KIWI KAI: NOTES ON PIES & STICKY BUNS

How to eat (and eat and eat...) when in Aotearoa.

Posh pies. An ordinary bakery’s pies will be between $6-7. But Wagyu Beef? Moroccan Lamb? You pay more for such delicacies (and its still around a fiver).

“Do you put on weight when you visit New Zealand?” my 95 year old aunty asked me. Is it that evident? Inevitably, I do. Partly because I cycle far less than when in London. And largely because Aotearoa is a foodie heaven - the kai (Maori for “food” - I’m impressed by how many Maori words/terms/concepts have infiltrated Kiwi English in recent years) is just stunning here. Across the world people acknowledge Aotearoa’s wines and lamb, but there’s so many everyday foodie delights here I’m still surprised our everyday kai’s not more celebrated.

Not just due to the vast range of restaurants - Auckland’s a hub for all kinds of Asian food (it having become a city with a sizeable populace from across Asia) - but for the long established Kiwi snack foods of fish&chips, pies, sticky buns, ice cream (+thickshakes) and mussels (marinated or smoked - both delicious).

Late last year I posted on the closure of a century old Deptford pie&mash shop. Here I noted how, much as I wanted to love this emblem of Cockney London, the pies were tasteless compared to Kiwi pies. Not just this particular vendor’s - all pie&mash shops serve similar tasteless, stolid fare. And the pies sold in Brit’ supermarkets are heavy, dull affairs (both pastry and filling). Being back here only reinforces this: Kiwi pies - and there’s now a huge range available, including posh pies with venison and Asian fillings - are the best in the world, no contest. I was once in a US city and my host took me to a shop that specialised in selling Kiwi-style pies. They might even have called themselves “the Kiwi pie shop”. Sorry, can’t remember where. But it had been set up by Americans who, having visited, were so impressed by the Kiwi pies that they determined to launch them as a new snack food. And they were pretty good (and doing a roaring business). My favourite Kiwi pie? Smoked fish.

This is my local Green Bay chippie. A bit more selection than the one in Peckham.

Fish&chips is another British creation that we colonials have excelled at, so much so the Kiwi efforts outstrip those sold across the UK. Where in Britain f&c are seriously greasy, in Aotearoa they’re crisp, cooked from very fresh fish and the ultimate share-at-the- beach feast. The Kiwi hamburger - especially the egg burger - is also a wonder to savour.

What once were called “home cookeries” now largely trade as “bakeries” and here they serve up humungous sandwiches (superb), all kinds of sticky buns/cakes (absolute sugar feasts) and the aforementioned pies. A personal favourite of mine, the sally lun (an orb of raisin bread covered with an iced coconut topping) appears to have become extinct. These were sold as loaves to be cut and buttered at home and, I guess, Kiwis have become so rushed - as with the rest of the world - that demand fell away. Cravings for the favourite foods of one’s childhood - I’m sure there’s a name for it (any idea what it is?).

A thick shake in a container decorated with a map and local stand - fill your tummy and think about your next destination.

Everything on sale in the bakeries is baked/prepared early in the morning and served fresh, with lunchtime seeing most of the day’s delights selling out. This is the best kind of fast food and it's so reasonably priced (and so damn yummy) only a fool would not fall for such magnificent munchies. Apparently our love of sugary squares (ginger/apricot/ apple/ caramel fillings), pink buns, custard pies and cream donuts dates back to the Scots who brought such traditions here. Thus the “home cookery” name.

A passionfruit, fresh cream donut. Divine decadence for $5.

As most of the former home cookeries are now owned by Korean or Chinese families - who would never cook such stuff at home - the branding was simplified to “bakery”. The name might have changed but the food remains delicious, the new Kiwis doing a fine job in keeping the kai mighty. This reminds me of how, once when in LA, I discovered the majority of donut shops were run by Cambodians - fascinating how migrant communities will take on a popular food emporium not at all related to their diet and excel in it.

Kiwi ice cream: again, we didn’t invent it but - oh boy! - we do it better. So creamy and so many flavours. Its a summer ritual here to head to the dairy (a newsagent/general store selling lots of lollies and chocolate bars alongside tinned foods, loo paper and, once upon a time, newspapers/magazines/comics) and study the dozen-or-so flavours on offer, then select which two or three ice cream scoops you want on a cone. Milkshakes and - especially - thickshakes are another specialty. How McDonalds manage to sell their tasteless shake sludge to the Kiwi public I do not know.

The perfect flat white.

And if you weren’t aware, Kiwis are master blaster coffee creators. No, we don’t grow the beans here. But we invented the flat white and the long black (the former a minimalist latte, the latter a slimmed down Americano) and take great pride in serving delicious coffee. The coffee explosion is a paradox of Kiwi cuisine - before the 1990s we sipped tea, coffee almost always was instant or boiled for hours (and bloody dreadful). Then Charley Gray, an Auckland entrepreneur, got an espresso machine and started serving cappuccinos. Tres chic! And what a revelation - tasty coffee. This was the mid-80s and Gray remained an outlier until, in the 90s, a wise individual came to the realisation that lots of Kiwis’ might enjoy a decent coffee: quickly a caffeinated revolution took hold. Now, even in the smallest towns, you will find someone serving flat whites and long blacks.

These coffee creations are now found worldwide, but rarely get made by a barista who knows what they’re doing: in December I met Kiwi pals in the cafe that’s part of Foyles epic bookshop on Charing Cross Road and, having got there first, ordered a flat white. They arrived just as I was taking my first sip so ensuring I shouted “don’t order a flat white!” Bloody poms, ruin everything…

Kaimoana - the Maori word for “seafood” - is abundant, if not the budget munchies pies, buns, coffee etc is here. That said, a 700gram tub of marinated mussels can be easily found for $11 (£5.75). And sushi is our new favourite snack food. Actually, I’ve never seen so many sushi outlets as those in Wellington and Auckland - Kiwis’ must devour acres of those cold rice cubes daily.

A chocolate lamington (there’s also a pink variant). A heart attack on a plate? Hey, we all have to go some time!

Fruit and veg’ and beef and lamb are plentiful - obviously, seeing NZ was originally colonised by the British as one big farm - but often appear more expensive than in the UK. This infuriates locals and reflects on how two major supermarket chains overcharge the populace. My favourite local fruits are Kiwis (of course), feijoas and tamarillo’s - all three were brought to Aotearoa by migrants and have flourished here like nowhere else.

Aotearoa’s Sauvignon Blanc & Pinot Noir are now rated amongst the world’s finest and there are a variety of independent breweries making quality beers (if too many aim for fizzy pale ales and dull IPAs - a problem everywhere). A feijoa vodka is also a tasty tipple.

A land to feast in then. Although it’s worth observing that many Kiwis’ feast far too much: New Zealand has the third highest adult obesity rate in the OECD, one in three adults, and one in ten children. Time to put down that pie and pick up a feijoa and some kaimoana? Indeed. As for me, when I return to London a diet of lentils and an intensive cycling routine will get underway.

Surprisingly, there appear almost no songs celebrating Kiwi kai - except this one by comedian Rod Derrett from the early 1960s. It’s “of its time”, trading as it does in broad caricatures of 19th Century Maori and silly humour. Pure Kiwiana then.

Mum reached 90 on a diet of ice cream, fish&chips, scones (and fresh fruit and veg’). Ice cream being the most important factor, of course.