The Riverhead
What makes your venue the Best Gastropub in New Zealand?
It was Sam’s turn to choose the venue for the family Christmas Lunch this year.
This gastro pub had it all. The Riverhead is one of the best in New Zealand and right on their doorstep!
He couldn’t think of a better place to bring his family for this very special occasion…Christmas and a big family announcement!
It was not a hard job to do, just something else he had to fit in around work, family, holiday, club cricket, buying presents and hoping the weather would play ball this year. Add to that, everyone in the family has a different idea of the ideal Christmas meal and different budgets, which is a major consideration, and the location was a big factor. No pressure!
There is Poppa from the North Shore, well into his 90s but mobile enough on the walker so long as there are not too many steps. He loves simple food that doesn’t need an encyclopedia to understand.
Mum and Dad are well-travelled, fairly well-off, love a good wine or two and have pretty exotic tastes. They’ll pick up Poppa on their way through from Whangaparaoa.
There’s Tane & Debs from New Lynn. He’s keen to bring the whanau up the harbour in his boat since the tide will be high. With 2 kids under 5, they need space to run around and a good kid’s menu with activities for them to do.
Grace and Hamish just engaged. She’s gluten-free, and both are vegetarian. There has to be a choice for them, and they’re on a tight budget, saving for the big day.
Then there’s Layla and Steve and their teenage daughter coming from Titirangi, the artsy type and the quintessential foodies. Cost is no object.
And of course, the most important person to Sam, is his partner Jess, who is 3 months pregnant.. It will be a big surprise for all the family so long as she can get through the meal in one piece!
Sam had been to The Riverhead for a long lunch with his work teammates two weeks before and loved the variety of meals on the menu, the price range, the stories on the walls, the outlook from the deck, and the fresh air given how humid the weather had been. He checked out the vegetarian & vegan menu (easy to do since it is all on the main menu), the wine list was comprehensive with a wide price point and he even surreptitiously checked out the kid’s menu. The access was easy for Pop; it wasn’t too noisy, and he knew Tane would just love the fact he could arrive in style on his own boat. The venue was strewn with the unique history of the original old building that will probably trigger more reminiscences from Pop.
Sam decided they’d do their Christmas on Christmas Eve with a lunch this year, leaving the big day free.
Describe the experience your customers have at your establishment – what is your food and beverage offering and why do people come back for more?
Trip Advisor: Christmas Day
“The Perfect Christmas Lunch: Excellent food and service, the food was above expectations and service was perfect. Drinks served on time. Our Christmas Day was lunch was perfect! Thank you!
Sam’s experience:
Mum and Dad arrived with Poppa and were made to feel at home by Catrine, the Matre’d. With no steps it was easy access from carpark to the deck. Their table overlooked the water, and they were just in time to see Tane and family come around the bend of the waterway. They could envisage the same scene 180 years ago with a waka as described on the menu.
Ten minutes later, the bubbles they’d ordered and grandchildren from the boat, both arrived!
Tane & Debs followed from The Riverhead’s dock. They were looking forward to a refreshing pint.
The rest of the family have arrived, and all 14 are seated together.
Choosing from the menu was easy, without the need of google.
Poppa chose the Market Fish following recommendations from their server, Georgia. The fish was served on tasty citrus risotto. Mum treated herself to Oysters, followed by the light and tangy Salt & Pepper Squid. Dad however, ordered the Pork Belly starter, rich & satisfying followed by the Eye Fillet, medium rare, a sight to behold with arty flourishes you’d expect from a Michelin star restaurant sans the long-winded explanation.
Tane ordered the famous Riv’s Ribs smothered in their bombastic sauce and was stonkered when he’d finished. Debs had the Fish & Chip’s, the best she’s eaten since growing up on Stewart Island.
Grace chose the Heirloom Tomato & Smoked Bocconcini Salad a fest of a meal even without gluten. Hamish started with Dumplings and finished with the Vege Burger featuring a delicious Chickpea rendition of a beef burger.
Layla, who was reluctant to come to a ‘pub’ for a special occasion, also had the Market Fish and was more than impressed. Steve ordered the Mixed Olives that to his surprise where slightly warmed then ordered the Beef Burger. A monster by any one’s standard.
That only left Sam and a rather gun-shy Jess. She ordered the Caesar Salad erring on the safe side and was pleasantly surprised. Sam ordered the Tiger Prawns was impressed with the combination of pomegranate & bulgur wheat. He followed that up with the Scotch Fillet, rare. The homemade Riv’s jus, set it off. After the meal, Sam and Jess made their baby announcement to more hugs and cheers!
A hoot of a horn heralded the arrival of the first of two ferries and within no time the place was full.
The food came out quickly, as did the diverse range of beverages orders.
Sam was relieved to hear compliments from all the family confirming his choice of venue.
Grace and Hamish made a note that The Riverhead’s The Boat House would be the ideal place to get married.
The bill was split with no problem, and it was a happy family that left The Riverhead.
Tell us how you showcase NZ produce / offerings? Does your menu change with the season and how is it locally influenced. How do you accommodate allergy and dietary requirements?
