Chinched Bistro

Owned by Chefs Shaun and Michelle, Chinched Bistro offers a gourmet casual dining for foodies. Aside from being the Pastry Chef, Michelle is also such a great host making sure to check up on the customers to make sure they are happy and well attended to.
DRINKS:
1) Newfie Twist ($ 12) — Infused Partridgeberry Vodka, Triple Sec, Cranberry, Fresh Lime
Love the cocktails here because they are strong. For this particular drink, I found the cranberry to have taken over the drink.
2) Limoncello Drop ($ 12) — House Infused Limoncello, Bacardi Limon, Fresh Lemon
This was such a refreshing drink. Takes me back to Limoncello drinks that I’ve had in Naples, Italy.
DINNER:
1) Combo Charcuterie board ($ 14÷28÷54) — Five Brother’s Mozzarella, Five Brother’s 1 year old Cheddar, house cured Coppa, Prosciutto and Soppressata. Including: house made mustard, apricot and pear compote and house made pickles, crackers and marinated olives.
Love love love the mix of cheese and meat here. Also, they use Five Brother Artisan Cheese which is the only manufacturer of cheese in Newfoundland and Labrador.
2) Baked PEI oysters ($ 3/​pc) — Baked with Parmesan and Bacon
These were baked well, but the overall taste was salty. I barely tasted the oyster anymore because of the saltiness from bacon and parmesan.
3) Buffalo Pig Ears ($ 10)
Omg! These were so addicting! So crunchy with a spicy and tangy flavour from the Buffalo sauce! Perfect with beer! Reminds me of what we eat in the Philippines called Sisig.
4) Lobster Cavatelli ($ ¹⁵⁄₃₀) — Local Lobsters, English Peas, Black Pepper, Mascarpone
They make their pasta homemade and these were just perfectly al dente. Lots of lobster chunks on this pasta which I really love. The creamy sauce went well to enhance the lobster.
5) Pan Fried Cod ($ 23) — Lobster Nage, O’Leva Olive Oil
This was so simply yet so perfect. The cod was perfectly pan-​fried — the texture was tender but the outside was crunchy. The cod doesn’t fall apart as you cut into them. I LOVE the lobster nage.
6) Cannellini Beans ($ 6) — Parmigiano broth
First time having this kind of soup. I found the broth a little salty, but in a good way since it’s Parmigiano salty, and not salt salty. This was very interesting indeed.
7) House-​made Pavlova — Newfoundland wild berries, whipped cream, Michelle’s granola
OMG this was so addictingly good! It was like eating fluffy clouds! You get the chewiness and sweetness of the merangue with the sourness of the berries and the crunchiness of the nuts.

Chinched Bistro is a lovely, laid back bistro that serves innovative dishes and specializes in charcuterie. Michelle was a very gracious host and very attentive to customers’ needs. She regularly checked in with us to see how we were enjoying our meal.
We had the following during our dinner:
1) House cocktails (Limoncello Drop & Newfie Twist) — Really enjoyed the cocktails since they were unique and had a strong dose of alcohol.
2) Charcuterie board — This was the best charcuterie board we had in the city. The cured meats were very flavourful and the variety of other snacks as part of the board made it fun to mix and match. The cheese selections were also from St. John’s.
3) Baked PEI oysters — These were a bit too salty, probably due to the bacon. Because of the saltiness, it was hard to taste the oyster.
4) Buffalo pig ears — Very creative dish and goes well with alcohol! These are extremely addictive; very light and crunchy so you can gobble them up easily.
5) Lobster cavatelli — The homemade pasta was cooked perfectly al dente. Sauce was very creamy and you can really taste the lobster. I really enjoyed this dish, though it is quite heavy due to the density of the cavatelli pasta.
6) Pan-​fried cod with lobster nage — Cod was pan-​fried masterfully so the texture was tender but the fish still holds a shape. Lobster nage complemented the fish without overpowering it.
7) Cannellini beans in Parmigiano broth — I’m not a big fan of beans but I really liked the broth here. The sharp and salty essence of the Parmigiano is distilled completely into to the broth. Almost like cheese transformed into a whole new dimension :)
8) House-​made Pavlova — Really enjoyed this dessert since it was very light, had the right amount of sweetness and berry tang. Perfect way to end a meal.

