Stomachs on legs are proud to present

So the weekend before last I was in Auckland attending our annual sisters' reunion. There are four girls in my family, no boys. This is usually a weekend in either Auckland or Sydney and involves copious amounts of food, booze, giggling, bitching and sometimes tears.

This reunion began with foot massages and yum cha at Pearl Garden for which I was not present, instead I was standing at the kitchen sink grumbling about everything being organised far too early for my tastes, when I realised I just needed to go back to bed for a couple more hours (I had spent the previous day travelling 13 hours from Canberra to Auckland because I had decided to save money and catch the bus from Canberra to Sydney)

So the real get together began Saturday night. I collected kokoda and uni from the Nola's fish shop,



whilst other sisters bought oysters, salmon sashimi, crab, pipis and mussels.

Our dinners when held at my older sisters' are usually a movable feast. First off someone popped some champagne and then I decided to make guacamole with corn chips to serve with the kokoda, a la mexican kokoda that had worked so well when I made in March in NZ....the combination of Pacific Island style fish ceviche with mexican accountrements works and I recommend you try it.

We drunk more

My sister made the pipis and mussels smoked inside the bbq.



We drunk some more

I made kina spread on bruschetta with a bit of butter, salt and pepper and lemon. I had intended on serving it raw but it had a strange bitter after taste that Japanese uni doesn't tend to have so I decided that grilling it would be better. It was. Although reactions to the idea of kina bruschetta by my sister's partner's Maori and Pacific Island work mates was one of confusion "Kina...hmmm....Bruschetta????" Kina Bruschetta is an abomination to anyone that grew up fishing and diving in the Pacific seas.



Then we decided we were full....the live crabs sitting in a bucket in the garage probably thought they had made it past dinner



But then a few hours later came a second wind. We plunged them into hot water, pried back their heads and quartered them and threw them on the brazier



The night ended with cheese, whiskey (seconded from our father's booze cabinet) and a card game that couldn't be won on account of the fact that a number of cards were missing from the deck but everyone was far too drunk to notice



Sunday morning rolled round and began with my sister's spelt flour pancakes served with strawberries, yoghurt and maple syrup. An indulgence that made me wonder where the indulgence was.

We then went cockling at Cornwallis



Once everyone had collected their alloted 50 cockles each we recounted them and threw back the littlest ones





We headed for the grass for a rest beneath the pohutukawa trees, the classic red flowering tree of NZ often called the NZ Christmas tree.



Until we decided we were hungry again

So lunch of smoked salmon, salmon sashimi, cockles, bread and every single condiment we could find was amassed on the table in addition to a salsa verde I whipped up from my sister's kitchen garden.





We peeled off. I had a nap, others went for a walk and the littlest went home to feed her kitten. We reconvened at another Huia beach for a high tide swim



We returned for one last mammoth eating effort, lentil salad, toulouse sausages, tomato ragu and watercress, avocado, pear and walnut salad.



And said goodbye for another year.

Today my pal in NYC emailed to see if I was interested in attending this event in NYC when we go on holiday in a week.

She said, "Dunno if this interests you. It's a gastropub down near South St Seaport and the Finance District."

NELSON BLUE 1st ANNUAL PIG ROAST!!!

Nelson Blue is proud to invite you to our KIWI PIG PARTY!! This celebration will be in full force from noon until 'THIS LITTLE PIGGY HAD NO MORE MEAT!' We will be roasting 150 lb's of succulent meat and serving portions with corn on the cob, cole slaw, potato salad and a complimentary beer or wine!!! There will be kiwi music, beer and wine specials and a whole lotta fun!!!! SAT OCT 4TH STARTS AT MIDDAY TILL WE RUN OUT OF PIG !!!

My sister also emailed me about my impending trip in late October

We went out in the boat today and I caught a fat gurnard just off Puponga Point by Cornwallis. Gurnard are so pretty, not to mention tasty. The garden has a ways to go, lots of fruit trees (heritage) have gone in but it will take a couple of years before it really starts to flourish. Meanwhile we also had our first 'breakfast on the front deck' of the season. When it's warm we have our coffee and toast out in the sun. However, there are always a couple of gorgeous weeks in September and everyone starts shrieking "summer's here!!!" and then October arrives and it gets cold and wet again.

