Nol Bu Ne

Nol Bu Né, one of the first Korean restaurants in the CBD located on Wellesley Street East housed in a red pagoda style building and still one of the best Korean around. Up on level one, after a dodgy elevator ride is not somewhere you would accidently stumble across. It’s very lively and bustling and you will feel like you’re in Korea for a moment.
It’ll be hard to resist ordering the bibimbap, which on my 3 trips for Korean is what I keep ordering. The dumplings are nice too and the barbeque pork punchy. Of all the side dishes that are complimentary with your meal I love the soy-​infused sweet potato. Even tried my first Korean Sushi which is a little different to your run of the mill.
Quick service and at a cheap price. Give it a whirl!

Popular Korean restaurant in centre of Auckland, judging by the crowd that was here on a Friday lunchtime. The fried dumplings were delicious and I got to try bibimbap for the first time — it’s a sizzling hot bowl filled with a mix of rice, veggies, thinly sliced meat, topped with a swirl of hot chilli sauce and a raw egg yolk. A really tasty and substantial meal in one. The accompanying pickles, sauces and seaweed were interesting additions. Lucky for me, I had someone to explain what everything was. Great fast option for lunch in the city.

Ate lunch here yesterday. The walk up the steps was concerning as it was dirty, but opened up to a nicely decorated restaurant.
We ordered flounder stew and yeugejan spicy beef soup. It was good, but both dishes tasted like they used the same flavor base,… maybe from their duk boki sauce or something. Was a little different tasting.
Also they don’t take major credit cards here… not a huge deal, but good to know BEFORE eating.
if we’re ever in Auckland again, we’d return, but might keep looking around and try other places.

Great food, super fast service, friendly staff and very affordable. The BBQ pork was insane and nice and spicy!

A simple but good Korean restaurant and the price for the dishes are reasonable. We arrived quite late and were just disappointed by the owner behaviour who almost threw us out, cleaning all the tables, switching off the lights. It was not even 10pm, the official closing time, but we were the last customers and he was just looking forward to going back home. Quite rude.

This is strictly constructive criticism on their table top BBQ menu choices and serving style on the BBQ — we did not have a chance to try the rest of the menu or kitchen BBQ.
Story as follow:
Usually for table top BBQ options you would expect to see at least sliced fresh un-​marinated beef, pork belly, bulgolgi along with other chicken/​seafood plates.
This place, for as large a menu they have, the table top BBQ option include only pork belly or steak — not sliced, not marinated — just a whole steak. We ordered the steak since my friend was in it for the beef, along with a steak knife so we can slice it down before putting it on the grill (because isn’t it how Korean BBQ is supposed to be???). The server instead gave us a butter knife, intervened when we attempted to slice it down raw, put the whole steak on the grill for us and insisted that it would turn out better that way. It still tasted good cause it was New Zealand beef but our experience was bitter.
My suggestion for the restaurant would be, if they were to offer BBQ, have the full choices of beef, marinated beef, pork, seafood and chicken. Otherwise, keep it to a no table top BBQ restaurant. Lots of places do just fine that way.
That said, by all means, eat here — I’m confident the rest of the menu is good based on other reviews. I didn’t have a chance to try it again because I was only on vacation. But if you’re looking to do your own BBQ, this is definitely not your place.

This is one of my favourite Korean restaurant. The food is simply amazing with a really good price, around $ 12 most dishes. The server is fast and they are really polite.

Nol bu né has a great location, located a few steps away from the busy Queen St and Wellesley St Intersection.
Food is good here. As good as Korean gets in the lower price range with mains averaging around $ 13.

Housed in a rather mystical, retro red pagoda style building on the corner of Wellesley and Lorne Streets, Nol Bu Né has been serving up good Korean for as long as anyone can remember. I used to frequent its floorboards in my days spent at the university’s city campus; we’d often go down together as a group and share a luxurious meal for a less than luxurious price tag and then sprint back to class clutching the stitches in our sides.
With an emphasis more on good eating than drinking (perhaps not for the table yelling ‘Drink, drink, drink!’ in the corner), the appetiser choices are short and sweet, offering pancakes, dumplings and Korean sushi. There are also your standard BBQ variety mains that come with rice and a good array of noodles, soups and stews (the cold noodles are a delicious and interesting dish to try albeit disconcertingly chilly). For those who enjoy grazing, Nol Bu Né now offers bento-​box style dosirak to please one’s indecisive tendencies. And if you’ve come in a large group with an eye to share, there are BBQ platters and steamboats to fit the bill nicely.
I ordered the Korean BBQ squid, eager to see what $ 12 worth of cephalopod would get me whilst Zoe decided to branch out and order the steamed egg ($ 10.50). As mandatory in Korean restaurants, our mains came accompanied with banchan (Korean side dishes), of which the marinated soy sweet potatoes have an almost cult following. Sweet, gummy and with just a twang of moreish saltiness, Zoe and I quickly finished and requested more of these spuds, along with the sesame seaweed salad and kimchi.
Despite arriving at the table hissing and spitting and volcanically hot, my squid was done to perfection, tender with a little spring to its bite once the fire had settled. Covered in their ubiquitous spicy, red sauce, the dish was very generously portioned and I challenge anyone to find better-​cooked squid in that quantity and for that price anywhere else. Zoe’s steamed egg was a good example of a perfectly set egg custard that was delicate in texture; filled with shrimp and finely diced vegetables, it was unfortunately also rather delicate in taste, but this was easily rectified with a few helpings of kimchi and squid on top.
Once Zoe and I had finished dinner and our second helping of banchan, we felt dangerously full to bursting and yet managed to spend less than $ 13 each. Nol Bu Né has managed to hold its place as one of Auckland’s kings of Korean and judging by the full dining room, the people in the streets all know it too.