KEY POINTS:
A is for agar-agar, extracted from algae and used as a gelling additive in spherification (see S) to make jellies, puddings and custards with fruit or vegetables. It's 80 per cent fibre so you feel fuller without filling up. Known as "china grass" in Indian desserts.
B is
for barley. "It's healthy and full of nutrition," says chef Nigel Marriage, "with a nutty and chewy texture."
Broad beans, according to chef Simon Wright. "People don't like buying them because they can't be bothered peeling them. Honestly, there's nothing to it. It's just like getting peas in the pod. Blanch them, and they're exquisite."And Bluff oysters: "They're a national delicacy. Nothing depicts New Zealand more than whitebait and Bluff oysters. Every year they are the two things#our customers are hanging out for."
C is for cheese, offers chef Simon Gault. Not your 1kg block of Tasty: now that the Ministry of Bio-insecurity has decided we can eat with the grown-ups and allowed roquefort to be imported, expect more exotic arrivals. At Euro Gault presents a soul-melting buttery Tarrago River triple cream brie from Australia and a heady Spanish blue. Why is it still so hard to find many of our best local breeds in supermarkets?
D is for dim sum: anyone who hasn't joined the lunchtime queue snaking to the Grand Harbour at the Viaduct has missed one of the great tastes of Auckland.
E is for edamame, says chef Sid Sahrawat. Better still, the young green soya beans are a Japanese food you can try at home. Pick up a packet from your deli. And for e-numbers, suggests Wright. You want to eat food, not preservatives or additives. See www.eatwell.gov.uk/foodlabels/understandingenumbers/cal, then take your reading glasses to the store to check the fine print on the labels.
F is for feijoa, insist Wright and Sahrawat. Wright's style: "It's unique to New Zealand. Use it with apple in a chutney, it's fragrant and flavoursome, or in a sorbet. I don't like it hot - I prefer to cook it and serve cold."
Farmers' markets are a first-class source of freshly picked, locally grown produce and now part of life for the fashionable foodie. Fire up the SUV and burn food-miles to Avondale or Matakana for fruit, vegetables, herbs; in the city, Ellerslie, Parnell, Britomart, Oratia and La Cigalle offer tasty alternatives to seductively lit "fresh" food fridges in the hype-market.
G is for goats' cheese, and Marriage is particular about it. "Not that soft, white nondescript stuff, but Old Gold from Crescent Farm Goats in Albany - a cheese loved and scrubbed by Jan Walter for a year until she thinks it is fit for consumption."
And while he's got the ball, Marriage tosses in a googly: "Guanabana. It's popular with my mates back in the UK and should be so here - a delicious fruit from Colombia tasting of vanilla/banana."
H is for hummus, the Med-wide chickpea and garlic paste that has matured from a party dip to a serious condiment.
I is for isomalt, offers Sahrawat. The natural sugar substitute, also used in spherification, is resistant to humidity and stays flexible longer than regular sugar, which makes it easier to play with. It lightly impacts blood-sugar levels, is better for your teeth and has half the calories of sugar.
J is for jamon, throws in Gault. Yes, the word means "ham". No, this is not your Christmas Day leftover. Jamon iberico ($5 a sliver at his Jervois Steak House) is a Spanish delicacy cured for three years. It's at least 75 per cent Black Iberian pig, the only breed that naturally seeks and eats mainly acorns.
K is for kaffir lime, according to Sahrawat and Wright. But perhaps not where you've been used to finding those sharply flavoured leaves. "It's a beautiful addition to soups, for instance pumpkin soups. I use it as a foam to add a headiness."
L is for langoustine, the flash name for Southern Hemisphere scampi, caught between 200 and 600m, found on the menus at The Grove and French Cafe. More ecologically correct than much of our seafood, the white flesh is more delicately flavoured than crayfish.
M is for microgreens, says Wright. The tiny cousins of grown-up leaves and herbs offer "so many different little flavours, they're so full of flavour - it's a perfect burst in the mouth".
Gault touts mushrooms - he's importing the first cooked porcini from Italy, rather than the dried arrangements we've been used to, and raw trumpets from France.
We have to mention molecular gastronomy, under S, for reasons that will be clarified.
N Nothing more or less than the nostalgic food revival, agree Marriage and Wright. The French Cafe supremo enjoys seeing "old dishes being reinvented, the components deconstructed and put back together in different ways to make new versions of dishes like Caesar salad, the prawn cocktail, or even steak and chips". Across the bridge, Marriage notices a huge surge in traditional desserts at 8.2. "They are honest and well-made with top-notch ingredients. No messing with "soil" or dry ice. They are things people recognise and the same has to be said of the menu in general. We like to keep it simple, modern and tasty. Just three or four items on a plate, not a confusing mess."
O is for organic. The "organic" shopper has changed a good deal along with what's on the shelves. From Glen Eden to Grey Lynn, the food-savvy, free-spending shoppers have forced the multi-national chains to free prime fridge and shelf space for chemical- and pesticide-free produce.
P is for paua. Back to our champion of Kiwi ingredients, Mr Wright: "Call it abalone or paua - you used to buy one that was the size of a thumbnail and it cost $5. Farming has made a huge advance. Now you can readily buy huge, fantastic specimens."
And for pigeon. Just as jamon ain't vacuum-packed ham slices from the supermarket, we recommend that you don't go down to Aotea Square with your BB gun and try to poach one. Long a popular cheap meat in Europe, it's now farmed in New Zealand, pleasing Sahrawat and Wright, for it's one of his favourite things. "You couldn't get it for years. Now they're farming it, the taste is exquisite. We started serving it last year and I really hope it will catch on." Splendid in a slow-cooked winter stew with bacon, rough red wine and button mushrooms. See R, too.
