Ethnic Auckland: Spicy lamb feet a delicacy that melts in mouth

By Lincoln Tan 5:30 AM Saturday Jan 11, 2014 Camel meat and horse milk are considered to be among the delicacies in the part of the world where Rizaydn Reyim comes from, and lamb trotters rank among the favourites. Mr Reyim, 31, is a Uyghur (pronounced "weega" or "weecour"). He hails from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China, and he is eager to share his food with those in his adopted homeland. "Not many Kiwis will ever get a chance to travel to Xinjiang, so by starting a restaurant serving Uyghur food I think it will be the only way they will get a chance to experience our food," Mr Reyim said. Uyghurs are a Turkic ethnic group whose cuisine is characterised mainly by lamb, beef, camel, goose, carrot, tomatoes, onions, pepper and various dairy food and fruits. They are mainly Muslim and the food is predominantly halal. "There is no seafood, and all the vegetable and meat we get are from what we farm and grow," Mr Reyim said. "So we know very well how not to waste any part of the animal, and eat everything from the lungs, tail and even eyes." Mr Reyim said lamb trotters, with their gelatinous textures, were a favourite because Uyghur men believed them to be an aphrodisiac and the women believe eating them helps beautify their skin. In Xinjiang, speciality "lamb feet restaurants" have sprouted in recent years because of the food's growing popularity. "Lamb feet don't really have too much meat, but the best part is eating the tendons and sucking the bone marrow," said Mr Reyim. "It is also the tendons and tissue around the leg that also naturally adds to the flavour and thicken the sauce." The spice in the koy pachak kormisy dish comes mainly from the cloves, which are considered to have anti-oxidant properties and other health benefits. Mr Reyim said the meal was best accompanied with an Uyghur-style milk tea, which is flavoured with salt instead of sugar. Lamb trotters are available at the butchery section of Asian supermarkets such as Tai Ping. Koy pachak kormisy Ingredients • 8 lamb feet, cut into pieces • 1 onion, chopped • 4 cloves of garlic, chopped • 1 tsp salt • 1 tsp pepper • 1 each red and green capsicum • 1 tsp dried cloves • 1/2 cup tomato paste • 1 Tbsp soya sauce • Vegetable cooking oil Method • Wash and clean the feet carefully and discard hooves, then immerse the feet in water. • Put the feet in a deep pressure cooker with some salt, pepper and oil. • Cook for 1 hours with medium pressure, remove and leave to cool. • Heat a tablespoon of vegetable oil in a separate wok and add the feet. • Add chopped garlic, cloves and onions and fry together with the feet for about 2 minutes. • Add half cup of lamb broth (from the pressure cooker), soya sauce, tomato paste and fry for a further 5 minutes. • Finally add the red and green capsicum, and after a quick fry it is ready to serve. • Add salt and pepper to serve. Where to try Silk Road Uyghur Cuisine, upstairs 12 Wyndham St, Ph: (09) 379 5299 http://www.nzherald.co.nz/lincoln-tan/news/article.cfm?a_id=308&objectid=11184566

Kiwi acrobat shows off her skills this Chinese New Year

Kiwi acrobat shows off her skills this Chinese New Year By Lincoln Tan 5:30 AM Saturday Jan 18, 2014 She grew up in Whangarei as a ballerina and a vegetarian, but 23-year-old Emma Phillips is back as a Mandarin-speaking acrobat who loves eating duck heads. For 20 months, the 23-year-old has trained as the sole European student with 180 young Chinese acrobats at the Wuqiao Acrobatics School in Wuqiao, Hebei, China. Specialising in foot-juggling a solid wooden table, Chinese parasols and spinning carpets combined with contortion, she has been performing alongside Chinese acrobatic troupes at circuses and stadium shows across China. But she is "extremely excited" to be back in New Zealand for her first Chinese New Year performance at the ASB Showgrounds today. "In China, Chinese New Year celebrations is a really full-on thing with fireworks and firecrackers going on 24/7 for the entire 15-day duration," she said. "It'll be really interesting to see what the celebrations are like in Auckland." Her love for the performing arts began when she joined a ballet school as a child, but she dreamed of becoming an acrobat after her dad took her to watch Cirque Du Soleil in Auckland when she was 15. "To be an acrobat, China's the place to be if you want to train with the best," she said. Training was intensive, more than eight hours daily over six-day weeks, and free time was used for visits to fabric markets and sewing her own costumes. She considers herself lucky to have trained in Wuqiao, which was the birthplace of Chinese acrobatics more than 2000 years ago. Miss Phillips will take centre stage at 11.35am with two foot-juggling acts performed to traditional Chinese music. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/lincoln-tan/news/article.cfm?a_id=308&objectid=11188362

