So much on our plates!

There’s only three days left of Welling­ton on a Plate, but there’s still a vast array of fes­ti­val dish­es and burg­ers to choose from, so if you can face the com­bined WOAP and rug­by crowds this week­end, here are some of our high­lights.

Five & Dime hide a sur­pris­ing­ly sophis­ti­cat­ed kitchen behind their tiny bar, and their Dine Welling­ton menu con­sist­ed of four cours­es of del­i­cate inno­va­tion. Almond gaz­pa­cho was delight­ful­ly sub­tle, almost bland on its own but the per­fect foil for the jew­el-like pick­led grapes, leaves and oth­er colour­ful delights that float­ed on its creamy sur­face. Instead of beer or wine, for an accom­pa­ny­ing fes­ti­val drink we chose their “Welling­ton slushie”, a crisp but fruity con­coc­tion of Light­house gin and hibis­cus.

We fol­lowed this with line-caught Alba­core tuna ceviche (which more resem­bled koko­da or ika mata with its coconut­ty sweet­ness), grilled sar­dine put­tanesca, and bread­ed salt and pep­per lamb cut­lets that were a sur­pris­ing­ly suc­cess­ful blend of east and west, com­bin­ing Sichuan spices with a hum­mus base. Dessert was spec­tac­u­lar: sticks of pineap­ple fried in kataifi-like shred­ded pas­try, accom­pa­nied by mouth­wa­ter­ing daiquiri Kāpi­ti ice cream, with diverse accom­pa­ni­ments such as salt­ed caramel pra­line, lime zest and dark choco­late ren­dered into dusts, blobs and wafers.

Their sis­ter estab­lish­ment Five Bor­oughs sticks to hearti­er fare. I could­n’t face the infa­mous Tur­duck­en Down burg­er (my arter­ies would nev­er talk to me again), so instead went with their short Dine Welling­ton menu. The braised beef pot roast from Island Bay Butch­ery was ade­quate­ly ten­der, while still retain­ing enough tex­ture to get your teeth into, with a rich meati­ness enhanced by fresh herbs and a touch of spice in the com­fort­ing­ly heavy sauce. The pota­to gratin was a lit­tle light on the promised emmen­tal, but when put togeth­er with mul­ti­coloured baby car­rots the whole dish was a suc­cess.

Again, the dessert stood out. The baked but­ter­milk pie had enough tang to off­set its innate heav­i­ness, but the sauces ele­vat­ed it to anoth­er lev­el. A dense pool of Welling­ton Choco­late Fac­to­ry choco­late hid tex­tur­al sur­pris­es of hazel­nuts and pret­zel pra­line, and just a smat­ter­ing of rhubarb cut through all that sweet­ness.

Grill Meats Beer made a wise struc­tur­al choice when design­ing their Lamb Shank Redemp­tion: braised shank tends to fall apart in a slop­py mess, so they put it on firm spiced lamb pat­ty to hold it all togeth­er. The result was not just good engi­neer­ing, but good eats, with intrigu­ing tex­tur­al and flavour con­trasts between the two pre­sen­ta­tions. Adding roast pump­kin, beet­root, feta and pine nut aioli cre­at­ed such a win­ning com­bi­na­tion that I’ll even for­give their inser­tion of point­less, scratchy baby kale. The accom­pa­ny­ing Garage Project Perse­phone was a bit tart and unbal­anced on its own, but when I drank it along with the burg­er, both food and drink sprang into mag­i­cal focus.

Out in Mira­mar, Park Kitchen went for a rad­i­cal inter­pre­ta­tion of burg­er­hood that is sure to annoy the purists. The con­vo­lut­ed name (Beef Pat Tie “Welling­ton”) gives a hint that this takes some cues from Beef Welling­ton, and indeed the beef is entire­ly con­tained with­in the brioche bun, with sal­ad ele­ments stacked sep­a­rate­ly on the tray beside it. It’s not even topo­log­i­cal­ly equiv­a­lent to the Pla­ton­ic burg­er, and the sup­posed Welling­ton-ness extends only to the enclo­sure of the meat, not to the inclu­sion of pâté and dux­elles, which are replaced by smoked beet­root and smoked pro­volone. Nev­er­the­less, in the way that James K Bax­ter could write “son­nets” while dis­pens­ing with their canon­i­cal rhyme scheme and yet make them entire­ly his own, this “burg­er” is suc­cess­ful in its own right.

The Bresolin stuck with a much more con­ven­tion­al approach, and in fact on paper their Fowl Play did­n’t seem much dif­fer­ent from their stan­dard fried chick­en burg­er. Pick­led jalapeños were the main dif­fer­ence, but the Amer­i­can cheese slice and Mis­sis­sip­pi-inspired ‘come­back sauce’ com­plet­ed the Deep South con­nec­tion. The result was­n’t ground­break­ing, but we both fin­ished our burg­ers before we knew it: it’s ridicu­lous­ly, dan­ger­ous­ly edi­ble.

Their fes­ti­val cock­tail, Cap­tain Nemo’s Demise, is a lit­tle edgi­er, at least in its choice of intense­ly savoury accou­trements. Gin goes com­fort­ably enough with rose­mary, hon­ey, lemon and bit­ters, and the sea salt rim brings a touch of Mar­gar­i­taville to the par­ty. But things then get even salti­er, with a white anchovy, gar­lic-stuffed olive, cor­ni­chon and pick­led chili all har­pooned togeth­er atop the glass. Stranger things have hap­pened at sea, but rarely this deli­cious­ly.

If the Bresolin’s burg­er offer­ing hints towards fast-food stylings (one of the staff described it as “like McDon­ald’s, only edi­ble”), Ti Kou­ka makes their homage explic­it with their “TKFC burg­er”. There are many sim­i­lar­i­ties, but with hints of exoti­cism in kim­chi salt, tas­so ham and smoked cheese. Many of those sub­tleties got lost in the mix, but the result was, like the Fowl Play, declared to be mor­eish and well-bal­anced.

The fes­ti­val dish­es were a lit­tle more adven­tur­ous. I chose what was effec­tive­ly a very sly take on a chick­en Cae­sar sal­ad, only with pulled con­fit chick­en that had been crumbed and fried, result­ing in a glo­ri­ous tex­tur­al con­trast between melt­ing­ly ten­der con­fit and crispy crumbs. The egg has been fried after poach­ing, pro­vid­ing an intrigu­ing­ly firm white, and the Cae­sar-stan­dard ingre­di­ents of ice­berg let­tuce, crou­tons and sar­dine aioli (in place of anchovies) was enlivened by a few items not men­tion on the menu, includ­ing crisp lavosh-like wafers and what I took to be rich nuggets of bacon.

Dessert also pro­vid­ed stud­ied con­trasts in flavours and tex­tures. Pan­na cot­ta was flavoured with Garage Pro­jec­t’s Cher­ry Bomb porter, its silky wob­ble com­ple­ment­ed by firm­ness and crunch in the form of cocoa husk and coconut rough. There’s some­thing both melan­choly and hope­ful about cher­ries this far out of sea­son: their deflat­ed soft­ness recall­ing the fad­ed glo­ry of last sum­mer, while their sweet­ness looks for­ward to the sum­mer to come.