Reviews

Great Kiwi Eats

Peter Janssen

Hands up who has ever suffered the wrath of a petrol station pie when on a road trip, because you weren’t aware of the other options? Too chicken to try an unknown café, you stick with what has traditionally been the pre-imminent choice, the once tried and true, only to discover the pie is thermo-nuclear hot, the bottom as hard and inedible as a cardboard box?

You dream of something super tasty, so amazingly delicious, that you start having hallucinations of homemade delights, comfort food like Mum used to make. As you drive on sheep begin to look like big, fluffy buttery white chocolate-chip muffins…the cows in the paddocks morph into mouth-watering steak sandwiches, with a side of hand-cut chunky chips, and road signs look like a thick slice of lemon syrup melt-in-the-mouth cake...

Lucky for all of us the hard work has been done. No longer will you drive on to your destination totally unsatisfied or worse still, hungry!

Great Kiwi Eats is a handy, glove-box sized guide to where to find the best and most tasty food in the land. Peter Janssen travelled the length of the country to discover the very best Kiwi fare. I’m extremely tempted to take a road trip purely so I can visit these places! His criteria were simple: the food inexpensive, the setting casual and it had to be the very best of its type. Sounds like a fun excursion, no?

Some standouts include the Ten O’Clock Bakery Café in Masterton. Peter explains this bakery has won numerous awards – including gold in Best Pastry, Best Café, Savoury and Danish categories, silver in the Café Cake, Cut Slice, Sourdough and Sponge Roll Categories – all of these in just one year!

If that doesn’t get your taste buds salivating – perhaps savoury, more specifically seafood, is more your fare. Stop in at the Slip Inn Café, in Havelock and partake in one of New Zealand’s tastiest seafood’s, green-lipped mussels. These babies take 12 months to reach maturity and are then plump, supremely tasty and are good for your health. What more could you ask for?

Despite travelling the length of the country to find was is undoubtedly the best kiwi tucker the Long White Cloud has to offer, Peter was unable to find a top-notch Pavlova!

This little book shares where to find the most extraordinary, tastiest, and in some cases previously undiscovered gems. Chow down on traditional Kiwi fare, often prepared by the same family over several generations – who are still producing fantastic homemade food to old family recipes.

There are so many gems featured in this book that it would be impossible to feature them all – you will have to take a road trip and discover for yourself!

Published by Harper Collins NZ

RRP $28.99