Year of the Horse will bring love, marriage and babies

Year of the Horse will bring love, marriage and babies By Lincoln Tan 5:30 AM Saturday Jan 18, 2014 Month of Chinese New Year celebrations will begin once PM has ceremonially 'dotted the lion's eyes' Janet and Charles Chan keep alive the tradition of celebrating Chinese New Year. This year they will be among those welcoming the Year of the Horse. Photo / Brett Phibbs Janet and Charles Chan keep alive the tradition of celebrating Chinese New Year. This year they will be among those welcoming the Year of the Horse. Photo / Brett Phibbs A month-long series of festive events to welcome the Year of the Horse will follow the Prime Minister's dotting of the lion's eyes today. Chinese New Year is still two weeks away, but celebrations start this morning with the Chinese New Year Festival and Market at the ASB Showgrounds in Greenlane. At 10am, Prime Minister John Key will officiate at an eye-dotting ceremony, also known as "dian jing", giving "life" to Chinese lions who will perform a dance to ward off evil and bring in good luck. Under the 12-year-cycle Chinese calendar, or sheng xiao, the Year of the Snake will give way to the Wooden Horse on January 31. Auckland feng shui master James Dong is predicting the year to be a challenging one for New Zealand, with possible natural upheaval and political changes. But the presence of shung chun or "double spring" also promises more romance, marriages and babies. "For some Kiwis, this will be the year to marry, move into new homes and have babies," Mr Dong said. It is also extremely rare for the Chinese lantern festival - observed on the 15th day of the Lunar New Year and known as the Chinese Valentine's Day - to fall on the same day as Valentine's Day on February 14. A highlight at today's market day is a "face changing" performance by a cultural group from China's Jilin province. Next Saturday, Chinese Yu Opera will take centre stage with Chinese acrobats, traditional musicians and New Zealand's Got Talent finalist magician Andre Vegas at Lunar Fest 2014. The event at Trusts Arena in Henderson, organised by a local Asian media company, World TV, will end with a traditional fireworks display. The Year of the Horse will be welcomed with a bang in downtown Auckland CBD as firecrackers are set off at the base of the Sky Tower at 7pm on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. The Chinese God of Fortune, Cai Shen, is also to make a spectacular appearance at SkyCity on January 31. The Korean community, which also observes the Lunar New Year, is organising an event held to honour those aged 65 and over at Takapuna Grammar School on February 1. "In our culture, New Year is a time to remember our seniors and thank them for their contributions," said spokeswoman Diane Lee. The Lunar New Year is traditionally observed for 15 days, and the four-day Auckland Lantern Festival returns to Albert Park on February 13 to mark the end of the cultural festivities. Tang Dynasty, one of China's oldest and best known heavy metal band, and the Shanghai Jiangzhou Drum Troupe will be headline acts at this year's event. The festivities will close with a fireworks display from the Sky Tower at 10.30pm on February 16. What's on Welcoming the Year of the Wooden Horse Chinese New Year Festival • Today, 9.30am to 4pm, ASB Showgrounds, Greenlane. • Market and food stalls, dragon and lion dances. Lunar Fest 2014 • January 25, 3pm -11pm Trusts Arena, Henderson. • Cultural performances, stalls and fireworks. Firecrackers • January 30 and January 31, SkyCity. God of Fortune • January 31, Sky City. Meet Cai Shen, the Chinese God of Fortune. Acrobats, drumming and lion dance • Every weekend from January 30 to February 16, at SkyCity. Auckland Lantern Festival • February 13 to 16, Albert Park, Auckland City. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11188363

