|
|
 |
|
A new Federal Street restaurant, (one of several in the last few weeks), The Grill by Sean Connolly was launched to a appreciative crowd of invited guests. A distinctly Kiwi menu using ingredients sourced locally from carefully selected New Zealand suppliers.
Wild game meats tend to be darker in colour than farmed meats. Animals are of course not drenched or sprayed making the meat a truly natural product free from residual chemicals.
A Christchurch coffee roasting company, Caffe Prima, believes it has produced the world’s first fully compostable foil bag, made by Hamilton-based company Convex Plastics from wood pulp and corn starch.
In this country, over the past decade, we in the hospitality trade have taken on board the idea of organics. Restaurants and cafes have been using more and more organic ingredients. We have promoted these products on our menus in the reasonable belief that there is a trend towards ‘perceived’ healthier and better eating. Until, that is, the dreaded GFC (Global Financial Crisis) bit us on the bum.
Of course it is and a bloody worthy one at that.
But if we are going to promote excellence in our industry we need to promote the notion in our young that working in the hospitality industry is more than just a fill-in job; that it is a career choice in its own right.
Fonterra announced an after-tax profit of $293 million for the first half of its financial year yesterday and a forecasted payout of around eight bucks per kilogram of milk solids to farmers. This half yearly result of $9.4 billion in revenue, is a whopping 21 percent higher than for the same period last year.
This situation is not likely to change in the foreseeable future. Our local meat prices are tied to the export schedule which reflects the price of meat internationally and the international trend is a rising one I am afraid.
Since the February quake New Zealand restaurants up and down the country pulled finger to raise funds for their compatriots in Christchurch. After all the hospo industry is our whanau and Aotearoa is our hapu; but also as it turns out Hospo-Aotearoa is an international Iwi.
Peter Gordon may have got a bit of the Kiwi knee-jerk battering from comments made on TV about the price and quality of our sacred kiwi lamb, but as usual he had a point – that is our grass-fed red meat is a seasonal product and to some extent variable.
New Zealand consumer confidence slid further this month, with the Canterbury region showing the steepest slide in the wake of quake2.
Specialist resource writer John Clarke highlights developments in produce, fish and meat supply.
The Grove, one of Auckland’s finest eateries, hosted a food and wine lovers extravaganza last Sunday night with every penny of the $17,500 raised going to the Christchurch Restaurant Association’s Earthquake Fund.
foodnews sponsors
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
foodnews network
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
