Taste of Home is a small Chinese street food shop on Vivian Street in Wellington's Te Aro, known for hand-pulled noodles, fragrant broths and a house-made chilli oil that regulars buy by the jar. The menu is deliberately short: reasonably priced comfort food that the owners — Tina and Steve — like to eat at home, from cumin lamb noodles and dan dan noodles to braised beef soup, pork wontons, milk buns and fried taro and kūmara balls.
The couple both came out of hotel and restaurant kitchens, where they cooked Western food by day while craving Asian food at home. That gap became the idea behind the name. After a year of searching for the right space, a friend pointed them to a tiny former fish and chip shop; Tina started it on her own, and as the shop got busier Steve left his full-time job to join her.
The shop itself is small, and the owners like it that way — cozy, unfussy, and welcoming, with the feeling of eating in someone's home. Beyond dine-in, you can order over the phone for pickup, or get Taste of Home delivered through DoorDash, Uber Eats and Delivereasy. The house chilli oil, a rich, aromatic blend of Chinese spices and heat, is sold in 200ml jars to spice up meals at home.
On Vivian Street in Wellington's Te Aro, Taste of Home does something refreshingly simple: it cooks the food its owners like to eat at home. That idea — honest, reasonably priced Chinese comfort food — has turned a tiny former fish and chip shop into a favourite for hand-pulled noodles, fragrant broths and jars of house-made chilli oil that regulars take home by the dozen.
The story starts with Tina and Steve, who both worked in hotels and restaurants before opening their own place. Professionally, they cooked Western food — but at home, they ate Asian food. That gap between the two kitchens was the seed of the business. They wanted to make the food they actually craved when the shift ended, and the name followed naturally: Taste of Home.
Finding the right space took patience. The pair spent about a year looking, but nothing was quite right — the wrong location, or too expensive. In the end, the shop came to them through a friend: a small fish and chip shop run by one guy. Tina took it on by herself at first, and as the shop got busier and busier, Steve quit his full-time job to come on board. What began as a leap of faith grew slowly, step by step, with the owners putting what they describe as 100% effort into everything they did.
The early days were experimental. They tried lots of different things to see what people would like and what they liked making — deliberately steering away from running just another fish and chip shop, or serving the Asian food Wellingtonians were already used to. The menu as it stands today was settled only recently, built around one goal: reasonably priced comfort food, accessible to everyone. Something simple, but that everyone would like to eat at home.
What that looks like in the bowl is Chinese street food at its most comforting. The shop is known for its hand-pulled noodles — the cumin lamb noodles and dan dan noodles head that list, alongside a playful spam noodle bowl. There's braised beef soup with fragrant broth, pork wontons, soft milk buns and golden fried taro and kūmara balls for the table. And threading through nearly everything is the house-made chilli oil, a rich, aromatic blend of Chinese spices and heat that the shop sells in 200ml jars so you can spice up your own cooking — perfect on dumplings, noodles, or as they put it, anything else you might eat.
The dining room is small, and the owners are upfront about liking it that way. They want the shop to feel cozy — for you to feel at home while eating their food. That warmth extends beyond the walls: they're quick to credit Wellington's community, both the customers who support them and the fellow small business owners around them, and they say they're grateful and look forward to serving the neighbourhood for years to come.
Practically speaking, Taste of Home makes itself easy to visit. Dine in during opening hours, which run Tuesday to Saturday with a lunch service from 11:30am to 2:30pm and dinner from 5pm to 8pm — the shop closes on Sundays and Mondays. If you'd rather eat at your own table, you can order over the phone on 04 260 2601 and pick up in store, or get your taste of home delivered through DoorDash, Uber Eats or Delivereasy.
Whether you come for a bowl of cumin lamb noodles, a wonton fix, or a jar of that chilli oil, the pitch is the same as it was on day one: food made the way the owners cook it at home, served in a shop small enough to feel like one.