Nice and tasty fish and chips, good atmosphere and cool view on the sea side. Relaxing at night…read more Friendly staff

Nice atmosphere, nice Macs on tap. But the kitchen failed to deliver 2 pizzas and a fish and chips…read morein what seemed like an hour. Had to leave due to to ravenous visitors and kids in particular. Might be good, but be wary of whether the kitchen can keep up with orders during tourist season. Often the best choice when Kaikoura is busy is to have a snack, enjoy the view and move on to some town that can handle the traffic.

My wife and I found our way to Tutis by way of a much needed reference from the owner of Kaikoura…read moreSportswear (at least I think that is the name of the shop) after a lot of unwanted pressure from our hotel owner to go other places. Wow! My wife and I have been in New Zealand for just over a week and Tutis provided us the best meal we have had, by far! We both had the side salad for an appetizer/entree. It came with the house vinaigrette that was light on the pallet, with a hint of sweetness. For the main course, I had the salmon with rice and a light curry sauce and it was wonderful, despite the fact that I am not a huge curry fan. The salmon was cooked to perfection and had a wonderful flavor. My wife had the daily special, grouper with vegetables and a lemon butter sauce. She fell in love with the grouper. It too was cooked to perfection. The veggies included sweet potatoes, white potatoes and green beans, they too were excellent. The service was excellent too, with our waitress Emily taking great care of us. The atmosphere is calm and peaceful with an upscale casual feel, somewhat low lighting and a noise level that allowed for easy dinner conversation. Don't miss this gem!

We enjoyed our experience here. Friendly staff. Would recommend the craypot chowder and anything…read morefrom the dessert cabinet

This place is amazing! Our group absolutely loved the ambiance and the service was delightful. We…read morestarted with the garlic bread and after each of us took a bite knew the meal to come would blow us away simply because of how delicious the appetizer was (the flaky sea salt was such a perfect touch). The tiramisu is the "best" our group had ever had. Hands down. We couldn't recommend this place enough and wish all the best to the owner John!

Everything was fantastic!! Will definitely go here again the next time I'm in Kaikoura!…read more The Italian pizzas were phenomenal! They were huge with nice thin base and toppings. For pizzas, our group tried the Italia- (tomato base, mozzarella, prosciutto crudo, parmesan, and rocket (arugula)), Siciliana with artichoke (tomato base, mozzarella, garlic, feta cheese, sundried tomatoes, rocket). The sun-dried tomatoes were an awesome complement to the pizza! We also had the Risotto al mare (black seafood risotto with mussels, prawns, squid, and salmon), Salmone (pan-fried salmon fillet with lemon risotto), and Pasta alla Bolognese. Wow. Although they didn't have squid ink available for the Risotto al mare, it was delicious with nice presentation. The risotto was delicious with great texture and flavor. The Out of everything we had ordered for the evening, the Salmone and Siciliana with artichoke were our favorites! We saw many other dishes go past us along with beautiful desserts, will most definitely have to come back to try more of their dishes the next time I'm in town.

Food/Pizza REVIEW:…read more Okay so here's the deal. Unfortunately relying on good reviews doesn't always turn out to be good. Hence I was completely disappointed by the food, and am a bit shocked by the good pizza review. This has got to be one of the worst and most overpriced pizza I've ever eaten. Burned crust, moisty dough and no fresh toppings. It tasted like a frozen supermarket pizza -- and even for that it was bad. Maybe the other food's better, but as a cook I would've never even send these pizzas out. Beer is great, and we were friendly treated. But for a 25$ pizza this was an absolute disaster. Salad was okay! Local Beer on tap was great. So maybe pop in for a snack and a beer, but please no pizza.

The pizza was super good and the place was super nice inside. I got a Hawaiian pizza with chicken,…read moredefinitely would recommend that.

Phenomenal fish and chips- a must-eat in Kaikoura. Everything is so fresh, flavorful and the fried…read morefish texture is light and not oily Recommend getting your food to go (everything wrapped in pieces of paper versus in paper boxes) to eat onsite because it's a funner ambiance!

My wife and I visited Coopers Catch during a recent trip to Kaikoura. We ordered the Blue Cod and…read morethe Whitebait Fritter. The Blue Cod was fresh and flaky in an airy crisp breading and paired with large soft fries and flavorful malt vinegar. We also tried the Whitebait Fritter; this omelet was airy and enjoyable. The Blue Cod was some of the best fish and chips we had ever had so we visited a second time before the end of our trip. Coopers Catch is a must stop in Kaikoura.

The fish was good, the fry, just ok. The oil that they use to fry was either old or they overheated…read moreit. It permeated the crust and produced a semi foul flavor. Maybe they don't change the grease often enough...

Got the seafood basket. Was okay. Too much breading on the seafood. You have to pay extra for…read morecondiments, cups and cutlery.

Delicious little roadside restaurant. Keep in mind, this is more of a food truck as all the dining…read moretables are outside. But the food is extremely fresh and well prepared and you can't beat the great price. No wonder that this was featured in lonely planet.

There's alot of negative reviews on this place, so I'm here to present some facts, as well as some…read moreinformation to help you choose between this and Nin's Bins. - This or Nin's Bins? It comes down to two things. The first is location. If you're going to Point Kean for the seals, this is right next door. Nin's Bins is closer to Ohau seal colony, or if you're driving up/from Blenheim/Picton. Nin's Bins is a much nicer looking "shack" and also has tables with much better views of the ocean. - The weather. This is fully outdoors. There is one table that is sheltered from the rain, but that's it. - The price of the crayfish. They're a bit sneaky in that they don't publish or tell you anywhere what the price per kg of crayfish is. When you turn up, you can have a look at their ice cooler of all their available crayfish. Each one has a different price. For reference, early Jan, the price of crayfish was between $110 and $155, depending on size. You can also choose a half crayfish. - Are they live crayfish? No, none of the crayfish are live. They are already pre-cooked, and will be grilled for a few minutes in butter to warm them up. - What else is there to order? Loads of other seafoods. From prawns to paua (abalone) patties, whitebait patties to local fishes, etc. I recommend the fish, either with rice of bread, really tasty and amazing value at like $12. The scallops were also pretty good; they are small scallops but super tasty ($13-16). - When are they open? For lunch. Don't know when they start, but they close up shop once they sell out all their crayfish. When we were there on a Saturday early Jan, peak tourist season, they finished at like 2:30-3pm. And this was despite it being a super rainy and windy day. - Are they much cheaper than other places in Kaikoura? We checked out another place (Craypot restaurant in town) which was looking to charge $129 per half crayfish! Here we paid $110-155 for a whole crayfish. Up in Marlborough Sounds, we saw crayfish in a restaurant at $60 for half, $120 for whole. So their prices are not super cheap, but probably cheaper than the restaurants in Kaikoura. Don't know compared to Nin's Bins. - Taste Really nicely grilled. The crayfish tasted super fresh, and very firm meat indicating the freshness. The rest of the dish (rice, salad, bread) was very mediocre. - Payment They accept card payments. Also - no credit card surcharge! Yay!