By using local suppliers and produce wherever we can, we use our ‘paddock to plate’ philosophy in sourcing the very best of what is available from our amazing corner of the country. Not only is the Northwest famous for its great wineries we are also blessed to have some fantastic meat and fresh produce suppliers on our doorstep which we incorporate into our seasonal menu offerings. We change our menu twice yearly, summer and winter, but our The Riverhead's 'Favs' section remains.
We have cheese from Puhoi, oysters from the Coromandel, berries from Kumeu and herbs and decorative flowers from our very own garden, to mention but a few of the local ingredients we currently use on our menu.
We champion our excellent local wine growers with Soljans, Kumeu River and Westbrook wines on offer by the glass but we also have exquisite local gin and vodka producers with Lavender Hill (Sloe, Lavender, Smoked Honey and Saffron flavoured gins) and Karven (Dry Gin and Starka Vodka) products both listed and used extensively on our cocktail list.
We showcase and promote our local suppliers by use of a locally crafted wines section on our wine list and use ‘table talkers’ to promote our local gin, vodka and limoncello offers which catch our guest’s eye as they first take a seat and start to think about what they might like to try.
On our menu outlines our recommendation of beer or wine that best compliments a dish. We promote as many of our local wine producers in this way, as many guests find this very helpful, and it is a popular way of getting guests to try something new.
Our food menus are updated seasonally as we make the very most of what is fresh and in season. Some recent examples of this have been last year’s warm winter vegetable salad, our roast cauliflower and radicchio salad with truffle vinegarette and our mixed seasonal vegetables side which rotate daily with whatever is in season and easily available.
Individual dietary and allergy requirements are a huge influence on our food offer as we plan and build our dishes from fresh ingredients to ensure we can accommodate special requests as often as we can. We use clear descriptions on our menu to help navigate our guests through what is available to them and have an in-house allergy highlighting system where special requests and allergy information are shared with the team. This is done by highlighting the position number of special requests at the table. This ensures we handle all requests as we would a serious allergy and share this information through the docket system with all FOH and kitchen staff to ensure the request is dealt with properly.
What are your key points of difference and how have you managed to deliver them?
Ok enough of the story telling! But, based on true experiences, it illustrates the essence of The Riverhead.
We are one of the only gastropubs that guests can arrive to by water, either via a public sailing or on their own craft. Alternatively, we are a pleasant 25-minute drive from central Auckland. Both offer a different experience on arrival.
The ferries are privately owned. But to provide a cohesive experience for our guest, we needed to invest heavily in creating an online booking portal that worked.
The site, www.theriverheadexperience.co.nz has reigned in an unregulated but valuable income stream and a point of difference for The Riverhead.
It needed to account for the capacity of our three venues and the varying tides on any given day. We write the schedules for the boats, stipulate their capacity, arrival and departure times, and manage all payments.
The trip to The Riverhead is only navigable 2.5 hours either side of high tide. The Riverhead has its own dock.
The route is steeped in history being the only way to travel through this area before the creation of roads and railway. The venue was built in the 1860’s by Thomas and Eliza Deacon and known as the ‘Gateway to the Kaipara’. The route, originally used by the Māori bought the first pioneers to the venue.
Northwest Auckland is one of the main bread baskets of Auckland and we have embraced local produce and wines and proudly include them on our menu.
Stories from the past are on the walls for people to read and to stimulate conversation. A few bevvies help! This is not a sterile environment.
Whilst Sam’s family enjoyed the decks under the ancient Oak trees, overlooking the waterways, we offer a fireplace for winter and ambience 2nd to none.
Our people are one of our biggest assets. Employment follows a rigorous selection and induction program which pays dividends. We have one person on our team that has been with us from the time that we purchased The Riverhead from the liquidators in 2011. Many have been with us for over 10 years.
We have structured training programs both internally and through apprenticeship training programs in the Kitchen and Front of House.
Even more of a credit to the team is the fact that Stephen and I, now approaching retirement age have left the day-to-day management in the hands of our management team. We lived onsite for 13 years and now have moved to Russell in the Bay of Islands. Our focus is one of guidance and vision of the business. We have very good data (see the daily budgets versus the actual sales and purchases via a real time app), monitor reviews and feedback and travel back to The Riverhead two weekly. We are there to support the management team, who in turn support the rest of the team. We are finding that given the age gap between us and some of the younger ones, we are getting better results.
Tell us about your commitments to Customer Service and Host Responsibility
“We are committed to delivering the best customer experience - every guest, every visit. Every action is in pursuit of happy, returning customers. This is achieved by:
- vigorous staff training guarantees the kitchen, bar or floor teams a solid foundation of theoretical and practical learning.
- listening carefully to guests’ wants and needs ensures we deliver a product and service that exceeds expectations every time. Our aim is to have a world-famous offer that goes the extra mile.
- our team knows that our customers have a choice to go elsewhere. We look after guests like our own family.
-our ethos of family guides our Host Responsibility. The welfare of everyone is vital for a safe, enjoyable atmosphere and a positive and professional work environment.
-our team are trained to monitor and avoid harm or potential issues. We promote alternative transport solutions.