We had a great evening there last night. Our reservation was early and it was quiet, but was busier when left. The concept is smaller entrée plates, so that you try more and sharing plates were encouraged. In the end we tried four courses and two deserts, all shared. Salmon, oysters, pork belly and duck leg. Well presented and great taste.
Thank you, it was a very nice evening. Worth a try.

I asked around and everyone suggested that I try Chinched… What a great decision… The mussels were literally the best I’ve ever had. No word of a lie. There is a taco challenge in St. John’s right now and all the restaurants in town are taking part… Their pulled pork taco will blow your mind… The service is as good as the food — the are very accommodating and friendly. This is seriously one of the best restaurants I’ve been to in years — great job!

Absolutely fantastic meal! Small, simple menu, everything simply wonderful. Michelle, one of the owners is around constantly checking on things to assure that it’s prefect. Highly recommend a visit here, especially if you are not a vegan or vegetarian!

We had a large, diverse group and everyone enjoyed Chinched. It’s pork intensive (check out the cheeky art work, especially in the upstairs area), but they accommodated vegetarian preferences. I’m not vegetarian but ordered the same thing as a vegan in our group and was thrilled with the taste and the presentation. We ordered the charcuterie plates for the group which were well received. The breads were quite interesting, as were the nut and olive appetizers. Good selection of wines by the glass.
Seating options include banquettes and tables. I believe that there was bar seating downstairs. Service was good, but could someone advise if it’s a Newfoundland thing that they don’t keep track of which guest ordered which dish? We couldn’t tell whether it happened every time that we ate out because we had a large group or because that’s a provincial tradition. Reasonable prices.

It is a sort of upscale, run by a husband and wife, great food always, nice location and nice atmosphere.

Excellent restaurant!
Lovely meals, really nice charcuterie plates and very original dishes.
Desserts are also excellent!
To try!

Great food, awesome service and a truly unbelievable margarita! In St. John’s for any time at all you must come by and at a minimum get the cilantro margarita with an order of Korean octopus.

The good: It’s all pretty average. Just walk around to the other restaurants in the city and grab their menus and pick one dish from each. Nothing original at all here. Why open something if you’re going to do the same thing as everyone else?
The bad: Limited menu, 3 entrees each of which can be found elsewhere in the city but prepared in a better manner. The bulk of the appetizers are just charcuterie which you can freely buy yourself in a store. The other dishes are just boring and the typical copy what everyone else is doing.
Everyone here wants to move back home and I guess it’s the in thing to open a restaurant. Why do it if you don’t have anything new to offer though.
I’d skip it. There are better options in the city.

Across from St, John ‘s ‘red light’ district (3 strip clubs) is a tiny but incredible bistro. The tiny dining area sits on top of kitchen and small bar. The bar maybe accommodates 6 while the dining area only has 10 tables… Reservations are highly recommended and well deserved for here.
The menu fits on one page but it highlights the seasonal offerings and bounty of the coast. It’s creative and phenomenally executed. Everyone at my table made a comment of ‘oh my gosh… This is amazing’ before going silent for the next 6 minutes of focused eating and savouring. We started off with a charcuterie platter consisting of 3 local cured meats including pork, duck, and elk. Also 3 types if local cheeses were generously plated beside them and in house cured olives, jams, drunk figs, and in house candied pecans. The flavours were bold, delightful, and a great start. The mussels were also ordered and the use of sweet cherry tomatoes with fresh Newfoundland mussels were tasty. Ontario can’t compete.
Our mains made us wish we had a second stomach to try more. Our table ordered the mammoth sized steak, 2 daily specials of fresh crabcakes, morel mushroom and meltingly soft braised veal cheeks, and 2 of the flash fried wrapped potato ‘noodle’ on a large cod steak. I had the cod and it was the best white fish dish I’ve had in a long time. The cod was a generous portion and seared nicely. It was creatively wrapped with potato but it was finely made into an angel hair pasta thinness. Then it was flash fried to crisp up the potato. The soft tender delicate white meat and crispy potato was a great textural combination. The fresh local cherry tomatoes were flavourful and the bright lemon and caper vinaigrette just made the fish standout. My colleagues all thought this was either the best dish they had all year or the best veal dish in their life.
The desserts were divine… I had the poached meringue that was cloud like and it was the perfect base for the best lemon curd I’ve had in a restaurant. Puckering bold citrus flavour but tempered a bit with a restraint use of sugar and butter… Loved it. The wild local blueberries compote was like taking a handful of real sweet berries and putting it into your at one time. I couldn’t believe how concentrated it was.
This restaurant is on the pricier side but friendly staff, phenomenal dishes, and warm atmosphere puts this on my list of ‘must eat here ’ in St. John’s.

