Chandelier, Ponsonby Rd

Chandelier's chef Bradman Harris opts for produce-driven comfort food. Picture / Carolyn Robertson

Herald rating: * * * *

Dahling," the Viva Diva instructed in the Sloane-ish drawl that comes over her at this time of year, "it's Feshion Week. Try to go somewhere feshionable. Where models go."

"Models don't eat," I protested. "They avoid restaurants for fear of catching calories. They're paranoid because the average piece of sushi contains 40 calories. For a model, nibbling 10 canapes at an opening means consuming her own bodyweight."

She fixed me from beneath an elegantly slim eyebrow. "So, if she was in town," she said, "where would you find Kate Moss?"

"It's like a catwalk," said the Valley Girl, surveying the sashaying up and down the marble central aisle from a booth in Chandelier. "They walk up and down so you can check them - and their clothes - out."

She was talking about the other patrons, but it went equally for the staff. All male, and she rather liked that. "The sort of boys," she said, "that you wouldn't want to take home, but are really good fun at a party."

She had put her finger on it. There have been changes at Chandelier. In its earlier days, the restaurant was - there is no other word - extravagant.

Actually, there is another word, for on an earlier visit one coined the term "maximalist". But as Robert Allen Zimmerman snarled, "There's a blonde on my lap and she's drinking champagne ... " Sorry, wrong line. The one I wanted was, "Things have changed."

The plush cushions are a couple of years older, the staff a few years younger and a couple of decades more laid back, and edges have been knocked off the marble tables and tiles.

We debated the stylistic influences. The Valley Girl thought Russian, I thought Venetian, the genteely disintegrating remains of a palazzo occupied by the last of the family. The contemporary Chandelier is a deliciously rococo grunge.

The food, too, has changed. Bradman Harris cited three influences in a recent interview - scientific: intelligent chefs creating new methods and rewriting the rules; comfort food: duck a l'orange, coq au vin and cauliflower cheese; and produce-driven food: good ingredients giving clean flavours and healthier dishes.

Last week's menu - it changes often, and what you read on the net might not be what himself is serving this week - stuck to the comfort food agenda. There was lots of seafood. There were lots of interesting ingredients. At times there were too many interesting ingredients on one plate.

She started with sauteed scampi tails, ruby grapefruit, baby cos and fennel. Because I was under instructions from the opening paragraph and eyebrow, I chose the sort of thing that a model might eat: radicchio, witloof, walnut, celery and blue cheese. That was my starter. I suspect that, for a model, it would have been a main.

"How did you find that?" said the Valley Girl, and before I could answer, she put it, rather neatly: "There was a lovely mouthful, then one that I wasn't quite so sure of, then some great tastes. Now that I've finished, there are lots of cool flavours banging around in my mouth."

She'd chosen the eye fillet main, lusciously red and dripping, bulbs of garlic and roasted jerusalem artichokes genteely disintegrating around the edges of the platter.

Snootier critics in our burgh sneer at confit of anything, much less duck, but Harris was nailing his culinaries to the comfort food mast. The bird was well and truly and slowly cooked, with a starch (creamed parsnip), a green (lovingly braised endive), a cliche (Puy lentils) and a novelty (pickled cherries).

We thought about dessert. I felt that chocolate fondant or plum tart might have put a full stop to a comforting evening. She didn't, but wasn't surprised when I called for cheese and port. It was a goodish port, too, Graham's 20 Year, after glasses of Patutahi Gewurz with my salad and Sam Neill's Sleeping Dogs pinot noir to hang out with the duck, but the cheeses were familiar mates from the supermarket.

Sauntering along the boulevard, she said, "So, what did you think?" and I said, "It used to think that it was a really good restaurant, which you would if Prince Albert dropped in for antipasto, but now it's a lot less pretentious and a lot more fun." She said, "I liked it, but the music is a real worry." I think it was the Kenny Rogers' tracks that put her off. Wonder if they've ever thought about some nice Bob Dylan CDs to hum along to?

Address: 152 Ponsonby Rd
Phone: (09) 360 9315
Hours: Open seven days, from 5pm
Owners: Chris Rupe and Paula Macks
Chef: Joe Boreham
On the menu: Duck Liver Parfait with Pear Compote and Toasted Brioche $16
Pork Belly with Star Anise, Soy, and Green Mango/ Pickled Cucumber Salad $16/$24.50
Plum Tart with Creme Chantilly $13
Vegetarian: Limited options on menu
Wine: Above average cellar
Bottom line: Rococo grunge and less baroque food fits better than its earlier over-the-top style