26 February 2007
Little India, 115 Cuba Mall, Wellington
Golf and India; incongruence at the extreme. You know when you’re surrounded by oxymora; friendly fire, jumbo shrimp, honest lawyers, Microsoft Works, Military intelligence and, much more enticing, perceived oxymora; almost exactly, dry ice, good grief, live recording, minor disaster, non-dairy creamer (one of my favourites), random order, standard deviation, white gold - you know the score? Even more enticing than perceived oxymoria are chances to run to earth the truth behind urban folklore legends and lay them bare, naked and spread-eagled.
Well, I found myself in an oxymoron this week. You know when you’re in a familiar setting but can’t quite remember if you’ve eaten in a particular restaurant? It happens to me a lot; more so in recent years but that’s a different story. A blonde and I were wandering down Cuba Street in Wellington looking for lunch and vaguely discussing which restaurants we had already eaten in and we decided we had enjoyed excellent service and cuisine in Little India. Of course when we arrived at the door and looked through the window we realized we had never been there in our lives!
Inside the décor was pleasant and mostly simple except for a framed flag from the 18th Green at Pinehurst No. 2 where Michael Campbell won the 2005 US Open! Does he own the restaurant? Does he exclusively eat there when he’s in New Zealand and away from his Brighton home; questions, questions, questions? The flag is autographed and there’s an accompanying picture of the smiling Mister Campbell holding the appropriate trophy along with three un-explained metal buttons/badges/money-clips associated with the competition (very perplexing these) – the thing must be worth thousands! This is the only non-Indian piece of art in the whole place and its quite disconcerting. Mind you, all the other pictures are of Jackie O riding elephants and dancing somewhere in the sub-continent. The only image missing is a cerise and lilac-clad Princess Diana sulking in front of the Taj Mahal; cultural schizophrenia springs to mind. Why is the green-flag there, what is it telling us? Is it a sports-auction trophy, is it a benevolent gift from a grateful diner, is it maybe vindaloo motivation paying homage to the apocryphal story of Michael’s mid-round visits to the loo en-route to his win? I made a serious error of omission by not asking the waiter about these world-shattering questions and I promise to return at a later date to correct this.
We sat in the window and watched the various Cuba Street gangs planning bank robberies, scantily-clad women displaying their wares on one of Wellington’s ‘always like this’ amazing days, and formally (a.k.a. anally) dressed businessmen seriously going about their lunchtime perambulations, as well as the usual, wonderful assortment of Cuba weirdos. Ordering was easy; the menu was concise, simple and clear, the choices varied and enticing and the waiter was polite, efficient and - a real bonus - appeared to speak English. Nothing revolutionary; chicken Tika Masala for me and the cleverly named Murg Mumtaz (butter chicken to the less than cunning linguists amongst you) for the blonde. We shared a Boti Kebab to start which was a disappointment; the ‘secret recipe marinade’, presumably developed over thousands of years, seemed to transmogrify the meat and gave a new dimension to the concept of rubber. However the mains were outstandingly memorable with delicate, tasty, and tactilely pleasant sauces, definitely warranting a return in the near future. At least I can research Michael Campbell’s ablutionary habits.
Lunch prices:
Starters $8-$10ish, mains $10-$12ish
Evening prices:
Starters same, mains $17-$19-ish
Food:
Absolutely top class but avoid the Boti Kebab.
Value:
Excellent.
Service:
Friendly, professional, efficient.
Ambience:
Late lunch so not many people left in there but nothing to suggest it wouldn’t be superb at any time of the day.
1 March 2007
Floriditas, 161 Cuba Street, Wellington
Floriditas? What does it mean? Of course it doesn’t have to mean anything; it can simply be a meaningless name which sticks in peoples’ heads. And I’m sure it does to a certain extent.
On the other hand, pregnancy; we all know what it means but the real issue is what does it do to you; I mean apart from filling you full of babies, causing your ankles to swell and affecting your centre of gravity, we all know it disturbs the equilibrium of your digestive tract and produces diurnally predictable reversal of the peristaltic progression of digested food. Also (personal experience here) it produces imbalance in the homeostasis of temperature control resulting in fainting in over-heated Italian restaurants when you’re eight-and-a-lot-months gone. But obviously it does more than that because today I lunched with a pregnant blonde and witnessed symptoms of nutritionally depraved behaviour which were disturbing to behold. (Disclaimer: the pregnant blonde was not the same person as the blonde who accompanied me to Little India a few days ago; apparent blondeness is a common denominator, claimed pregnancy is not).
