Chef Ainsley Rose Thompson

Chef At Home In Jacks Point

Known for her healthful and laidback style, Ainsley’s Queenstown culinary journey began opening the Sherwood restaurant, a new experiment in community and sustainability that has grown into an admired local fixture. Ainsley went on to become the Executive Chef at The Dishery, a popular eatery in Arrowtown, and most recently, Ainsley established her own business as a Private Chef. Ainsley draws on her years of experience from Wellington establishments The Matterhorn and Floriditas, the French cafe in Auckland and Michelin star restaurants in San Francisco, Atelier Crenn and Quince.

For me, cooking is...

My passion, I love taking the beautiful raw ingredients the South Island of New Zealand provides and doing them justice.

I learned to cook at...

Cookery School in Wellington, NZ

A cooking secret...

Seasoning meat correctly and cooking it with care!

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Chef Ainsley Rose's reviews

4.81

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24 services

Ainsley was absolutely brilliant! We would highly recommend using Ainsley for your next trip to Queenstown!! She went over and above to provide the most amazing experience for our dad’s 60th birthday dinner. We had a 3 course meal and canapés and every dish was incredible. Adding a waitress was also the perfect addition to complete the whole experience. At the end of the service everything was left clean and tidy, you wouldn’t have even known she’d been.

We enjoyed our delicious meal for 6 of us. The food was yum and there was plenty of it - she even left us the left overs! We really loved this as a holiday option.

We engaged Ainsley Rose through Take a Chef, and from the onset she was very attentive to our requirements and came up with a fabulous menu for our small family wedding party. When we made a couple of suggestions, she bent over backwards to include these for us and then went even further. Ainsley presented professionally and had a calm friendly demeanour that all guests enjoyed. The meal was 100%, I could not have wished for better. Having her own table decorations helped to set the scene and the table looked fabulous. Her clean up was miraculous, she was perfect in every way. As you can tell, we give her the highest possible rating in all departments and we will recommend her to all our friends. Thank you Ainsley.

This was such an awesome experience. The food was some of the most delicious I have ever tasted. Chef Ainsley was the first private Chef I have ever had and she was so much better than I had hoped. My group of friends looked over her curated menu and had a hard time choosing what we wanted because everything on there sounded incredible. When I spoke to her about plans we had before dinner, she immediately told me what paired best with the wines we had. We were all watching a movie when we started to smell the food and had to go see what it was and she was more than willing to explain each dish and where the food was sourced from. Only problem I had was not having a large enough stomach to eat everything she made. Do you and your friends a service and book her IMMEDIATELY!

Ainsley was excellent- looked after every detail and the quality of the food was outstanding.

Chef Ainsley bring us a wonderful experience when staying in Queenstown with not only the meal, but also wine pairing. It’s super cozy, and awesome dinner time. Thanks, Chef Ainsley