As a typical British boy, Stewart Franklin loved his ‘crisps’. He even sold them as a kid growing up in the UK. As a young man, however, his not-so-typical side emerged and he travelled to New Zealand, landing in sunny Nelson. Having worked in the crisps industry in the UK, Stewart wondered why NZ ‘chips’ were so average when the country possessed some of the world’s finest potatoes? In 2007, he decided to tackle the disparity head on and adventured back out into the big wide world, sampling other crisps and learning all of the various ways one could make a better potato chip / crisp. He settled on the idea of using a kettle and brought one back with him to make proper crisps. Thus was born the namesake company we love, “Proper Crisps”.

Proper Crisps set up in a shed near Upper Moutere making crisps using the Agria potato Stewart chose from the Temuka area of Canterbury. He found the texture, density, colour and flavour of this particular cultivar the best he’d ever experienced. Next, Stewart developed just the right technique for making a proper crisp which he identified as having the perfect thickness, cooking the potatoes for just the right time and, of course, attaining the right degree of saltiness. For the salty part, Stewart chose the sea salt from Lake Grassmere in the Marlborough Sound. All these components came together and Stewart was pleased, creating what to him seemed the best chip he could make.

People visiting the Nelson Farmers Market agreed and bought up Stewart’s crisps – as did other local markets and, eventually, stores around the South Island, including the Mediterranean Market in Queenstown before it became part of the Raeward Fresh team. Stewart increased production but kept his standards in place. Things hummed along nicely and in 2010 he sold the business to Ed & Mina Smith. The Smith’s were on holiday at the time and curious about real estate in the area. They came across a bag of Proper Crisps in Golden Bay and fell in love with the product… and wanted to buy the business!

Ed and Mina were tired of overly processed food and loved the idea of keeping Proper Crisps 100% natural, which meant hand cutting each crisp, hand stirring every batch, hand sorting and hand seasoning – right down to placing the person’s name on the bag who cut, stirred, sorted and seasoned those particular crisps for you! They were also exited about the possibility of building on Stewart’s winning tradition, using international influences paired with local ingredients, and extending Proper Crisps flavour offerings. This began with the creation of a Rosemary and Thyme crisp, the idea for which originated from Mina’s Grandmother’s roasted rosemary and thyme potatoes back in France. Next came the Smoked Paprika crisps, a flavour combination born of the couples’ Californian influences meeting the Kiwi BBQ vibe.

After establishing these new crisp varieties, the couple went further afield to look for other flavours and veggies to create into crisps. Ed was no newcomer to expansion, as he had already established a large baking company in the US (Ne-Mo’s) which had a reputation for delivering high quantities of quality baked goods all made from scratch using the best ingredients. Ed naturally brought these skills and experiences to Proper Crisps. The invention of their classic Salt & Vinegar Crisps highlights his expertise. In NZ, we love our salt & vinegar but most chips of this flavour type don’t even have vinegar in them but, rather, sodium diacitate and multi dextrons (super high on the GI). Ed and his team collaborated with an innovative engineering crew in Nelson to create an encapsulation process that takes real apple cider vinegar and makes it into a crystal that can season the crisps. They are the first in the world to do this.

Next, Proper Crisps looked north to the Kairpara where Kumaras grow aplenty. They brought back huge bags of red, gold and orange kumara and began the R&D necessary to get just the right thicknesses, oil type (rice bran for these ones) and cooking times. They found that cooking times varied for each colour kumara. Such attention to detail results in what I think are the best kumara chips in the world (with, perhaps, a the exception of the red ones in the bag, which don’t quite match the sweetness and crunch of the orange ones). Having got that veg properly in the bag, the Smith’s looked at another iconic South Island root veg – the humble parsnip. They have recently finished their trials, translating all of Stewart Franklin’s core values into a bag of delicately sweet and salty parsnip crisps ready to snack on. In keeping with their values about healthy snacks, the Proper crew have worked hard to keep the fat quantities at a minimum and have searched for a parsnip variety with a higher density so the slices don’t absorb as much oil. I was fortunate enough to be able to try some of the trial versions and they’re a sensational crisp. Light, salty, sweet and delicious.

I really, really, really like this company. Solid values right from the get go, international influences properly localized and innovative flavours perfectly created to be as healthy (and delicious) as a crisp can be. On top of all this, Proper Crisps recycle all of their cooking oils into biodiesel fuels, a smart sustainability move which gets all kinds of cred in my book. The 21 people in the Proper Crisps team who have their work cut out for them keeping up with the demand from happy customers like me, are all working hard in their new kitchen in Stoke (Nelson), applying a proper mentality to the making of these fantastic crisps. I’ve especially appreciated Tina-Maree’s promotional work and her connection with the community (check out their Facebook). Keep your eye out for the new Parsnip Crisps now at Raeward Fresh as well. It’s been well worth the wait for someone to finally nail the production. Thank you Proper Crisps for taking some of NZ’s best and most abundant root veg and turning it into sweet as tasting chips!

On most mornings of the week Morgan Maw gets on her bicycle and rides a few minutes through Eden Terrace to Bonnie Goods’ kitchen. She’ll turn on the ovens, heave a large bag of Otago oats onto the counter, and mix up a batch of dough. Morgan will take her substantial rolling pin and level out the oaty stuff until she’s content with the thickness. She’ll then mark out and hand cut hundreds of wee rectangles, placing them gently onto a baking tray and into the oven until they’re just the right texture of softness and crunch. The lovely Morgan Maw is making Bonnie Oat Cakes.
Oat cakes?

Yep, oat cakes, and here’s why:
Morgan grew up in Taranaki where, like most Kiwi kids, she spent her days mucking around at the beach, baking through Ladies, A Plate and the Edmonds cookbook, as well as generally tinkering around her Dad’s workshop making things. And, like most kiwi kids, Morgan did not grow up eating oatcakes. Instead, she had an active mind that leaned towards crafting and an entrepreneurial streak that got her making jewelry. After leaving school, she began working with Craig Macfarlane at one of his Ozone cafes in New Plymouth. Morgan was inspired by Craig’s energy and innovation and went on to Uni in Wellington to study communication and marketing.

