pork belly For my first Wel­ling­ton on a Plate meal deal, I decided to go to Finc, with the delight­ful com­pany of a friend I’d just seen killed twice on Sat­urday night. People have dif­fer­ing opin­ions about Finc, but for myself, I’ve always found it great in the even­ings and very aver­age at lunch­times. For pork belly, I would take the plunge.

Lunch Offer – $25 set menu
Choose any two courses plus a glass of Wel­ling­ton region­al wine, and a cup of tea or cof­fee

Starter
Feta mar­in­ated in lem­on honey and avo­cado oil served with grilled ficelle or
Pan fried pork and cori­ander dump­lings served with a sherry vinai­grette

Mains
Slow cooked sticky pork belly served with sea­son­al veget­ables sauteed in chilli and gar­lic oil or
Grilled haloumi cheese and vine toma­toes served with a rock­et bruschetta and bal­sam­ic and avo­cado oil

Dessert
Vel­vet organ­ic chocol­ate tart served with organ­ic cream or
Itali­an meringue served with cream and winter poached fruit

When we got to Finc, it was pretty busy, but not com­pletely crowded. Although there were lots of sets of two people sit­ting at four tops and there were still some vacant, we were shown to a tiny corner table that really was really only appro­pri­ate for one, and should only have been used as a last resort. We looked at the menu, but there was no sign of the Welly on a Plate offer, and since the wait­ress had dis­ap­peared, I told Brad about it. When she came back to take our order, he asked about it, and then she brought us a list. Not a very big pro­mo­tion­al push, which is unfor­tu­nate. We ordered our wine – the Mebus Pinot Noir for me, and the the Urlar Sav for him, and a second later she came back to ask if we’d both wanted the Pinot Noir. Our feta arrived pretty soon after that, five cubes in olive oil with some strips of lem­on rind, and five slices of toasted ficelle. I asked where our wines were, and she said that they were just being poured. I think it is weird to get your food before your drink, espe­cially if they’re sup­posed to be paired, but hey. The feta was nice, but not spec­tac­u­lar – it needed a note of some­thing else to make it stand, like some chili, per­haps. I think the ficelle might have been bet­ter if it had­n’t been toasted. Brad did­n’t eat all his feta, but I did­n’t ask why.

Out came the pork belly shortly after. It was a fairly small piece, and a huge pile of bok choy. Far too much bok choy. I was expect­ing a mix of veget­ables, not just the one. Ah well. The pork was melt-in-the-mouthy, and rather intensely fla­voured. The Mebus Pinot Noir, which I had chosen because the wine­maker had once described it as being “like angels for­nic­at­ing in your mouth” was a good match, but I thought it was a shame that the wine glasses they were using were those short tast­ing glasses.

For $25, with small por­tions, it was­n’t out­stand­ing value, nor do I think it really show­cased how good the food at Finc can be. It did­n’t put me off return­ing, but I do think I’ll be stick­ing to night-time vis­its only.