- our artesian bore provides plentiful complimentary pure water. Our enthusiastic team create beautiful mocktails and exciting non-alcoholic options.
- a well-managed food driven business, is something the police and local licensing board acknowledged in 2017. They changed our liquor license to a ‘Restaurant License’ across all venues to remove restrictions. We welcome families across our venue.
Best Known for:
Accessible by water
Private ferries
Wedding venue in “The Boat House”
Please describe your commitment to sustainability.
We are a business that is very conscious of our environmental impact and see ourselves as being pro-active in our attempts to keep improving our sustainability and are always exploring new ways to further reduce our imprint on the environment.
Having completed a major review of our approach to all refuse in the last year we are now separating, re-using and recycling our waste much more than we ever did and through the help of our team we continue to strive forward by embracing new ideas and practices that will continue to improve our sustainability programme.
Some of our current practices include:
Composting - instead of defaulting to landfill bins for the majority of our waste, we separate all organic waste for composting. We use biodegradable sugarcane containers and take away packaging, so that we can compost these and allow our customers the option to do the same. Working with our refuse collector we have been able to reduce our landfill refuse to a minimum. We have halved our landfill refuse since implementing our composting systems and are always working towards being better.
Recycling - we recycle all plastics (including all soft plastics) cardboard, paper and glass twice weekly with our local recycling contractor. Along with recycling all light bulbs, batteries and polystyrene at our local Mitre 10 store as and when we need to. We also offer our staff to bring in any of these materials from their homes so we can help improve sustainability practices both at home and in the workplace.
Re-using - we return all the cardboard we can to our suppliers, with Gilmour’s being the highest volume supplier we have of re-usable cardboard. This removes cardboard from our refuse/recycling collection and allows our suppliers to re-use for our future deliveries - saving them money and saving on our waste footprint. We also take advantage of already existing schemes that push glass bottles back through sterilization and production for future products.
Where we can, we buy our products from local suppliers. this is not only to support our community and local businesses, but also to minimize carbon emissions involved in the transportation of goods. We buy our produce fresh and local cutting harmful emissions and fuel involved in refrigerated transport and preservation of goods. With non-perishable products, we bulk buy where we can, again in order to reduce environmental harm and the fuel use involved in unnecessarily and frequent deliveries.
For our cleaning products, we aim to use biodegradable and environmentally friendly products. This helps us reduce any harmful chemicals from running down into our waste-water systems and environment.
The sustainable practices we have implemented into our day-to-day operations has helped us reduce our impact on the environment as a business. It has also in turn informed and educated our team and helped us transfer these practices into our personal lives, benefiting the sustainability of not only the business, but also our individual lives and respective households.
Have you won any awards in the recent past? Tell us about them.
We won the 'Best Destination Venue' award in the Hospitality NZ Awards for Excellence 2021. Reviews from millions of Tripadvisor travellers place The Riverhead in the top 10% worldwide.
Please describe how you create ambience.
Ambience management is a big part of our daily routine at The Riverhead, making our unique historic setting memorable. As the day progresses into night, the ebb and flow of customer volumes, the ever-changing light and the inside/outside flow of the venue we tweak all aspects of our ambience.
Ambience is a subconscious ally in making your guests feel welcome, relaxed and detached from the world outside. Many can’t quite put their finger on why they like the ‘vibe’ of The Riverhead as they arrive, but our ambience is well planned and controlled.
We train our management team to routinely walk out of the front door, wait 10 seconds and then re-enter to gauge their senses and assess a first impression as guests would experience it. Assessing the music, the volume, the lighting and room temperature are all important aspects of this important first few seconds of anyone’s visit. The energy the room is generating is so important. Are the staff engaged and interacting with guests and each other with positivity and purpose? Are there any off-putting noises? Is the approach to the entrance clean and well presented? First (and last) impressions being so important.
We create our ambience through matching our music and lighting to our historic setting, by complimenting the feel of who we are with the right tunes, temperature and lighting.
Our dimmable lighting system adjustable as the days sun comes and goes really helps set the atmosphere inside. Our open decks, with the dappled light coming through the 150-year-old oak trees outside lends a much sought after location for any occasion. Dimmed lights, flickering candles, open fire and the bespoke fairy light globe twinkling above the rockery outside sets a beautiful back drop as the river view slowly disappears in the evening. Sitting out on the deck on summer evenings are a favourite with returning guests who request to sit under the stars with the festoon lights and outside table lanterns. With soft music, a warm rug or outside heater if needed, creates a wonderful deck-side atmosphere which our customers love.
Our music system is a specialised cloud-based system and allows us to be able to access a wealth of different genres that match the time of day and volume of traffic at any given time. Our music options are not mainstream but ambient in nature, music that is there in the background but never takes over and is always played at a volume that our customers can always interact with each other effortlessly.
One of the most important aspects of creating a positive and enjoyable ambience, one often overlooked as being part of this process, is the energy of the team on duty. The body language, movement and expression of the team is so important in the creation of a great overall ambience – all of the other factors involved might be set-up and controlled perfectly but unless the team are onboard and live it, then the overall result will ultimately fall short.