In her second year, Morgan met her now partner Nic and, after graduation, the two went to the travel agency and asked where the cheapest tickets to Europe would land them. Rome. No oat cakes here yet either. They travelled Europe (like most Kiwi kids) and ended up in the UK. London seemed too hectic and a friend of Nic’s was running a hostel in Edinburgh… so Scotland it was. And guess what they eat in Scotland?

Nic got a job in marketing and Morgan got an admin job at Standard Life, which she says felt exactly as the company’s name implies. In her free time Morgan happened upon the Baking Club at Sofi’s (their brother pub Joseph Pearce is this writers’ favourite in the UK) and got creating alongside some of Edinburgh’s best – you guessed it – oat cake makers. Along with an appreciation of great whiskey, Morgan learned the subtleties of the perfect oat cake. Namely, that a great oat cake must compliment the manchego cheese or duck pate (or in Fix & Fogg’s case, peanut butter) and not over or under power it. There must be a certain saltiness (Morgan uses Marlborough sea salt) but not so much that it’s too savory. And, there must be a crunch that speaks of heartiness but not dryness. Morgan learned all these things and came back to NZ to try her hand at, of course, fashion design.

Didn’t work out. And here’s why.
When Morgan returned home to help cater for her brother’s 21st, she decided to buy some oatcakes and couldn’t find any. Hmmm. She made some herself and found her family both bemused and pleased at this foreign fare. Hmmm. She didn’t like the jobs she was getting along the way and it came down to making a decision. Morgan thought back to her time with Craig (who now mentors the couple) working at the New Plymouth cafe and how since childhood, she really wanted to run her own business. And so, like many of our amazing producers at Raeward Fresh, Morgan and Nic decided to risk ‘the secure life’ and become entrepreneurial bakers.

Bonnie Goods Oatcakes were born in November 2013 starting off with an ‘Original’ flavor and then a ‘Linseed’ edition (with linseed sourced from Nic’s uncles farm in Canterbury) was added soon after. Recently, Morgan has made a smoked paprika oatcake to round out (or, rather, square up) the offering. I’ve tried each of these with Mandy’s horseradish, Taste of Provence duck pate, a mix of cheeses, honey & Fix & Fogg peanut butter and they’re all wonderful. Especially Bonnie’s smoked paprika oatcake. There’s something rich and comforting about this reddish oatcake, the colour reminiscent of Central Otago hills during a long slow summer sunset. It’s like nothing you’ve ever had in a cracker or snack and topping it off with a bit of brie or a mouthful of manchego creates a beautiful oatcake experience. Knowing just a bit about Morgan and Nic, I’m sure we’re going to see more innovation, craft and deliciousness come from these two exceptional Kiwi kids.

The Recipe for this week’s blog…
…is to check out the deli counters at Raeward Fresh and pair Bonnie Oatcakes with your favourite Stilton and Zoe’s garden relish. Or, a creamy French Camembert and Provisions Cherry Almond preserves. You can go sweet or savoury with these hearty healthy oatcakes which me and my neighbours have been thoroughly enjoying.

With the notable exceptions of the preservation of corn and fish by the Maori, the only other real Kiwi fermentation tradition has been the making of beer. The Germans have their sauerkraut, the Koreans have their Kimchi and the American Midwesterners have pickled just about everything else. Cold climate cultures have always found a way to preserve foods using fermentation but, in New Zealand’s moderate-to-warm climate culture, we preserve beer to drink when it’s hot… or whenever, actually. Now, we do make some pretty outstanding beer here in NZ, but it’s too bad that this is where our fermentation endeavours end. Cultures that preserve their local abundance with probiotic rich fermentation processes (such as Napa cabbage, daikon radish, carrot and onions for the Koreans) enjoy the super tasty and super healthy benefit of preserves that last pretty much forever as part of their cuisine. And, they aren’t putting heaps of salt or sugar in their condiments.
In fact, properly fermented foods actually reduce sugar cravings – a happy finding Joanna Nolan learnt and experienced when she first explored the the world of live culture (fermented) foods. A personal trainer at the time, she was so impressed with this and a swag of other fermented food benefits that she ended up quitting her day job to create Be Nourished – her current business, making raw, unpasteurized, cultured vegetables & probiotic foods for health.

Like most New Zealanders, Jo grew up eating highly processed, white food staples, such as bread, pasta and sugar. Cornflakes topped with sugar for breakfast, white bread and whatever for lunch… we all know the drill. The litany of health issues to arise from eating like this for decades has become an alarming topic of many contemporary diet conversations, from onset diabetes to childhood obesity. As a personal trainer, Jo worked with heaps of people who had to deal with the sugar cravings born of the Kiwi diet, or wrestle with the increasing number of food allergies they were developing as they grew older. What really struck home, however, was when Jo’s first child started coming down with unexplained allergies. This, combined with the increasing general lack of energy Jo experienced as a young parent, led her to research healthful solutions. She read about the ground breaking studies by Weston Price in the field of fermented food. This topic of inquiry further came to life for Jo in Sally Fallon’s Nourishing Traditions. Learning how many ancient cultures preserved both their food, and their health, by utilising simple, abundant, everyday ingredients in fermented processes was a life changer for Jo.

Finding properly fermented foods ready to buy on the shop shelves in Auckland in the 1990’s was another matter. Jo was unable to get anything but pasteurized (read: sanitized to death, killing all the essential live cultures) sauerkrauts imported from far away places. The next step, then, was to simply make some for herself. At first she was daunted by the prospect of having to make something that had been developed for centuries without any local knowledge in NZ, and without any professional culinary experience herself. It was pre-internet and YouTube how-to’s for Jo in those days too, so armed with some informative books and possessing a mother’s dedication to the wellbeing of her family, she dove in and began making proper sauerkraut. Proper sauerkraut means small batch, live culture food with naturally grown cabbage, spices and a slow three phase lacto-fermentation process. Eventually, the adventure had a happy ending for Jo, who was surprised at how easy fermenting food was once she got the hang of it. She also found that by making these foods a regular part of her diet she lost her sugar cravings, felt her energy and mental acuity return and her son’s allergies went bye bye.