Anyway, there are some wines in the cellar that need an occasion in order to drink them. When you are here we can do some yummy dinners and dispatch of some of the older vintages. Will you have some spare time while you are here or will you be busy with work? I'm hoping my workload will have eased a bit by then.
Gx
P.S this is a gurnard, not my actual gurnard however.

My response: pig no, gurnard yes. Would rather eat shitty American food in NYC than shitty NZ food, but fresh caught gurnard, "heritage" fruit trees and vintage cellar, yes, yes, yes

Have I mentioned that I am a lucky cow?

I firmly believe the best burgers in the world are to be found in good old New Zealand, at a chain called Burger Fuel. Their third-pounder with cheese (extra beetroot) is one of my definitions of heaven. I'm not usually one to top up my calorie intake with a shake and fries either, but at Burger Fuel this is mandatory: their malted shakes are the bomb and their kumara fries with garlic mayo are, in terms of dopeness, weapons of mass destruction.

So New York's Shake Shack (supposedly one of the city's best burger spots) has frozen custard in tomato, sweet corn or caramelised peach flavours. So what. Burger Fuel has coconut ice malted shakes!
Suck on that!

Note: coconut ice is a type of old-fashioned sweet, common in Commonwealth countries, especially at garage sales, school fairs, and in grandmothers' kitchens. Crumbly pink cubes composed of dessicated coconut, condensed milk and pink food colouring. Here is a recipe.

Wellington's famous for at least two things. Music (rastas, the jazz school, Flight of the Conchords, dub fusion bands, Mu), and Malaysian food.

Above you see my best-friend-when-I-was-16's toyboy postman musician boyfriend, tucking into a rather average laksa at Rasa, a Malaysian-South Indian restaurant in Wellington, NZ.

I'd love to know the population of Malaysian people in Wellington: if anyone knows how to check that out, let me know.

Malaysian's been a staple takeaway food for Wellingtonians since the '90s. In some cases it's become totally kiwi-fied: I guess it's the only place in the country where you can get nasi lemak to go with a burger and chips. What I'm still dying to have is a super-hot egg sambal like I used to have when I was a teenage lacto-ovo-vege, from Bandong Country Kitchen. I tried to replicate it at home once: it worked out OK.

To keep the locals happy, nasi lemak usually comes with a coconut beef rendang type dollop on the side. I think I only found one place that does plain fatty rice with condiments and peanuts etc.

By the way, this site must get at least one google hit a day from a previous post titled Nasi Lemak Yo Mama's Pussy.

Nasi lemak:


Ring a ding rendang: (this was actually fiyah)



Whatever you do, don't Pay the Dosa-man (Pictured: Wellington rappers Erik Ultimate & Kidz with Gunz)

Voila: my husband. (I still get a kick out of how arcane that word sounds). He hates this photo.

#2: Gamely eating fried fish with soon-to-be in-laws at the Fisherman's Table Restaurant, Wellington, NZ



Nice location, but this restaurant is decidedly not good.

If you have that bourgeois, obsessive-compulsive habit of photographing food, no doubt you've also accidentally collected quite a few shots of people caught in the act of stuffing their faces. Hence: the Hand to Mouth series. Gut Feelings members, I heartily invite you to add your own.

And in the interests of bringing myself down a peg or two, I present:


#1: Chewing ribs in Porirua, Wellington, New Zealand.

Have you ever been to a restaurant late and they accept your business but then start turning off the lights half way through your meal?

Bamboo House is such a place. It serves very cheap and rather tasty home-style Korean food, and is a bargain if you don't mind rude service and eating in the dark. The meal came to around $14 NZD each. We ordered shoju but they didn't give it to us stating that they didn't think we could drink it quickly enough before they closed. Aaahhh the delights of true Korean hospitality





9 Commerce St
Auckland City
Closing is at 10 pm SHARP

It has been a long held dream of Hock's to slow cook ribs inside of my sister's chimney bbq. So being back in NZ we obliged his fantasy.

