HERALD ON SUNDAY RATING: 3.5/5
Address: 55 Tamaki Drive, Mission Bay
Phone: 521 5758
Open: Weekdays from 5pm
KEY POINTS:
It's mesclun - not mescaline - the take-home mix of salad greens that takes on a silage-pit smell if you keep it for too long. If the one you're getting at three bucks a bag is, in fact, mescaline, I want to know where you shop.
Mesclun takes the effort out of salad at home, but it has been something of a disaster for dining out: it's become the chef's afterthought, the farewell fistful that gets dumped on everything just before it leaves the kitchen. Two fistfuls in a bowl make a line item on the bill. The idea of the potager - the chef's kitchen garden from which garnish greens are harvested daily and used thoughtfully - is now as out of favour as whale sashimi or date-stuffed, spit-roasted camel.
The Bay Bistro in Mission Bay is not an egregious offender in this regard, but the thought occurred to me when the Blonde's entree - a carpaccio of beef and venison - landed on the table. It looked like a green salad. With meat on the side. The carpaccio - near-raw slices of meat, more juicy than paper-thin - and its dressing were quite superb, but the accompanying chlorophyllous clump made it look like someone was making sure the Blonde ate her greens.
Finding a decent restaurant in Mission Bay is a challenge. The excellent pasta restaurant Sages, tucked up a side street, is an honourable exception, but the main drag is remarkably free of top-quality dining options. Every time I run the gauntlet of pizza joints, icecream parlours and cafes where they serve bad coffee, I pine for Bondi and St Kilda.
So Bay Bistro, which opened in the middle of last year, offering what it bills as New Zealand food with a French twist, is a welcome addition to the strip. Its upstairs position, looking over the pohutukawa along the roadside to the reserve and beach beyond, takes in one of the harbour's best views, and the room - starched linen, a fire (in January?) and waiters with exotic accents - gives the impression that an effort is being made.
The chef, Samoan-born Kasiano Tagoai, won gold in a field of 600 at a culinary contest in September and he plainly knows his stuff. But the composite parts of the meals sometimes struggled to meld into a coherent whole.
An entree of foie gras and scallops on a sweet brioche made for a heavy combination: the scallops, nutty and juicy, were divine, but the overall effect was cloying.
The Blonde's main of moist seared salmon was accompanied by a remoulade (classically a caper-and-anchovy mayonnaise) which was mainly shrimp - a fish that I have always thought should be eaten by other fish, not by humans - and evoked unhappy memories of shrimp cocktails.
Bay Bistro still needs to get some of the details right - the diner should be told in advance, and not required to discover from experience, that some ingredients promised on the menu haven't been delivered.
And the service, while courtly, is so over-attentive it verges on harassment. But it's good to see another upscale eatery at the bay. Let's hope it's the second of many.
Wine list: Adequate. Limited by the glass, and remarkably little French.
Vegetarians: A few options.
Watch out for: The view.
Sound check: Conversation-friendly.
Bottom line: A cut above the competition.
- Detours, HoS