In effect, Jo’s digestive system was being rebooted. Her gut gained the living probiotics and phytochemicals it needed to absorb all the nutrients she was eating – probably for the first time in her life! Typically, our stomachs only absorb around 20% of the available nutrients in our food. Fermented foods can boost this uptake to around 80%, which has many positive effects across our metabolic functions. (The health aspects of Be Nourished products are better described on Jo’s web site which you can find here). Jo was so glad with the personal health results that she started sharing her homemade fermented foods with friends. As you might imagine, Jo’s friends weren’t quite as enthusiastic about the prospect of sauerkraut as she was. Undaunted, and emboldened by her families increasing health, Jo decided to bottle up some of her recipes and take them to the Oratia Farmers Market. But the response was the same. The guy next to her selling Pics Peanut Butter had jars flying off the table while her sauerkraut sat there, continuing to ferment.

Jo knew how tasty and healthy her creations were but the average Kiwi neighbour or market shopper just didn’t get it. It wasn’t until she took a few jars to some friends who ran a proper health food store that things started to change. People who knew raw foods and understood what a bit of raw Apple Cider could do to jumpstart the metabolism in the morning (for instance) saw Jo’s live-culture foods as a blessing. They appreciated that Jo’s recipes moved way past the hippie raw-food-in-a-jar vibe (really healthy but stinky as, and, super strange tasting) and into some highly developed and refined sauerkrauts and kimchi. Jo had both the common sense and ability to take the best of her local food environment and blend it in a delicious way. Her culinary results were crying out to be paired with elements of a newly developing Kiwi cuisine. For example, her Helena Bay Sauerkraut is a mix of cabbage, carrot, onion, garlic, ginger and a hint of chilli, the combination of which comes from her living in that beautiful region up North. She pairs this kick-ass kraut with a steak sandwich, or tacos and nachos. A great fish taco on a soft corn tortilla needs a good slaw but Jo’s Helena Bay mix works even better (in my opinion), adding a lovely kick to the battered or blackened fish in the taco.

Recapturing and reconfiguring of foods from far away times and places is another facet of modern Kiwi cuisine and it’s boutique producers serving up their best. For Jo, it’s about health and flavour, two essential aspects of a good life. Having been eating Be Nourished all week, I’m feeling pretty good myself, and, I have to say Jo’s nailed both the classic flavour dynamics of traditional sauerkrauts and kimchi (I grew up with both) and added some lovely fresh twists which I’ve found a delightful addition to my morning toast, can salmon salads and a number of dishes I look forward to creating in the coming weeks. Jo will also be adding to her range of fermented food in the coming months so keep your eye out and your taste buds open.
(Keep your Be Nourished goods in the fridge as these foods are alive, and will keep you so too.)

Recipe: Raw Probiotic Salad Dressing Recipe


Jo was kind enough to pass on one of her favourite salad dressings, which would be great on a mixed salad of any kind.
1 Part – Be Nourished Sauerkraut Juice any flavour
1 Part – Extra Virgin Cold Pressed Olive Oil
2 Parts – Braggs All Purpose Seasoning (also at Raeward Fresh)
2 Parts – Tahini (hulled or un-hulled I like hulled for a lighter flavour)
Put all ingredients into a jar and shake to mix.

Oonagh Browne makes chocolate from the heart. She chooses ingredients based on her inner passions and combines them in ways that delight her soul. Her production process is a meditation of sorts, whereby she forms each chocolate rolled ginger, or sesame thin slab, with the intention to bless. She shares her heart via these creations at her cafe, at the Littleton markets and, now, at Raeward Fresh in Queenstown where I had the good fortune to try them out.
Oonagh’s certified organic chocolate was rich and smooth, tempered perfectly to create the essential snap and crunch of a first bite, quickly followed with that smooth, melt-in-your-mouth-endorphin-stimulating sweetness. Then the ginger hit – all kinds of spicy and candied notes melded in with the cacao (making me very, very happy). And the Fresh Truffles! Each one in the box of six were delicious revelations of dark caramels and rich fruity creams (like lime!) encased in delicate chocolate architectures. This is Oonagh’s goal, to spread some love through the work of her and the whole teams hands.

Oonagh grew up in Baltinglass, Ireland, where chocolate meant Cadburys. It wasn’t until later in life, when she took a business trip to Belgium, that she discovered chocolate could be so much more. Having finished her business degree, Oonagh worked for a multinational in London. Despite doing well, she longed for her life to be more creative and fulfilling. Hosting dinners and expressing herself through hospitality covered some of this ground but, at the end of the day, working in a business that didn’t operate from her passions made her feel as though her soul would shrivel up and waste away. It seemed to her at that point that the most logical thing to do (as it seems to be for many people) was to head to the Himalayas.
Oonagh shook off London in the mountains of Nepal, went on to study meditation in Thailand and discovered during her sojourn how wonderful New Zealand is for the soul. She went on to Australia for a time, where her love of creating with first chocolate began. She discovered how to be creative through practicing a moving meditation called The Form. Oonagh met the founder (B Prior) who told her he was planning on opening a centre in NZ. She loved the idea of being a part of something that was about more then just business as usual. She joined with Bernie, Suzanne Johnson and Declan Scott to create She Universe, a business that was about expressing human potential and heart in the business world, one beautiful chocolate at a time.