We picked up Louisiana styled rib cuts at Westmere Butchers, which was packed to the gills the day before Easter Friday. We took our ribs back to my father's apartment in town. Hock protested that we hadn't bought enough ribs so Ginny ran up the road to Parnell butchers and got more. We began the preparation by removing the membrane from the back of the ribs and then rubbing them down with a dry rub. The ribs marinaded overnight.



Hock put Ginny to work pounding the chicken marinade. A paste of vegeta, Mexican oregan, oil, smoked paprika and a Mexican spice mixture containing Annatto .




Ginny was also instructed to start the fire in the BBQ early the next morning to make sure the heat had died down just enough to keep the bbq warm but not hot. She was instructed to never let the embers flame, but to always have a small pile of burning embers in the corner of the bbq, just warm enough to slow cook the meat with warm smoke.

BBQ-ING




Hock put together the bbq sauce, choosing a recipe from Mike Mills.

Moppping



Ruby the dog gave out tortured whimpers



Hock cooked Corn Bread



The Finished Product


Kereru landed in nearby trees but this time no one was interested in speculating on their flavour


The ribs were good, but would have been better if we had used a proper smoking device. Still it was a perfect evening and a perfect family meal.

Speaking of ducks, we of course had to have an Empress Garden Peking Duck back in AK. I've been around the world (well Asia anyway) and I've never found a better duck meal, despite once being told by a Chinese concierge in Beijing that "duck meal is duck meal" when we enquired where to get the best duck in Beijing. How wrong she was.

In my books, Empress Garden still cooks up the best duck meal I've ever had, despite being a million miles away from Beijing. There are several notable qualities that I especially like about the Empress Garden duck. First is that they cut the skin and a little of the moist and tender flesh for the peking rolls. Most places around Asia, including Beijing, cut only the crispy skin, but having a small slither of duck meat accompany the skin into the pancake and down your gullet is much more satisfying.

In addition, the following duck creations made from the left over flesh and bones are excellent, so good that they definitely compete with the first succulent pancake offering. Although there are several options for the two other duck dishes that follow from the pancakes, we always order the sang choi bao option (duck mince with crispy iceberg lettuce leaves) and the salt and pepper fried bones. The salt and pepper fried bones are one of life's true pleasures. I'm not shitting you. Think crispy kentucky fried duck with asian flavours but yummier and you're on the right track.

It was a lovely warm easter weekend in New Zealand, and out in West Auckland an informal home made pasta lesson took place. "It's easy" said Hock in the kind of way that Jaimie Oliver says things are easy and really they are time consuming and difficult.



With Hock over seeing, G&G rolled it and folded it and rolled it again, and when at first they failed...they tried again



First homemade pasta dish of the weekend involved our dead easter bunny....Hock and Ginny took charge of this. First they pan fried the loin and the kidneys, then they made a stew of rabbit, bacon and tuber veges with a light white wine and sage sauce. They served it with fresh "beginners home made pasta" parpadelle





And we drunk it with some damn good NZ wine.




Later that weekend the lesson continued and G&G graduated onto the ever tricky ravioli, stuffed with chicken. Hock pronounced, as resident chef, that the "ravioli must be sealed properly with no air bubbles otherwise it would split and we'll end up with a gruesome bowl of boiling water with bits of broken up pasta and poached mince meat."...He said and everyone looked horrified and set about double checking the ravioli for air bubbles and broken seals.

"Ravioli is difficult, that's why in the 1990s there was that time when everyone made one big ravioli, because making small ones is annoying and often disasterous".



But of course, it's not exactly rocket science either


We put basil, roasted tomato, mozzerlla and parmasan on top, well they did...I watched and drunk wine and complained about being hungry. Then they heated it in the oven, just enough for the cheese to go gooey.


Someone set the table


And we treated ourselves to another damn good bottle of NZ wine, a well earned bottle of Mt Difficulty. I love my sister and her wine cellar.



Papadelle hanging out to dry