The annual Monteith's Wild Food Challenge is now in full swing with about 120 restaurants around the country (10 in Dunedin and 13 in Central) going wild and wacky with their food.
Each winter for the past 11 years, the competition has drawn adventurous diners out with the lure of 'something different'.
Wild food can be interpreted in different ways.
Some of these include using ingredients not raised on a farm, unusual ingredients or cooking methods, or unusual presentation.
Each dish must be matched with one of Monteith's beers.
Dishes range from gorse-smoked goat and pork sausage, apple and piri piri dumpling with pan jus and vanilla anglais at The Palms, or pikipiko and huhu grub terrine at the Botswana Butchery, to blue cod brined in ale on a pumpkin and apple rosti with pickled fennel salad and saffron oil at Guilty, and wild boar spaghetti Bolognese at Cableways.
In Dunedin, participating restaurants are: Craft Bar, High Tide, Relish at the Mercure, Ombrellos, Ports O'Call, Princes on Dowling, The Palms, Alibi, Barakah and Cableways.
In Central: Botswana Butchery, Missy's Kitchen, Monteith's Trout Bar, Sargoods and Wineglass cafe in Wanaka, Hamills, Surreal Bar, Lombardi, Guilty, Grand Mercure Resort and Monty's Bar in Queenstown, Monteith's, The Cellar Door and Stadium Bar in Alexandra.
