Lunch

Press, 9 February 1983, Page 16

Lunch

Nobody would go to Dux-de-Lux for the decor the interior is gloomy and untidy, the tables are old and the cutlery is what is called “serviceable" — but the food is good. I started with a curried peanut soup — a thick soup, well-spiced, and a good way of letting the palate know who is master. I continued on this incendiary path with “enchiladas," in effect a tortilla, stuffed with cheese and other agreeable ingredients, and topped with a highly-stimulating chilli sauce. My wife had a zucchini and vegetable quiche. Both the quiche and the enchiladas were delicious, but both my wife and I were disappointed with the vegetable salad which accompanied them. It comprised ingredients, taken from several bowls, such as red cabbage, lettuce, beans, rice, corn and potato.

But, with the exception of the potato, all the other vegetables seemed to have been dressed in the same rather bland dressing. Few things are more delicious than a salad assembled from as it were, a collection of subsidiary salads which have been individually dressed.

There are places in Christchurch where such salads are available to a diner and I have been surprised to find

that Dux-de-Lux. as a vegetarian restaurant, is not one of them. It is a pity as. on this

occasion, to serve an excellent tortilla and an excellent quiche, and then detract from the over-all effect with undoubtedly nourishing but not particularly exciting vegetables. Prices seem to vary substantially between lunch and dinner, but the lunch prices were very reasonable. The first-rate soup described above was $1.60; the cost of the enchiladas was $4. and the quiche was $4.75.