Misc Notes on the other samplings I did.
• The Hot Chocolate Original Swirlers, a package of three chunky blocks of hot chocolate on a stick, were a whimsical answer to my question; “where oh where in NZ can I get a fantastic hot chocolate”?. I melted the full cream milk in my milk frother and swirled the chocolate cube on a stick until my hot chocolate was ready. Of course, I did take a few licks of the cube along the way, the wonderful coconut sugar blending wonderfully with the dark chocolate. The result was a creamy hot choc that was smooth and rich. Perfect, especially because the coconut sugar happens to have healthy amounts of magnesium and zinc. I couldn’t be happier.
• The six Fresh Truffles were fabulous. Especially the burnt caramel and the lime cream, and the rose water turkish delight’ish truffles. I ate all six within minutes. I have been around the world and She has nailed it. I could compare these truffles with any in Paris or NYC. Well done crew!
• The Mayan (70%) Raspberry bar was dark, thick and sprinkled with dried raspberries which was perfect as they melted at the same time the chocolate did on the palette. I was impressed with the tempering and that lovely sweet / fruity sourness that speaks of a cacao kept in tact through the chocolate making process. This bar will last a while as a simple bite is enough to hold you in paradise for long enough.

Tom grew up in Wellington where he thinks his first word was “McDonalds”. You would have known him at the time as the fatter kid in class, hanging out with his mates at the tuck shop downing lollies to soothe those primary school blues. Even though Tom’s parents were health conscious and his mum made sure he at least knew the names of his vegetables, Tom was, at the time, a typical kiwi junk food kid. It wasn’t until Tom hit high school – that magical arena for self-awareness – that he started to become aware of his body, especially after joining the rowing team. The physical regime demanded a better kind of nutrition which Tom became aware of, but more importantly, the awesome community of 30 kids and coaches working together towards a common goal became a game changer for Tom and his peers as they sought a better way to live and improve together. Such are the seeds sown in a young man’s life who grows up to be a personal trainer, nutrition expert and food business entrepreneur.

Once Tom got going in his career as a personal trainer, he noticed there was a massive disconnect when it came to fitness and nutrition. Most of his clients wanted to focus on weights and training, but Tom didn’t want to just change peoples diets to bulk up, but rather to help his clients eat properly to develop their bodies across the board. During this time, Tom developed a great radar for nutrient dense foods that brought on the right mix of fats, proteins and the right kind of slow burning carbs. While working at Les Mills Gym in Lower Hutt, Tom would head across the street to Abode Cafe where chef Luke Cooper was making some pretty fabulous caramel slices and GF choc brownies to snack on between sessions. Tom wanted to reduce sugar intake for himself and his clients and asked Luke if they could come up with something for people in the neighborhood together. No ordinary cafe cook, Luke had some killer ideas on how to bring the best of kinds of ingredients together to get this fat / protein / carb ratio right while being delicious at the same time. For the first six months, Tom was the focus / test group but as they nailed the recipes, Tom’s clients and other folk in the neighborhood started getting on board. Tom shared the new snacks with people back at the gym, one of whom was a sharp entrepreneur with skills in the food industry who first advised, then later collaborated with Tom and Luke to take these goodies to market.

Making the transition from Luke’s cafe kitchen to full-on production was a bit of work for all them. First, it was about getting all the right ingredients and quantities from the right suppliers. Then, came a lot of trial and error, rehydrating the goji berries for instance for the right texture (those puppies can be super chewy right?). Agave was already being used to both aid digestion and to soften other ingredients and then other sweeteners were added to find the right balance with new flavours. Then they had to back off on certain flavours while pumping up others to make chef Luke and chief product taster Tom happy enough to eat these goodies every day. An Apple Computer lead designer (Alan Kay) once said that if a kid can use the thing, it’ll sell like crazy. In a sense, what Tom and Luke were doing was tapping into their inner child food needs to see if it was something, say, a mum might get away with placing into the lunch bag every day…

Tom & Luke shared the end results with friends, family and the places they liked to shop. One such place was Common Sense Organics, where they sourced a lot of the main ingredients for their new nutrition / health / sports / snack bars. Common Sense snapped them up as did a few other retailers in the area. What was making the difference, was that on the back end, Tom & Luke bars had some deep nutrition going on while on the front end chef Luke made sure these bars had the flavours, textures and sensations which would make people glad. Then, they had to transition from 300g testing quantities, to say, 7 tonnes of goodies to make a heap of bars, bites and treats under the newly establish brand of Tom & Luke Bars.

Now having a product they all liked, Tom hit the road to share the goodness with other gyms, clients, retailers and farmers markets. His main pitch wasn’t just that these things were really good for foodies, healthies, (is that a term, or a person?), kids and their mums… but that he had a box of “Black Forest Bites”, or “Apple & Cinnamon bars” or GF Spirulina and Whittaker’s 72% Dark Ghana Chocolate bars called “Trinity”. Whoa. Of course, all of these bars were also:
• super high in fibre (10g per bar)
• even higher in protein (20g per bar)
• had the right balance of good fats (sunflower butter at 20g per bar)
• only 6.4g net carbs per bar
• and of course, naturally low in cholesterol
win, win, win, win, win

Being able to have a tasty snack is pretty cool, but packing said snack with stuff like organic sunflower butter, golden pea protein, toasted organic oats and organic chia seeds makes it even better for health and happiness (on top of all the cool of course). Tom & Luke bars, like the world they inhabit, are also adapting and changing according to the needs and desires of their customers. The bites came about for instance, because Tom’s mum (and others) were cutting the bars into pieces to last throughout the day. New flavours are coming on line as well and Tom is always finding new groups of people who are keen to have an amazing snack to fuel their holistic personal development. Tom’s come a long way from the tuck shop to being his own shop on the road selling much healthier and tastier snacks to people. At Raeward Fresh, we’re stoked to be able to share this story, these products and their vision for a healthier personal development for all of us.

They say it takes a tribe to raise a child. In this case Mr & Mrs Coconut have been the proud parents and the community of Raglan have been the supportive village. Raglan Coconut Yoghurt is the prodigy of this creative community – born of love and collaboration – and what a beautiful baby it is! I had the privilege of chatting with the diversely entrepreneurial Tesh Randall (Mrs Coconut) this morning to find out more about their amazing process and product. Tesh is an engaging young Kiwi who embodies the best of a new breed of foodie culture, people who care about making exceptional stuff from the heart.