To be straight we weren’t planning on Floriditas to begin with. We had agreed on Olive - still on Cuba but on ‘the other side of the street’ both figuratively and literally - know what I mean? We entered at 11.22 am and Olive’s breakfast menu was chalked up. We weren’t impressed by the content and asked if they were serving lunch. Apparently breakfast finishes at 11.30 and lunch starts at 12.00. You can see the problem can’t you? Apparently they can’t. What the hell happens in the intervening 30 minutes? The concept of ‘all-day breakfasts’ transcends it all; why are you only allowed bacon and eggs at breakfast time and why are lamb shanks only available in the evening? I know chefs have to ‘plan’ and ‘control inventory’ but freezers are good things and microwaves are the savior of modern ‘chef-ness’. So we bailed out of Olive and ‘crossed the Cuba floor’ to Floriditas. Wonderful first impression; clean, fresh, bright and tasteful. We approached the counter and were met by a very personable guy; ‘Are you serving lunch,” we asked? He semi-rotated to check out a wonderful, clock suspended from the ceiling which must have been stolen from a 19th Century railway station; it read 11.25 am. ‘Yes!’ he exclaimed. RIGHT ANSWER! Olive please note.
However, that was it from the personable guy for the time being. We were left to our own devices to find a table but were quickly attended to by a nice young thing with tempting menus. These were very elegantly designed and printed but presented in an extremely tatty cover/holder. Shame really, and a clue to other shortfalls which could potentially transform the place onto a real gastronomic gem.
From outside, the windows are impressive – Floriditas’ designs and glass etchings display a terrific image enticing customers inside and the interior impression is classy and tranquil. Once inside, however, the reverse, exterior view of Cuba Street is not the best. Cuba deteriorates rapidly as you transverse South to North and the architecture and passing clientele deteriorate accordingly. Floriditas’ customers display style and class second to none but that’s in spite of the location, not because of it. I wasn’t hungry so ordered rocket leaves, olive oil and feta as a side and roasted tomato and summer herb soup with baguette as a main. The pregnant blonde, visibly exhibiting an appetite suitable for a Tyrannosaurus Rex, restricted herself to char-grilled rib-eye but failed to conceal the immense amount of self-control necessary to restrict herself to just one choice of mains.
While we waited for service the discussion turned to other gastronomic delights. The previous evening I’d seen ‘Hannibal Rising’ so the cannibalistic developments in the maturation of the young Hannibal were significant, particularly the gastronomic survival necessities during the Second World War. If you or I were exposed to young Hannibal’s experiences, who knows, maybe we would also have matured into serial-murdering-socio-psychopaths with exquisite taste and questionable tendencies? The discussion then progressed to maggots as a problem with sheep rearing and the dangers of pneumonia when lambs fall into lakes – all in a day’s general flux of Kiwi day-to-day conversation.
My salad was promising. There was no evidence of salt at all but had the Chef added sea salt, increased the Feta by 50%, upped the amount of olive oil and introduced Kalamata olives he could have a stunning introductory dish. The description of the soup was enticing; ‘roasted tomato with summer herbs.’ The summer herbs turned out to be overwhelmingly parsley which totally obliterated the tomatoes and ruined the whole soupy experience. Additionally the soup was lukewarm – no excuse for that.
On the other side of the equation the pregnant blond was ecstatic. Apart from devouring the menu in anticipation, her order of grilled rib-eye was a conscious restriction of appetite constrained by evolutionary peer pressure – she wanted a veritable horse-trough; it didn’t work. After slicing through and thoroughly masticating the resulting culinary presentation in record time (before I’d taken a quarter of the soup) she pronounced, ‘Jeez, I’ll come here again. Everything tastes absolutely beautiful and the meat is divine.’ I thought her portion looked small but pregnancy changes your metabolism, it must do - there’s another person inside your being, and the pregnant blonde considered ordering the same meal again so maybe Floriditas should serve bigger portions for pregnant people (usually women).
My espresso was translated into ‘short black’ by the waitress. The espresso beans were over-roasted and tasted burnt. For all its overt sophistication Wellington is not the ‘center of the sophis-Universe’ that it would wish to be. It’s not far off, but its not there yet.
As we were leaving I noticed the place seemed to be a veritable chick-magnet: weirdly, females outnumbered males 8:1. When we approached the check-out we saw some lovely looking tarts (nothing to do with the chicks). Enquiry determined they were quince, taste displayed they were wonderful and offering to pay for them resulted in an offer of ‘gratis’ from the ‘personable guy’ encountered on our entrance!
Anyway, obviously 1) if you’re pregnant: eat at Floriditas, 2) pregnancy alters your taste buds. Maybe I’m pregnant.
Lunch prices:
Starters - no idea; they don’t really do them as such.
Mains:$16-$20
Food:
Variable – excellent if you’re pregnant, if-ish if you’re trying to be.
Value:Good
Service:Confusing
Ambience:
Amazingly chick-friendly.
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