KEY POINTS:
Martin Bosley is somewhat bemused by his rock-star status across the ditch. Wellington's much-lauded chef has just performed before hundreds of Brisbane foodie lovers, clamouring for any morsel of culinary advice, and surprisingly, personal backstory.
"They are really interested in my experiences and cooking habits at home. The
questions went far beyond the food I was demonstrating on the stage," he says over the phone from Brisbane's Hilton Hotel where he's hosting a series of masterclasses.
For a country that barely acknowledges New Zealand's political scene, Bosley's fans seem fixated with our foodie icons.
"People want to know about my whitebait and paua recipes - it's just staggering the amount of interest in our produce. We've had record numbers of people attending my show."
All the more impressive, considering he's performing alongside such culinary luminaries as Michel Richard, a two-star Michelin chef from Barcelona.
Bosley is of course, a legend in his own country. He opened his first restaurant at 21, spent 10 years as head chef of Wellington's influential Brasserie Flipp and has a trophy cabinet of awards. Last year was stellar; Bosley's signature restaurant at the Royal Port Nicholson Yacht Club rooms won the supreme award for Cuisine magazine's Restaurant of the Year, and he joined the Listener as a food columnist.
Meanwhile, his new book, Martin Bosley Cooks, which is being published by Random and hits the stores in August, is a collection of recipes drawn from his weekly medley of tasty fare. And at the Food Show, which starts in Auckland this Friday, he will charm more fans with his lifelong passion.
Taking over from writer Lois Daish at the Listener was daunting, admits Bosley. "Twenty-three years of history - I didn't take [the task] lightly as I have utter respect for that woman and her writing."
Indeed, if Bosley needed evidence of Daish's enormous following, his lawyer was the unlikely source. "He told me he'd collected every one of Lois' stories and they were all in files at home. I was quite shaken by that."
For a chef with 25 years of high pressure in the kitchen, meeting the weekly writing deadline is far more challenging than getting a double-baked whitebait soufflé to stay pert.
"The kitchen is at the centre of my world. It's where everything takes place, both at work and at home," writes Bosley in his new cook book which is packed with 90 recipes to encourage ordinary folk to get in behind the stove.
Bosley collaborated with former Listener photographer Jane Ussher to produce understated (read not over-styled) foodie images blended with candid family portraits: A bearded and portly Bosley on a windswept Waikanae beach with his daughter Isabella. Mother-in-law Jo whitebaiting ("sorry I can never reveal where"), cooking with wife Julia and their daughter at home, and Des the, er, not-so-friendly greengrocer.
'He is the grumpiest man you've ever met... and I've loved buying produce of him for the past 10 years."
Most endearingly, the author has a passion for reinventing traditional dishes like rice congee or Asian rice porridge.
"There's something glorious about combining rice and chicken with a luxury item like oysters. It gives this humble dish a discrete elegance. I love revisiting dishes and giving them a new spin."
The chocolate terrine has been on the menu for 20 years and Bosley says diners howl at any suggestion it be replaced.
He recalls how a bridge club from Tawa would make a special pilgrimage to his Brasserie Flipp restaurant to enjoy a tea and cake break between card hands.
Isabella, who works at his yacht club restaurant after school every Friday, shares his love of chocolate.
"Her favourite is Valrhona, the exceptionally cocoa-butter-rich chocolate from France... I pity any future boyfriends who turn up at our door hoping to impress her with a box of Roses chocolates. It just won't work," he writes.
Cooking, like family ties, is ripe with emotion.
"I genuinely believe that cooking is an emotional experience. When it's cold, and stormy I know exactly what to cook to make people feel good."
And don't his fans know it.
* See Martin Bosley at The Food Show, 31 July-3 August at the ASB Showgrounds.