Tesh grew up in the Kumara capital of the world (Dargaville) and spent most of her homeschooled childhood around good baking with an exposure to the land at her grandparents nearby farm. Finishing school at 15, she soon went on to Whangarei where she took jobs in a number of fields from accounting to event management. By the age of 19, she had self-published her first childrens book, ‘Button Thief’, which she has sold over a thousand copies of to date by going store to store. From there, Tesh started focusing more on writing and, moving to Christchurch, worked for a radio station writing ads and freelancing other projects until the earthquake knocked the wind out of the city. Back north then, Tesh worked in Auckland running her own copywriting business, working from home and developing her web skills. Happily working away in this milieu, Tesh met her partner Seb (Mr Coconut) at an ‘Art Of Happiness’ seminar because they were both attracted to the vegetarian food on offer.

What has all that to do with coconut yoghurt you might be asking by now? Well, it’s the same as with the NYC lawyers who started WEKA olive oil, or the Cromwell school teacher who runs Off Our Tree Cherries. People with diverse professional and creative backgrounds bring all their skills together in the creation of something very new in the world of food. What’s unusual about Tesh and Seb however, is that they’re not retiring into food at mid life, they’re shifting gears in their mid 20’s. Seb had been working for Telecom and Tesh had been focusing on corporates in her writing and web development. They both wanted to break away from this scene and live more from the heart so, of course, they moved to Raglan. Like American musicians Jack Johnson and Ben Harper, Seb loves the surfing there and Tesh found herself at home in the community vibe.

Seb and Tesh immediately started making things together. They loved creating various foods from Kefirs to Kombuchas and, Tesh tells me, the baking got a lot healthier than in her childhood “Edmonds” days. They also formed a company to help small businesses get on-line but felt like it was keeping them in the corporate scene more than they really wanted. Along the way, Seb noticed he was reacting to dairy products so Tesh started experimenting with non-dairy yoghurts. She’d heard of coconut yoghurt but wasn’t in love with anything at the stores. Tesh trial-and-error-ed through four months of iterations, trying different creams, incubation times, temperatures, cultures and mixing the coconut with other milks or creams. Eventually, she came up with something both she and Seb really liked (and this pair REALLY LIKE yoghurt, blending it in breakfasts, smoothies, straight up… all the time).

The final recipe was completely dairy free (good for Seb), had no refined sugars (a large 700ml jar has about 1 teaspoon of organic honey which comes from local bee hives based around the Manuka Bush of Mt Karioi), no GMO or preservatives, as well as also having millions of healthy probiotics (which my Mum tells me is even helping her eczema). Tesh and Seb started making larger batches of their new creation and one weekend, ended up with a bit of a surplus. Raglan being Raglan (where the community Facebook page has 3000 members helping each other find lost jandals or puppies), Tesh posted that she had a few extra jars if anyone was keen. Tesh’s post was flooded with requests and Raglan Coconut Yoghurt was born. She spent the next few days finding more jars (from Raglan’s trend-setting recycling centre) and making huge batches to fill 60 orders, which then became weekly requests. Her post was reposted, shared in Hamilton, Auckland and elsewhere until Mr and Mrs Coconut figured they’d have to make heaps more coconut babies.

Seb’s strategic skills met Tesh’s kitchen / digital strengths allowing the couple to start a new business around this fantastic yoghurt (and, a very cool web site). But it was the Raglan community that kicked in to offer product feedback, word of mouth marketing and practical No. 8 wire support. For instance, when Tesh needed a bigger container to brew the yoghurt, a local metal artist converted a large pot by welding a spigot to the bottom, creating a large urn. You can buy this kind of thing of course, if you didn’t live in Raglan… Tesh loves that this same community has a “Time Bank” where she can write copy for a local business who, in exchange, will pay back with plumbing or baking or whatever’s needed. Tesh and Seb are also involved in local initiative KASM to help safeguard New Zealand’s beaches.

When you look at the overall story, it seems almost inevitably normal that such a creamy, deliciously healthy coconut yoghurt would come from a place and people like this. And, it makes sense that we’re not seeing this kind of quality or innovation come out of larger manufacturers who’s best efforts of late seem to be limited to coming up with cooler labels or brand names, born of paid focus groups rather than down to earth makers. Tesh and Seb seem to be glad for their experiences and connection to the corporate world, especially in terms of lessons learned in strategy or sales. But what they would really like to do is take the best of New Zealand food innovation and make it available to their neighbors (instead of all the really good stuff being sent overseas all the time). In fact, their first stockist was the neighbor down the street whose organics shop, Whaingaroa Organic Kai, is where they get the regions best groceries from others who also really care. At Raeward Fresh here in Queenstown, we fully appreciate the community behind Raglan Coconut Yoghurt and are really glad to be sharing their goodness with our own local communities of like minded food-lovers.

Tesh and Seb have put out a fantastic little cookbook featuring some wonderful personalities from around NZ and their favourite recipes using Raglan Coconut Yoghurt. It’s a wonderful read and Tesh and Seb are using the proceeds to build their own commercial kitchen. You can find a link to the cookbook here.
Ingredients
Bars:

• 400ml of Raglan Coconut Yoghurt
• 2 cups of desiccated coconut
• 3 large tablespoons of melted coconut oil
• 1 large tablespoon of coconut nectar
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• Generous pinch of salt

Coating:

• 250gram block of 72% Fairtrade Whittakers Chocolate
• 2 large tablespoons of coconut oil

 

How to make:
Mix all the ingredients wet ingredients together in a pot.
Stir in the coconut until the mixture is clumpy, but not runny. The coconut nectar will give it a slightly golden colour. Press into a rectangle container lined with baking paper and pop in the freezer for 10 mins to let it firm up slightly.
Take out and cut into small bar shapes (recipe makes about 24), and put back in the freezer to harden completely.
Once completely frozen, melt chocolate and coconut oil together in a bowl sitting in a saucepan of hot water – you can add more oil for a thinner coating. Dip each bar smoothly through the chocolate using a spatula and knife, and it will snap freeze immediately.
Place finished bars on baking paper and try not to eat them all at once! They keep in the fridge for at least a week.

