Get 3 Courses for $77 – Entrée, Main & Dessert
ENTRÉES
- Soup du jour / 17
- French onion soup, gruyère crouton / 19
- 55 day aged fillet tartare, radish, free-range egg yolk, smoked miso mayo, crispy shallots, crouton / 21
- Free-range pork belly, burnt apple puree, celeriac remoulade, compressed apple, crispy sage /22
- Butternut squash, smoked halloumi, tamarillo chutney, black rice cracker /21
- Black tiger prawns, calamari, bok choy, olive oil, garlic, butter, white wine, peri-peri sauce, milk bun /23
MAINS
- Market fish, scallops, yams, spinach, harissa, garlic, rocket, almonds /42
- Half deboned roast duck, red cabbage relish, chorizo, Brussel sprouts, parsnip puree, walnut /44
- 200g 55 day aged beef fillet, sweet potato, sautéed broccolini, bacon, potato galette, truffle jus /48
- 2Free-range pork ribeye, confit garlic mash, portobello mushroom, mustard cream, chips /42
- Royalburn lamb fillet, merquez sausage, Jerusalem artichoke, goats cheese, pear and date chutney, hazelnuts, brown butter /45
- Vegetarian cassoulet, tomato, cannellini beans, parmesan and thyme crumb /38
SIDES
- French fries with truffle salt
- Steamed broccoli, silverbeet, kale, blue cheese dressing
- Sautéed baby peas, bacon, shallots, butter
- Confit garlic mash potatoes, chives
– please add $10.50 for sides –
Trust the chef 2course $60 or 3course $74
DESSERTS
- Vanilla crème brulée, almond crumb, boysenberry ice cream / 19
- Choux pastry, hazelnut praline diplomat cream, citrus textures, caramel, lime sorbet / 19
- Almond friand, berry curd & coulis, rhubarb, rooibos gel, strawberry caramel, vanilla ice cream/ 19
- Chocolate pastry flan, maple Chantilly, pop corn, walnuts, coffee crème anglaise / 19
- Selection of house made ice cream and sorbets / 16
UN FROMAGE
One 80g portion of cheese, served with accompaniments / 23
TRIO DE FROMAGES
Selection of three 40g portions of cheeses, served with accompaniments / 35
AFFOGATO
Vanilla ice cream, espresso coffee, liqueur / 20
5 COURSE TASTING MENU
with wine matching
Soup of the Day
Maude Methode Traditionelle Brut NV, Marlborough
Butternut squash, smoked halloumi, tamarillo chutney, black rice cracker
Maude Pinot Noir ‘20, Wanaka
Market fish, scallops, yams, spinach, harissa, garlic, rocket, almonds
Jules Tayles Sauv Blanc ’21, Marlborough
Free-range pork belly, burnt apple puree, celeriac remoulade, compressed apple, crispy sage
Maude Pinot Gris ‘21, Wanaka
Almond friand, berry curd & coulis, rhubarb, rooibos gel, strawberry caramel, vanilla ice cream
Pegasus Bay Finale Noble ’19, Canterbury
5 Course menu / 120
Wine matching / 170
When the season allows, we enhance our dishes using fresh produce from the kitchen garden.
-
-
-
Bistro Gentil is described in a major tourist brochure for Wanaka as '...our award winning restaurant ' and came up as #1 on Trip Advisor reviews. The online menu looked... read more exciting too, so off we went for dinner.
Now I don't like writing negative reviews but I really was disappointed.
Wild venison carpaccio as an entree had about as much venison as a single thin slice of prosciutto. And with more than that in the form of poached pear, cranberry gel and sun dried tomato, I just couldn't taste the venison. It's not that these things don't go with venison, but the dish was so mean on the venison that it just got swamped.
It didn't get much better with the fish main. Three tiny pieces of monkfish, while tasting good, just didn't show the character of the fish. The celeriac puree was good, and could have been the main counterpoint of the fish with maybe one other flavour. But add prawns, leek, orange and bok choy to a tiny serve of fish and it just got lost. Somewhere there was apparently black garlic butter too... I've had many entrees that were more generous.
On the plus side, the garden salad was good and so were the wines (though a bit on the high price side by the glass).
Overall I think Bistro Gentil is trying too hard, maybe to hold or rescue some past glory. But the meanness of the and better balanced than this.
A French onion soup was sweet but maybe at the expense of some flavour of the onion. It was saved by a crust of gruyere but we're still trying to work out where the crouton was.
Overall the meanness of the feature ingredients in the serves, and the overcomplicated and overcompensated accompaniments, really it down.
I'm hoping they were just having a bad night, as their menu should really set you alight.
Goodandsimple
May 22, 2021
-
-
-
-
-
-
-