Le Clerc catering for our change to healthy tastes

Julie Le Clerc is one of New Zealand's best-loved cooks, her recipes used in homes and cafes throughout the country. She has also owned cafes and a catering business and has worked worldwide as a food and travel writer and photographer.
For all the thousands of dishes she has created and published, there is one that emerges a clear favourite - her pumpkin, chick pea and sundried tomato salad, "people tell me they have a favourite recipe and I know what it is before they even open their mouth".
Years since she first published that recipe, she still makes it regularly herself.
Le Clerc said the dish works so well because of its contrast in textures and the vibrancy of the flavours.
Made By Hand is Le Clerc's 12th cookbook and even more of a labour of love as not only did she write and prepare all the recipes, she also acted as food stylist and photographer. "This book is literally made by my hand," she said.
The book's theme of health, natural food and home cooking from scratch came to her after Le Clerc spotted a trend in the magazine columns she was writing. "There seems to be an increasing interest in people wanting to go back to basics and use natural ingredients from their farmers markets, shaping their meals around seasonal ingredients and produce."
She said the healthy eating advocated in the book was nothing new. "My recipes have always been healthy, but people found that out by default. It was never packaged as such, but this time I decided to do so."
As well a big selection of delicious recipes, the book offers some of Le Clerc's top tips, including how to start a kitchen garden, how to be more organic and eco-cleaning.
Le Clerc said she tried to practise what she preached, making sure she ate a range of fruit and veges, grains and pulses. "It is well documented that we are what we eat. Consuming a rainbow of different-coloured fruit and veges makes you live a brighter life."
One of Le Clerc's hottest tips from this book is her use of buckwheat, more specifically a buckwheat, eggplant and tomato salad.
Le Clerc said buckwheat, widely available in organic and specialty food stores, was highly nutritious, a great substitute for pasta or rice, and soaked up the flavours of whatever was put with it. She also picked her fragrant rice picnic pie as a winner - cooked with rice, grated zucchini and feta with a whole tomato sunk into the mixture before it was cooked.
Le Clerc has always been impressed by Hawke's Bay cooking and said it was "hugely innovative and uses some of the best produce in New Zealand".
Julie Le Clerc will be showcasing recipes from her new book at Hastings' Opera Kitchen at 7.30pm tonight.