Just for fun, Richard and Helen Dorresteyn started the Clevedon Farmers Market around 10 years ago. Actually, they were also a little bit tired of buying all the manky fruit and veg being dumped in their local stores, especially given that they lived out of town by many of the produce farms supplying top quality fresh food to trendy inner city markets. The community came together around this initial venture to create a thriving local market, drawing out all kinds of interesting stalls (now numbering 70) showcasing the regions best growers and makers. The only problem, as Richard and Helen saw it back then, was that no one was selling any cheese at the Clevedon market. Time for some fun…

Richard was working as an industrial electrician while Helen was teaching art in schools. The couple saw an opportunity to fill the market’s cheese gap and decided to do some research. They both loved mozzarella but wanted to make something special, and one glaring hole they noticed in the NZ cheese world was that no fresh buffalo mozzarella was being produced in their region – or the entire country at that time for that matter. So they decided to have a go at making some. With buffalos, of course.

The first step, obviously, was to fly to Darwin and buy some buffalos from a guy named Bill (Buffalo Bill to his friends). They arrived in remote northern Aussie to what seemed like another planet. Riding roughshod over the red earth they could not escape the rugged landscape, it rose up underneath them in clouds of burnt ochre through the rusted out bottom of Bill’s old truck. During this epic outback adventure they learnt heaps from Bill, bought what buffalo he could sell and then also picked up a few more from another Aussie farming contact. The buffalo were sent to Melbourne in preparation to get them back to Clevedon, NZ. No small task , not only from a quarantine perspective, but also because many of the buffalo were as wild as the landscape from which they’d come. Helen and Richard persisted and, in time, had 18 buffalo back on Kiwi grasslands ready to be milked… and milk ready to be made into cheese. And not just any cheese, it needed to be world class buffalo mozzarella. They knew that such a dream would require an amazing level of cheesemaking craft, so it was time for some more fun…

Off to the 8th World Buffalo Conference for the Dorresteyn’s. They eagerly soaked up all they could and struck it lucky when a couple of kind Italian’s took them under their wing. These gentlemen showed Helen and Richard a few tricks of the trade. Serendipity struck again when their introductions connected them with a phenomenal professor in Naples who’s life study is the making of buffalo mozzarella. Next stop: Naples (for fun of course), where they took a master class with the master. While they were making cheese together the professor was kind enough to share his “make sheet”. He then sent them on their blessed way to a small store in one of Naples’ back alleys where loud talking, chain smoking cheese specialists put together an order of all the intricate gear Helen and Richard would need to make buffalo mozzarella back home.

Over the next two years, while their buffalos were maturing into a herd of well bred, long horned beasts, Richard and Helen spent their time experimenting and perfecting their cheesemaking processes. They got to the point where they were ready for market and, following some initial encouraging feedback, Helen jumped into the Toyota and drove up to Auckland to share their labour with Tony Astle from Antione’s Restaurant,(as you do if you wanna know whether you’ve nailed it). Nervous as all hell she delivered a kilo of their smooth, round, white, cheesy goodness to Tony, who whipped it out, cut off a slice, and responded, “That’s not bad, is it”. He then made an order for the entire year ahead and has been buying, along with a slew of other chefs, from the Dorresteyn’s ever since.

On top of all the fun they’re having, it’s clear to me that some rock solid values underpin their enthusiasm and success. I think the essence of what motivates Richard & Helen is their passion for sustainable Kiwi community; to take their smallish piece of land, along with their formidable talents, and then work hard together to help see NZ truly shine. They want this from the ground up, quite literally – from the grass, to the animals, to the accumulation of craft and techniques, to the ongoing ingenuity, and then, of course, to the people in their neighbourhood and beyond who can now enjoy a delicious NZ buffalo mozzarella. They love standing alongside the 70 other stallholders at the Clevedon Farmers Market these days, looking down the rows at the men and women who are creating the future of this gifted country. It takes special people to see the heart of their community and build something extraordinary within it together. At Raeward Fresh, we take our hats off to the industrial electrician and the art teacher who went around the world and brought back a beautifully fresh buffalo mozzarella for our lucky land.

Not to brag, but I happen to be an expert on popcorn. Growing up in the U.S., I’ve sampled hundreds of variations from Cracker Jacks to your standard movie going fare, to gourmet kettle corn popped in a large cast iron caldron on the spot. I’ve created dozens of variations at home from miners thyme and sea salt to coconut sugar and nutmeg, all in my quest for that buttery, sweet, salty, puffy, moorish treat. So yeah, I knows my popcorn.

Not long ago, I saw a new popcorn offering at Raeward Fresh Queenstown with a bear on the bag, peering back at me. Obviously, we were both very serious about this stuff. Back home, I rented a serious (mostly) movie – The Big Short – and worked my way through three different kinds of Serious Popcorn. In the first act, I got an education about the lead-up to the world financial crises of 2008 accompanied by the Serious’ Sea Salt popcorn. Both the film and the popcorn had subtle complexities and surprises. For instance, who knew that baby boomers were going to rip off the whole world, right? Even more surprising though, was how buttery Serious’ popcorn tasted. Especially seeing as there’s no butter in the popcorn.

In the second act, the humor, tension and insanity of the looming crises grows while I made my way through the second bag of Serious’ Sweet & Salty popcorn. Kettle corn is my all time favourite and this one is right up there on the balance of flavours. Again, really buttery too. Hmmm? Once the financial meltdown hit in the Big Short, it was time for some Coconut & Vanilla popcorn. Maybe a bit sweeter than I’m used to but that didn’t stop me from polishing off the bag in the midsts of watching the world implode on the greed and insanity of the last decade.