Pomelo . Never heard of it? It's a huge grapefruit not seen here, imported from the US and much loved by Wright. "It has the clean flavour of grapefruit but it's not so acidic. It has huge segments that fall apart easily and the flesh is dry, unlike most citrus."
Q is for quinoa, which has been around so long that it was in Viva's Hot New Foods of 4000BC with potatoes and corn. Higher protein than wheat or rice, the Incas' grain is ideal for vegetarians and a blessing for those with wheat and gluten intolerances. Light in your stomach and easy to digest, it can make a good "risotto" or salad, similar to couscous or tabbouleh.
R is for rabbit. If you still go all Diana-eyed at the thought of Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail, get over it, say Marriage, Sahrawat and Wright. "What a great source of food!" raves Marriage. "I get mine up from Gore and have never seen rabbits like them. So clean, full of meat and delicious flavour. In the UK they were sold full of buckshot. Not here. They are clean as a whistle." Tasting not unlike a good free-range chicken, the lean meat begs to be cooked with bacon, mustard and cream, or with lemon.
S has to be for sushi, which long ago overtook sandwiches as the lunch du jour for workers from Albany to Ellerslie and elsewhere.
Sous-vide ("under vacuum") is the cooking method you've been reading about everywhere. You seal ingredients in plastic bags and place them in hot water (around 60C) for a long time (sometimes over 24 hours). Famous example is the 45-minute egg, discovered when Parisian food scientists argued whether it takes 10 minutes to boil the perfect egg. The answer: doesn't matter, so long as the temperature is 64C, near as dammit. The process is ideal for meat.
Our foremost practitioners are Sahrawat, Gault, Peter Thornley (Bracu) and Michael Meredith (Meredith's). Gault: "You can vacuum-pack a steak, say, with an anchovy and butter marinade. You poach it slowly in the pack, so all the juices and the aromas stay in the meat, and that means all the flavour, and you just turn it out for a quick grill at the end."
Wright is enthusiastic: "It really does work, I've had one for years. Cook an egg for 40 minutes and it's perfect. It's given more versatility, especially for cooking big, hearty meat dishes." Marriage is scornful, believing it detracts from the art and nuance of traditional cooking.
Got your head around that? Let's try "spherification". Developed by the same scientists, refined by Ferran Adria at El Bulli, it's a technique for creating new dishes and flavour combinations. You inject a liquid with an agent such as agar-agar, which allows it to form a solid sphere that remains liquid on the inside. From there the chef can come over all Jackson Pollock with flavours - Thornley, gorse-flower pavlova; Gault, foie gras and green peppercorn ice cream. Wright is cautious: "Loads of people are trying it around Auckland right now. The originators have been experimenting for 20 years. They know what they're doing, and have tried and discarded a lot of ideas until they've found what works."
T is for truffles. Believe it or not, there are around 100 truffieres in Aotearoa, growing mainly black Perigord truffles (They got our kiwifruit cuttings. We got their olives, wine and cheeses) and are finding their way on to menus near you.
Tzatziki, the tapas-bar appetiser of strained yoghurt, cucumbers, garlic, salt and olive oil, and herbs, has grown up and is found on the side of restaurant plates. Often at The Grove.
Wright wants me to mention tofu "because vegetarianism is coming into its own". Well, I've done it.
U is for umami. Japanese prize the fifth taste sensation after salt, sweet, sour and bitter. Call it "savoury" and think of sticky goo on roast-potato skin or fried chicken, or the taste of parmesan or roquefort.
V is for Vietnam's exhilarating, hot, sour, salty and sweet food - lemon grass, lime leaves, chilli, coriander leaf and mint; sticky, fragrant rice and beansprout- and prawn-filled rice-paper rolls. If your idea of adventurous eating is still Thai or Indian, get down to Dominion Rd.
And for Valrhona, but we're going to talk about that below, and you mustn't be greedy.
W is for wasabi, the green paste that makes sushi and sashimi so delectable. Try these ideas: stir the hot gunge into mayonnaise or smear lightly on cold roast beef.
One minute's silence for the whitebait harvest, which - as Wright points out - worsens with each September. Wonder how long we'll be able to enjoy patties, with white bread and butter, at Matakana Market on Saturdays?
X - yes, there is one - is for Xocopili. French chocolate manufacturers Valrhona cook up this entirely legal Venezuelan marching powder from 72 per cent cocoa and spices including curry and chilli pepper. It adds an original flavour to white meats, lamb, fish, fresh or dried vegetables. No, you won't find it at Pak'n Save. Yes, it will impress when dropped into after-dinner conversation.
Y is for yakitori bars. Japanese tapas is so much lighter, offers so many more tastes (and is a heck of lot more wallet-friendly) than what's peddled in its European equivalents. Yes, we have faves. Not telling you: it's hard enough to get into them now.
Z is for zaatar, North African dried wild thyme used for seasoning yogurt and grilled meats. Dust over lamb steaks or chicken kebabs.
The panel
* Simon Wright is chef-owner of the French Cafe, consistently voted NZ's top restaurant. He recently published The French Cafe Cookbook
* Sid Sahrawat is head chef at The Grove, one of Viva's 6 of the best Auckland restaurants. He won the 2007 Lewisham Award for Most Innovative Chef
* Nigel Marriage came to Kiwi attention alongside John Burton Race in the BBC series French Leave. He is head chef at the much-praised 8.2, Northcote Point
* Simon Gault was recently described as "the best chef in New Zealand". He is executive chef for the Nourish Group (Euro, Pasha, Jervois Steak House)
