Logan-Brown, Wellington

By AUDREY YOUNG for canvas

The Brown half of Logan-Brown restaurant in Wellington, chef Alister Brown, took the telephone reservation himself for a Saturday night.

More impressive was that he agreed to accommodate a small group for a late dinner at 10pm, after the theatre.

But it was clear we were pushing the margins. "I wouldn't want you to get there any later than that," he said, and we didn't.

The restaurant is a converted National Bank building in Wellington's red-light district, the location epitomising a studied lack of pretension (they refer to a lack of pretension on their website).

Scruffy denim-clad diners (my lot) are as welcomed as the well-heeled suits at the table over the way (Mr Bolger and American visitors).

One friend began conservatively with Waikanae crab cakes and salmon gravlax. The other had crispy veal sweetbreads on savoy cabbage with shiitake mushrooms.

No complaints from the friends about their dishes, but both agreed mine was the pick. It was an entree recommended by previous diners and something of a signature dish there - paua ravioli.

It sounded like a contrived "New Zealand meets Italy" mismatch. In the flesh, it is a beautiful relationship. Thin, almost see-through ravioli is packed with a tidy amount of chunky, dark, ground paua that pokes through the paste and is set on a tangy lime beurre blanc.

Five of the nine entrees ($18 to $25) were seafood: paua, scampi tails, squid, crab cake and fish soup. And so were two of the mains ($30 to $37): groper, and seared turbot with crab and crayfish orzo.

Our first waitress was smart, friendly and informed, with one exception. She did not know whether the crayfish orzo (rice-shaped pasta) was simply orzo cooked in crayfish stock or whether it came with crayfish meat as well. Not knowing was not a problem, but she had to be asked to find out, rather than volunteering to.

Oddly, we had four different waiters, one for each course and another for coffee. But it was a seamless change: each knew who at the table had ordered what.

The bloke in our group ordered Awatere wild boar pie with cranberry relish - the dish said to be named after the porker's origins around that river in Marlborough. It was later declared a fine and tender creation.

The other friend ordered groper fillet with little neck clams on the wide-ribboned pappardelle pasta on a lemon olive oil broth.

The answer from the kitchen was that the orzo dish had crab meat, not crayfish meat. I chose it anyway, curious about the turbot. Apparently caught off the West Coast, it resembled a terakihi fillet, only much more moist. It seemed perfectly well cooked, but as fish go was not terribly memorable.

The orzo was the star of the dish, with an immediate aroma of crayfish.

The meal portions were not generous, but after dessert we felt replete. The elegantly striped brandied cherry and chocolate trifle was served in a martini glass.

My dessert looked plain, but was again quite the sensational finale: warmed rice pudding in a small fine pastry shell, with a dollop of brandy ice-cream on top and cognac-soaked prunes on the side.

The fact that Logan-Brown is at home among the capital's adult entertainment is perhaps not an incompatible fit. It serves seriously adult food. Excellence, not snobbery, gives Logan-Brown its class.

Cost: Three-course meal for three with vegetables, and coffee, $246. We also paid $74 for two bottles of Cable Bay sauvignon blanc. It also offers a $29.95 three-course bistro menu for weekday lunches and pre-theatre dinner.

* Read more about what's happening in the world of food, wine, party places and entertainment in canvas magazine, part of your Weekend Herald print edition.