Overall, this is some really good popcorn and being an expert I had to do my popcorn research so I called Serious Popcorn’s creator Roger Holmes to get the back story. Roger grew up on a North Waikato farm where his Grandfather first planted sweet corn, squash, asparagus and baby carrots… As a kid, sorting corn on the line, and watching the food go to market gave Roger a sense of quality, supply chains and the market overall. So after studying and working in London for a while, Roger got hit with the same financial crisis of 2008 and had to come up with a serious solution for work. Having a flare for combining flavours and produce in his blood, Roger developed the award winning Stolen Rum.

While promoting Stolen in Miami, Roger observed the U.S. obsession with popcorn which kindled his own connection with corn. Using that same gift for combining unique ingredients, Roger developed a recipe to achieve the essential buttery taste by using a fantastic organic corn from the Hawkes Bay and organic deodorized coconut oil to which he adds the other ingredients making up the flavours I described above. And watch this space, Roger is concocting even more flavours in his serious development to create a healthy snack that satisfies, delights and pleases the heart. And as an expert, I can verify that he’s seriously nailed it:-|

There are a gazillion drinks available on the market today – and most of them are average. So, when you take a swig of something that surprises your palette and gives you pause to take a second look at the bottle, it’s worth noting. This was my experience with the range of drinks from All Good. First, it was solid traceable flavours (as in you could actually taste the black currant or ginger, instead of their chemical alias). Next, punchy fizz balanced just right with real fruitiness. And to finish up, a startling taste experience that lasts all the way down the back of the throat (because you’ve actually just swallowed your first real cola nut beverage). It seems there’s actually something to this fair trade, organic business that comes through in the flavour and quality of the drinks. Chris Morrison, a third of the brains behind All Good, was kind enough to explain how….

Let’s begin with a bit about this third of those brains. Chris grew up in Wellington and started wandering around the world in his early 20’s. He spent some time in Vancouver, where he worked in a health food store which piqued his interest in all things organic. One of his first food endeavors in the field was to create an organic vegetarian dog biscuit. Hmm. Moving on… Chris carried on around Europe and Mexico before returning to New Zealand where he studied naturopathy and met his wife Deborah. From here it was back to work at another health food store, where a supplier eventually sold Chris his recipe for ginger beer – the long story short of which saw Chris founding and running Phoenix Drinks (along with his wife Deborah and friend Roger Harris). Phoenix became Australasia’s largest organic soft drink company.

After Chris and his wife chose to sell their shares of Phoenix, Chris continued to look for ways to keep his Kiwi entrepreneurial gears turning and turned to organic bananas. Along with his brother Matt and friend Simon Coley, Chris and Co (of the collaboration All Good Bananas) wanted to make the shift from looking solely at the environment (organics) to the social side of food (fair trade). As food production is the staple part of small community economics around the world, Chris, Matt and Simon decided it was time to get in direct contact with growers and work the supply chain in a fair and ethical way. They were the first in the country to supply NZ stores with organic, fair trade bananas.

This combination of solid business nous and a compassionate ethos formed the background for taking their All Good company to the next level. For Chris, this meant cola. Many companies had abandoned using the actual cola nut in beverages and opted for chemical substitutes instead. Cola is challenging to source (especially in war torn Sierra Leone) and costly to work with, but it has a such a unique flavour that can’t really be reproduced. Similar to the ethical thoughtfulness that’s come to characterize the coffee movement of late, Chris wanted to build bridges between growers and discerning NZ consumers. He chose a village in Sierra Leone (Boma) to work with, bought directly from them and thus Karma Cola was born. Simon, who worked with 42 Below’s marketing team (an interesting story in it’s own right) helped come up with the campaign for All Good drinks, telling the honest story of shared values between Sierra Leonean farmers and a few ordinary Kiwi blokes. Karma’s main pitch is “What goes around, comes around”. It’s catchy but it’s not spin. They have indeed created a virtuous cycle around quality farming of exceptional ingredients (including organic vanilla from Sri Lanka and organic cane sugar from Maharashtra India), it’s transformation into healthy and delicious beverages, and it’s sale to an appreciative audience.

Since Karma Cola, the All Good crew has gone on to make Gingeralla, a fantastic low sugar, high ginger kick of a drink sourced from Forest Garden Growers cooperative in Sri Lanka (who are made up of 130 small family farmers who grow a variety tropical spices and fruit). After that it was Lemmy, a lemonade made from organic Sicilian lemons and organic cane sugar from Suminter Organic Farmers Consortium in Maharashtra India. And finally, just last year, All Good added a range of sparkling fruit drinks to their stable of liquid goodness. These wee sparkling sippers smack of James Bond coolness paired with Gordon Ramsay in-your-face flavour. Seriously, these fruity little bombs will light up your day. The water is sourced from Waiuku and the fruits come from as close to home as the Canterbury Plains (for black currants) or as far as the Negev Desert (for the bitter lemon). Have a look at All Good’s site to see the wonderful range of fruits and their sources used in their new Sparkling drinks.

Perhaps the only thing I’m left wondering is, with ingredients sourced from all over the world, what’s so Kiwi about All Good? Here’s what Chris had to say. Like many boutique companies in the Kiwi food scene, Chris and crew would love to get all of their ingredients creating as few carbon molecules as possible. Problem is, for all our clean and green image down under here, NZ uses only 1% of it’s land for organic growth (as opposed to say, Switzerland which uses 11%). So while this does create a carbon conundrum, it also creates an opportunity for green tech, fair trade creatives like Chris, Matt and Simon to come up with a Kiwi-esque solution. For All Good, this has meant using the inevitable distance to build bridges. All Good shares it’s Kiwi sensibilities in the form of ethical practice, fair prices for primary produce, and the opportunity to build substantial relationships across cultural divides. Recently, these relationships have meant they also literally build bridges (like in Boma, the village where they source the cola nut). They also network like crazy to find other boutique producers (like Eyal from Dan in Northern Israel who supplies the red grapefruit) who they can share ideas and markets with, creating both the social and environmental impact their values have them dream of on a worldwide scale. Chris still campaigns to see more of NZ grown organically, but he’s not afraid to use the existing horticultural tension as a means to share the profits with an international set of villages. I say grow on All Good, grow on.