Six of us dined at Chinched last night to celebrate my wife’s birthday. Service is very good and the food was excellent. All of us thoroughly enjoyed our meal and would dine here again.

This place has a decent local reputation in the city but I ate here once for dinner and it was pretty good. There are certainly better places in the city like Piatto and Bacalao but I’ll probably try it again to make sure it wasn’t an off day. They were serving pig trotters as a special so maybe the chef was in a weird mood

This place is amazing. I went here twice in 3 days because I couldn’t get their salad off of my mind. I also tried the chicken livers, chartucere plate, nettle and potato soup, and the pork belly. All were insanely good, and this coming from a guy who lives in San Francisco (foodie central). Highly recommend for anyone with a sense of adventure who likes food. Oh, and the staff were amazingly cool. They gave us tourist tips and chatted with us all night. Great bunch.

What a fabulous discovery! Local foods, fantastic staff & delicious menu items, there really isn’t much to complain about! Reservations are recommended, as there doesn’t seem to be a lot of room. I arrived shortly after they opened, and I was one of 3 walk-​ins they seated, everyone else was turned away. I ordered from the bar menu which I loved, because it allowed me options rather than forcing me to choose just ONE (2 choices for $ 12, 3 for $ 17, 4 for $ 22). I, of course, opted for 4 because I really had trouble choosing!
Local Mussels, Chorizo, Buttered Corn Broth: light and delicious, although difficult to eat at the bar because of space constraints. The broth was so unique, and worked really well with the mussels… sopped up the rest of the broth with their delicious house-​made bread.
Squid Ink Cavatelli, Artichokes, Sun Dried Tomatoes, Kale: this had to be my favourite dish of the 4 I chose. The cavatelli was tender, and the combination of artichokes, tomatoes and kale worked incredibly well together. Highly recommended!
Veal Sweetbread Fritters with Whole Grain Dijonnaise: I’ve never had sweetbreads before and, feeling somewhat adventurous, I figured «why not?» The dish was a tad on the spicy side for me, so I didn’t enjoy it as much as the other dishes, though I didn’t dislike it either. Perhaps had it not been so spicy, I would’ve eaten more of it…
and, finally, the Duck Confit Spring Rolls with Miso Dressing: I wish this dish hadn’t come last because I feel it got an unfair chance. By the time I got this dish, I was already beyond full (who didn’t see that coming when I said I chose 4 dishes?!) so I sort of took one bite of it, if only for tasting’s sake. It was okay but, again, I think I might’ve liked it more had it not been the last dish I got.
I was told that the menu changes every so often, so I’m definitely looking forward to coming back here and sampling all the other dishes that Chinched has to offer!

Found this bistro on Unilocal and tried it. Must say that there are many restaurants along Water Street and Duckworth but so many are touristy. This little place is at the end of the row on Queen and offers easy street parking. I had a starter to sample the cuisine and I found it to be well-​prepared and fresh. The staff were friendly and the place has charm. Unfortunately, the city was experiencing a heat wave and the restaurant was quite warm so I had no wine.
Highly recommend it for a new and different dining experience.

