Delicacy Café
Charmian Smith
$$-$$$
595 Highgate, Maori Hill, Dunedin
ph: 03-464 0770
Mon-Wed 8.30am-5.30pm; Thurs-Fri 8.30am until late; Sat 9am until late; Sun 9am-4.30pm
Rating: Eat: 6.5 Drink: 6
Look: 6.5 Care: 7
Reviewed in Cuisine Issue 119, November 2006
Delicacy, the busy little suburban deli and café in Maori Hill which opened earlier this year, now offers evening dining three nights a week. The menu is intriguing – you can mix and match the flavours on your plate.
Because the kitchen behind the counter is tiny, owner Ron Bull and chef Craig Redmile (formerly of the Conservatory Restaurant at Corstorphine House) have designed the menu so you select the different components separately: first a meat or fish such as pork belly braised in Asian spices, or grouper flavoured with citrus Vincotto and wrapped in prosciutto, or dukkah-coated venison; then you match it with a carbohydrate such as potato rösti, mushroom risotto or preserved lime and fig couscous; then add a selection from the vegetables such as steamed bok choy, roasted mushrooms, or slow-roasted tomato; and you finish it with a sauce such as warm Asian dressing, a shallot and garlic jus, or a red capsicum reduction.
The permutations are many and obviously some work better than others, but I suspect the flavour combinations are not as finely tuned as they would be if the dishes were individually designed. Nevertheless, it’s a chance to play with your food – the waitress will guide you, you can leave it to the chef, or you can go for something wild and wacky. Redmile, a skilled chef, admits to tweaking flavours slightly if he thinks the combinations diners have chosen are too way out.
While you are pondering the menu, or if you’re there for lunch or just a drink and a snack, there are salads, an antipasto platter and little tarts – or simply bread with the grassy, peppery new season’s oil from Cairnmuir in Central Otago and a dish of olives.
And there’s a selection of interesting cakes and pies for dessert and decent coffee to finish.
Bull has a small but carefully selected range of wines, including some of the new, small Central Otago labels such as Gibbston Highgate and Black Quail. 
Photography by Bill Nichol
|
|
 |
 |
|
|