Most of us have an intuitive sense about the sorts of foods our bodies need. What good things we may know about our personal nutrition are, however, all too often overridden by sugar cravings, stress, comfort foods, tempting Christmas treats… or all of the above. Our daily battles with food often boil down to the struggle between listening to that healthy inner voice of nutritional wisdom vs. overt cravings caused by us constantly messing with our innate systems. I know, for instance, that I should start my day off with something that will get my stomach ‘thinking’ right – like some apple cider vinegar, or lemon juice in hot water – prepping it for the host of delicious (and not always super nutritious) things that it will have process throughout the day. Instead, I’ll often go with what I ‘feel like’ (cue black coffee), what will be the most comforting (like thick sourdough toast slathered in butter & honey) and then do my best to play catch up over the day from there. This constant tussle between intuition and cravings isn’t so much about how many calories will end up on which part of our bodies; it’s really about what our stomach, acting as our second brain, knows if only we would listen. Namely, that we need to be healthy and well across the spectrum of ourselves, and that means our mental, physical and relational selves. For many of us, the inherent resilience of our bodies affords us the ability to play with the fire of poor dietary choices. My interview with Anita and Terry Kyle from the Kefir Company taught me that not everyone has that luxury.

Anita Kyle was a busy woman working in the fashion industry. When she and husband Terry had their first child, Shamus, they were immediately confronted by long sleepless nights, their small son screaming uncontrollably and vomiting constantly. It wasn’t long before this difficult start became a growing awareness that their son was struggling both mentally and physically with what would later be diagnosed as autism. Interestingly, Anita tells me how she knew intuitively – as hard as the reality of the diagnoses hit her – that Shamus’ illness was deeply related to something in his gut. Anita had struggled with stomach issues for most of her life as well, so she decided to dive headlong into the mountain of research available on the issue. She and Terry visited a range of specialists too, from GP’s to nutritionist to naturopaths. They compiled everything they learned and decided to take Shamus off both dairy and gluten to refocus on his internal bio-ecology. Within four months they saw improvements. He slept better, vomited less and began to engage in more social behaviors. Spurred on by the encouraging results and the hope they might be on to something, Terry and Anita studied even more diligently and continued to learn from and work closely with their doctor (Leila Mason) and nutritionist (Gina Wilson). Necessity had given them the opportunity to gain expert knowledge and first hand experience on the importance of gut health and how that affects the rest of our well being.

Of particular note to the Kyle’s was the priority of rebooting gut health and then maintaining it through absorbing the right kinds of foods. This included eating well-made bone broths and fermented foods while avoiding foods high in sugar and carbohydrates that bred destructive microflora. These sorts of food choices affect digestive function and metabolic health for all of us. In Shamus’ case, Anita (and team) knew he wasn’t digesting food correctly and that his constipation and vomiting were obvious signs of ill-health. Putting Shamus on bone broths and taking away dairy had such a positive effect (the family noticed increasing improvements in his ability to focus and be relationally connected) that Anita sought out other foods that would keep Shamus well and allow the rest of his system to function in healthier ways. 

Thus the Kyle’s came to discover fermented foods – and one powerhouse of the fermented food family in particular; kefir made with coconut water. Kefir of this kind was not available commercially at the time, so Anita and Terry pursued a process to make it themselves using fresh coconut water (from coconuts Terry learned to chop open with Islander efficiency) brewed slowly to neutralise the sugars (even the natural sugars in coconut water can feed candida) with the addition of seven strains of healthy bacteria and yeast. The hope was that this precious kefir could reboot Shamus’ gut health and, by extension, his immune system. The Kyle’s had such positive results from the kefir in conjunction with the rest of Shamus’ dietary regime that Anita and Terry saw the biggest improvement yet for their son – Shamus actually smiled at his mum for the first time. 

The specialists working with Shamus were also so impressed by the improvements in his well being that his nutritionist asked Anita to make more kefir so she could offer it to other families she was working with. Eventually, Anita sold her fashion business so she and Terry could develop their kefir full-time. Since those days, the Kyle family have faced other challenging personal circumstances which have required them to be at their best health wise. Anita tells me these situations also required them to apply everything they had learned about the centrality of gut health to overall well being for Shamus to themselves. You can read more about their story on their web site here.

For the rest of us, who may or may not be dealing with health crises, we have to decide what we’re going to do in response to the increasing body of knowledge, research, and even the anecdotal experience of a mother’s remarkable intuition, when it comes to our own gut health and overall well being. Thankfully, we don’t need to be sucking down Kale smoothies all day to be well, or skinny for that matter. We do, however, need to know what goes on inside our bodies, what our internal systems need to function at their healthy best and how to consistently put the basics of wellness in place. I think this is especially true in the mornings, so that we can enjoy a wide array of wonderfully delicious foods throughout the day that actually build on good bio ecologies. Anita and Terry’s Kefir Company coconut kefir water does this. It’s pricey, but you only need about 30-50 mils a day to keep nourishing your stomach with the good stuff. The good stuff squeezes out the bad bacteria over time, making it a very good deal in the long run. It is always difficult to put a price on well being and sometimes you simply can’t – in Anita’s case, the first smile of her son after a good nights sleep for her whole family is priceless. At Raeward Fresh, we’re super glad Anita and Terry found this solution for their family and that in doing so they have created a beautiful, life-affirming product to share with the rest of us.

PS. Anita suggests giving her a call or email if you want to discuss dosages for specific needs for yourself, your children or family. 0800 KEFIR ME or anita@thekefircompany.co.nz