It’s been a busy year for top rated Clyde restaurateur Paulina Corvalan, with the birth of her daughter Isabella and a string of accolades for her multi-cultural dining experience.

Her restaurant and namesake, Paulina’s, recently featured in the annual Eat.Taste.Central regional menu initiative and her team has worked hard to develop its reputation for New Zealand and international dishes.

“It was really nice to connect again with the Eat.Taste.Central annual food series and we enjoyed creating a dish to match wines from Central Otago,” says Paulina’s restaurant manager Mariana Alvarino.

“For the first time we worked with Alexandra based Hinton wines and customers loved it, so we are continuing to collaborate with them with special wines of the week during summer.”

Adept at fusing international flavours, Paulina’s focus is on using fresh, localised produce often picked from the restaurant’s own market garden.

“We have introduced some new dishes for summer and brought back favourites that showcase our ‘garden to plate’ philosophy,” says Mariana. “There is an African influenced Peri Peri chicken dish that has a touch of spice with cherry tomatoes, pineapple and coriander and feta salad served with hand cut fries.”

“The two favourite dishes returning are the Lomo Saltado, Peruvian style beef fillet stir fry with tomatoes, red onions, hand cut fries, coriander and our secret sauce and the Tempura Blue cod, Mexican style rice, corn and beans, crispy corn tortilla, avocado salsa and lime mayonnaise.”

“For our vegetarian dish we have introduced homemade fettucine served with rocket pesto, cherry tomatoes, olives, parmesan and pistachios.”

Mariana says smaller plates and sharing platters are ideal to enjoy with a glass of local Central Otago wine, including Peregrine Sauvignon Blanc which is a recent addition to the wine menu.