Michelle and her team was excellent during service in September. We started off with a party of 11, and it dynamically changed to 17 when service began. The waitress and the kitchen staff adapted to the situation as expected, and no one left Chinched hungry.
We were warned that the food would be coming out slowly, and the is some truth to that. However, the news of how quickly the kitchen staff could expedite the meal allowed the gathering of 17 to invest in Chinched wide selection of wines, and gave our group the opportunity to reconnect. 13 bottles later…
The food arrived just as we were getting to the point of fierce hunger violence. The melody of flavors in the scallop starter was superb. Cooked to perfection, juicy, and a descent portion for a scallop starter. (Unlike a certain restaurant I visited earlier in the week (bleu)) Moving on…
I do believe the majority of the table ordered the scallop dish and no one was disappointed by the execution and the flavors. For the main dish, the majority of the table ordered the potato wrapped cod with, what I would describe as explosions of lobster meat. Incredible dish. I could have eaten another if our group didn’t have post dinner commitments.
Not a single person had anything negative to say about the about the service, we pretty much covered most of the menu, including a birthday dessert, our waitress was incredible, honest, fun, effective. I feel like she worked at a bar sometime in her life.
Definitely will be returning, it appears that their menu is seasonal, definitely would recommend to a friend, I can’t wait to go back.

Rules. Ate here three times in one week. Staff is great friendly and helpful as hell. Nettle soup is the best. Bread is dominant. Bacon mayo is king. Atmosphere is boss. Truffle is tits. Salad is super. YUM! x 100 000

First off I had a wonderful experience! The restaurant had been reserved for our large party. The waitresses and bartender were really friendly and funny.
My meal consisted of:
Wine: Unfortunately I can’t remember the names of the wine but we had a red and a white. The white which was made with champagne grapes was probably the best white wine I’ve ever had. The red was good also.
Lemon Drop: Really nice flavor, and good amount of vodka.
Lettuce Farm Greens: Wow! The lettuce is so light and fluffy, the spiced almonds were really yummy. It works really well with the goat cheese. The pears were ok but it would have been better if they were more thinly sliced.
Coconut Milk Steamed Newfoundland Mussels: You get so many and they are pretty big. They were delicious and cooked to perfection! I wanted more. :)
Pan Seared Striploin with Barley Risotto, Bone Marrow Jus, and Crispy Onions: My stomach is growling just thinking about this meal. It was really really good. I especially loved the barley risotto, yum!
Warm Chocolate Pudding: This was good but really filling and rich. I especially enjoyed the seemingly homemade marshmallow on top.
Hopefully one day I can return!

The site of good old Mustang Sally’s hey? Add a cool bar, new stair railings, some unique artwork plus Michelle and Shaun and you have Chinched, a very smooth and suave newish bistro on
Queen St. Everybody is having a good time here, even the staff, there’s a low rumble of satisfaction that you notice when you enter, this ship is sailing smoothly. There is a welcome, a quick drink and an explanation of the various menus; because I am flying solo this night I opt for the bar, let me tell you this bar is not for kids, the height is almost too high to eat on. However the attentive Michelle who is running a very efficient front of house, interspersed with trivia, local news and foody chat, persuades me that eating at chest height is better than solitude at a table.
Food? Oh yes the food, one of the draw backs about solo dining is that it limits the total number of dishes one can order. However Chinched not only has their regular dinner menu, but it also has a bar menu with tapa sized portions, many that also appear on the main menu. Sitting by the bar one gets a good idea and even a few glimpses of what’s a happening in the galley, Shaun is running a tight ship is what is happening, as you would need to with a kitchen of this size. Wonderful looking dishes are appearing on a regular basis and all also sounds orderly, with no panic or even an occasional curse — good sign! I order from the bar menu to increase my options, the 5 dishes, steamed mussels in coconut milk with ginger, Crispy chicken livers with smoky tomato dressing, a small salad with poached pears, goat cheese and almonds, homemade charcuterie and prawn with caramelized onion and bacon arrive in waves. Everything is freshly prepared, a visual and oral delight, with the home poached pears and the unexpected prawn, onion and bacon mixture the highlights. In fact the prawn dish is one of the better apps I have had the pleasure of experiencing. The wine list is modest but adequate, with the best thing being the ½ liter carafes, the only place in St John’s that has this sensible option for individuals (or pairs) who want more than a glass but less than a bottle!
All in all a very sensitive and satisfying experience, as I have not mentioned any of the «mains» or desserts available check out the menu at
to see the full menu and special events upcoming. Cheers