Tanuki's Cave

My friend and I went on a Thursday night, you know it's a great restaurant if it's packed even on a weekday. It's one of the hidden gems of Auckland. We ordered quite a variety from the menu and everything was delicious. My friend did make a mistake on ordering the mushroom with minced coated with breadcrumbs instead of the yakitori mushroom with minced so it wasn't what we expected but overall good taste. Loved the dessert especially. Highly recommended and will definitely return!

Really love the atmosphere of this place! There are a lot of options for food and the fact that each order gives you two sticks is really great for sharing. Really enjoyed the mashed kumara with almonds on the outside, but to be honest everything was good. Would come back here again!

The food is yum! Although it take sometime to arrive. Staff are friendly but took a long time to take our order and its hard to get their attention too maybe it was a busy evening that night. If you are big eater and on a budget this place is not for you. But the pork skewers are nice! Im a bit disappointed to the prawn wrapped in bacon as I’ve tasted a better one before. Otherwise i would recommend this place and will come back too.

WOW! The food, the service, and the atmosphere; everything was amazing. The scotch fillet with butter was the best part as well as the legend 22 sake. The jelly sake was super yummy it's basically alcoholic aloe vera drink. Highly recommend coming here but just watch how much you order as it adds up very quickly! Vegetarian options: Yes some vegetarian ones. Kid-friendliness: More of an adult scene Parking: Recommend public transport or walking if you can Wheelchair accessibility: No, the main entrance is stairs.

A must try in Auckland. It feels like a tucked away yakitori bar in Japan, from the entrance, the atmosphere and the food. The skewers are great and I'm not one to like cheese stuffed foods but the chicken mince ball and others are great here. Other recommendations would be the wings, yakitori and the steak. Best spot is to sit at the bar but there's plenty of other seats around. The price is decent and in my opinion, worth the price per skewers. Ended up spending around $100 a head most recently.

Delicious food with a cosy atmosphere, and to top it off they have excellent customer service! Love the range they offer, mashed Kumara with almond and Kumara with butter n salt is our fav.

Very nice atmosphere,excellent service. Food was really nice and a lot for two they have lots of options to choose

Food and prices are good, but customer service, thumbs down. I found the waitresses to be unfriendly, unsmiling, and no initiative to check up on whether we would like more food, a simple top up of a glass of water, or clearing up the pile of dishes as more dishes were getting served. This affected my dining experience because I didn't feel valued as a customer. Their work ethic just doesn't resonate genuine Japanese to me. The restaurant needs an improvement in ventilation too because it's quite smokey when you enter.

One of the OG Japanese spots in Auckland that still holds its own. I love Tanukis Cave, it’s one of the first restaurants I went to when I moved to Auckland 10 years ago and after a 7 year relationship with a Japanese eating their food almost daily and nearly a dozen trips to Japan I’m convinced that this is about as authentic as yakitori gets for Auckland.

I was happily surprised with this place. I was not expecting to find an authentic yakitori Japanese BBQ chicken skewers restaurant here. There were a few types of yakitori that I wish they had, but the selection was pretty good. The staff and atmosphere was quite good Food: 5/5