Charm you've never had before, make it this.

Go braver. The Zaab Chicken... sticky wings marinated in herbs, Asian spice and Thai whisky, finished with sesame. "Zaab" means deliciously bold in Isaan Thai, and it delivers. Or the Salad Moo Grob, crispy pork belly in a fiery lime salad, hot and sour and crunchy all at once. And the Red Duck Curry, roast duck in coconut curry with pineapple and bamboo. Duck in curry is a step beyond the usual chicken, and a delicious one.

Some lunches need no explanation to anyone who's had them. Asian Satay is one of them, and at dinner it's some of the best value on the whole strip. Malaysian and Indonesian hawker food, the kind of cooking that turns simple noodles into something you think about the next day.

The regulars. Satay chicken noodles, combination noodles, the honest fried rice. Springy, generous, cheap in the best way.

The hero. The Curry Laksa. If you only know pho, this is the next frontier... a Malaysian coconut curry noodle soup with prawns, crab, chicken and tofu, rich and fragrant and completely different from any soup you're used to. This is the single most under-discovered dish in the precinct for a pho-familiar crowd. Fix that.

Go braver. The Seafood Mee Goreng, Indonesia's answer to pad thai but deeper and spicier, loaded with prawns, calamari, fish cake and crab. The Sambal Chicken, where the Malaysian chilli paste fears nothing... properly hot, deeply savoury. Or the Char Kway Teow, king of the wok-fried noodles, all smoky char and dark soy. That charred "wok hei" flavour is the entire point.

Up in the 340s, Panj Taara is a full Indian restaurant with a tandoor at its heart and a menu that goes deep... north and south, vegetarian, seafood, even Indo-Chinese. Every curry cooked to your heat, mild through extra hot. This is the kitchen where "how brave are you" has an actual dial.

The regulars. The butter chicken and the chicken tikka masala... the two dishes that made half of us fall in love with Indian food in the first place. Creamy, tomato-rich, tandoor-kissed. No shame in the classics, and Panj Taara does them right.

The heroes. This is where you climb. The Goat Rogan Josh, goat on the bone in a robust Kashmiri-origin curry of layered warming spices. Goat is the most authentic thing on this menu and almost nobody outside the Indian community orders it. Or Chicken 65, the legendary South Indian bar snack, bright red, deep fried and properly hot.

Go fully adventurous. The Bhuna Goat, goat with spinach and dry-fried spices cooked right into the meat... intense and aromatic. And the Vindaloo, the fiery Goan curry made with vinegar and a blend of hot spices. This is the benchmark for heat with a sour tang. Order it hot only if you mean it. Kitchen will happily take it to extra hot if you dare.

Right next door to Panj Taara, Bolina is something Hawke's Bay barely has... a proper vegetarian South Indian kitchen and sweets house. Dosas, chaat, a glass case of freshly made mithai. If you've never eaten South Indian food, this is a genuine taste of India rarely found this far south, and it's all meat-free.

The hero, and it's the whole reason to come. The Masala Dosa. A huge, crispy, naturally fermented rice-and-lentil crepe filled with spiced potato, served with sambar and coconut chutney. It's one of the great things you can eat and almost no one here has tried one. Order the Mysore version for a spicy red-chutney kick. Nothing like a French crepe. Everything like a revelation.

Go braver. The Paani Puri. India's most famous street snack... crisp hollow shells you flood with spiced tangy water and eat whole, in one explosive sour-crunchy bite. Pure fun. Or the Masala Uttapam, the dosa's thicker cousin, a savoury fermented pancake with onion and tomato cooked in. And for the pickle-curious, Paneer Achari, tangy and funky with fenugreek and pickle spices.

Golden Spring is the classic Chinese takeaway everyone needs in their life, with one thing that sets it apart... a proper Szechuan streak running right through the menu. The comfort food is all here. So is the fire, if you want it.

The regulars. Sweet and sour pork, honey chicken, chow mein, chicken and cashews. The whole comforting Cantonese songbook, wok-fresh and honestly portioned.

The retro hero. The Egg Foo Young. A fluffy Cantonese omelette packed with meat and vegetables under a savoury gravy... a classic most people under forty have somehow never tried. Old-school in the best way.

Go braver. This is where Golden Spring surprises you. The Szechuan Squid, stir-fried with dried chilli and Szechuan pepper for that signature numbing "ma la" tingle unlike any other heat you know. The Szechuan Beef and King Prawn bring the same electricity. And the Hot & Sour Soup, peppery and tangy and thick with tofu and egg... a totally different soup experience. Real Szechuan heat, the kind most Kiwi Chinese never delivers.

And at the far end, the anchor. Kippers is the Kiwi baseline, the familiar we measure everything else against... and there's real honour in that. Fresh fish, hot chips, burgers, the works. On a Friday night after a long week, sometimes this is exactly right and nothing else will do.

The regulars. Fresh local fish, gurnard, tarakihi or snapper, battered or crumbed to order. The gold standard of the familiar, done well.

The surprise hero. Even the chippy has an adventure on the menu. The Paua Fritter. A fritter of minced paua, our New Zealand abalone, with a deep, dark, almost beefy shellfish flavour found nowhere else. It's a true local delicacy hiding in plain sight at the fish and chip counter. Add fried oysters, mussels and scallops and even the safe end of the street has something worth being brave for.

So how do you actually do this? A few ways.

The one-a-week challenge. Eight dinners, eight weeks. Work the strip end to end, one new hero dish each time. By the end of it you'll know this street better than most people who've lived here for years.

The cluster crawl. Three of these sit right by the Market Street corner... Thai Orchid at 103, Asian Satay at 106, Charm at 108. Panj Taara and Bolina are next-door neighbours up at 342 and 344. Pick a corner, park once, and let the group argue happily over which door to walk through.

The brave night. Decide before you go that tonight you order nothing you've had before. Laab Duck. Curry laksa. Goat rogan josh. A dosa the size of your arm. Szechuan squid with the numbing pepper. This is the night the guide was written for.

Dining at a kitchen run by the people who grew up with the food isn't just about authenticity on a plate, though you'll taste that in every dish. It's that these are our neighbours. They chose WestSide. They brought a whole culture's worth of cooking to four blocks west of a railway line in Hastings, and they cook it for us every night. The least we can do is order the good stuff.

Set your mood. Set your spice. Slide it toward Adventure West. Tonight, be brave.