People in our past: New life in a garden of plenty

Chinese have a long history in New Zealand, despite limited immigration rights, racial discrimination and social exclusion for many decades. Lim Sun Ngan (Betty) tells a happier story I came to New Zealand as a young girl with my mother in 1939. We were war refugees escaping the Japanese occupation of China. We came to New Zealand because my father was already here. He had been living here for about 20 years, working in market gardens and coming back to visit us in China when he could. Chinese women and children were not allowed to live in New Zealand until the outbreak of World War II. Chinese men had been coming here without their families for a long time. My grandfather, Lim Ping, worked here as well as my father, Lim Hong. My husband's grandfather came in the gold rush to Otago in the 1860s. When the gold ran out he worked in market gardens in Dunedin and his son, my husband's father, was in his teens when he started coming here to join him. It was hard for Chinese here in the early years, my father used to say. But in my lifetime I have not experienced any of that. I was 7 or 8 when I arrived and went straight into primary school not knowing English. It was a convent school in Ohakune and the other children were lovely to me. It might have helped that on my first two days I took a bag of lollies and handed them around. People ask me, "Betty, how did you learn English", and I do not know. I just watched what the kids around me did and I suppose I worked things out. After school and at weekends, we helped with the garden work. In those days at Ohakune, farmers used to give Chinese growers a bit of land that was covered in bush. The grower would clear the bush and was then allowed the land rent-free for a few years. I remember that I was always picking up bits of branch and stump and throwing them into a cart pulled by Dad's horse. The trouble with the bush-clearing deal was that after a few years the land reverted to the farmers, cleared and cultivated, and the grower had to leave with nothing. That happened to Dad around 1948, and we moved to Mangere where he bought a few acres that had glasshouses and he planned to grow grapes. Dad knew nothing about grapes. Eventually he bought a bigger garden at Pukekohe where he could keep his old horse, Ginger. When the time came, he could not bear to send Ginger away. He borrowed a bulldozer and buried him on the property. Meanwhile, I had met Young Kai Jue (KJ) who was from Otago and was visiting cousins at Pukekohe. We married in 1955 and lived at Stirling, near Balclutha, where KJ's father was a commercial grower. Our son Gary was born there. In 1957 we bought a 30-acre (12ha) garden at Bombay and have been there ever since. We have retired now, but I loved gardening. It's a great life, not financially but everything else about it is lovely. You are outside, you can work at your own pace. There are other people with you, and you can chat as you work. And you are working with plants that stay where you have put them and do what you want. As I used to say to people, "A cabbage can't talk back to you". We had three more children, all daughters, Sharon, Leanne and Teresa, and like Gary, they all helped in the garden after school and at weekends. It is what our families do, it just comes naturally to the children. The children also had time for other things. Sharon wanted a horse and we fenced off a bit of land that could not be used for growing. We got her a piano, too. We did not get television until the Commonwealth Games in Christchurch (1974). Commercial growing never gave me much time for hobbies. The local people are wonderful and the women were keen to get me playing golf, but I had to keep telling them I just did not have time. Gardening is a struggle financially because it is not cost-plus. The prices you have to accept seldom reflect the increasing costs of sprays, manure and other things. It got worse when the auction system stopped. Now you have to sell to brokers who get in between growers and retailers and take a cut. Turners and Growers were good to deal with. They always treated us fairly, and were always polite. That is all I ask of people - to be fair and polite to you. What they say behind your back does not matter so much. We feel very Kiwi, and we have not kept in regular contact with wider family in China. We had been in New Zealand 50 years before we saw China again. Sometime in the 1980s, a friend phoned from Canada to say she was going to visit China and did I want to come? We took our youngest daughter and went back to see what had happened to our villages in Canton. It was all different. It is all a city now. You cannot find anything there unless someone shows you. The place is changing so quickly that when we went back a second and third time, just a year apart, things that were there the first time had disappeared and been replaced. In New Zealand now there is a new Chinese population but we do not know them. Our families are well established. Gary has a fish and chip shop in Pukekohe. One of his sons works with him, the other is an economic analyst in England. Sharon has four daughters and two grandchildren. Sharon is still an outdoor girl. She helped her husband in market gardening until their children were grown, and now works for a friend who grows flowers. Our second daughter, Leanne, is in Dunedin. She works in a bank and has a daughter at university. The youngest, Teresa, worked at the airport in the duty-free shop for a long time. Now she is with a beauty-products firm in Auckland. We Chinese have deep roots in this country now. People in our past: New life in a garden of plenty 5:30 AM Friday Nov 15, 2013

Por Por’s Cookbook

Por Por’s Cookbook From Asian Report From Asian Report 29 October 2013 Lynda Chanwai-Earle travels to Ashburton to check out Por Por’s Cookbook, which explores the lives and recipes of 15 Chinese-New Zealand grandmothers http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/asianreport/galleries/por-pors-cookbook

NZCA Youth Leadership Camp

NZCA Youth Leadership Camp – 12 to 15 December 2013 PDF Print Following the successful inaugural Youth Leadership Camp in 2011 – NZCA Auckland is hosting a second camp on 12-15 December 2013 at Camp Adair, Hunua. The camp offers a comprehensive leadership, cultural and team building experience for over 40 college aged NZ Chinese/Asian students from across our community. In 2011 the participants came from Auckland, Wellington, Foxton, Levin, Waikato and even the Gold Coast Australia. The energy and enthusiasm of Albert King (Inspiration and Leadership Motivation Consultant), our key facilitator from Singapore, will again be present at the 2013 camp. Camp Adair is an ideal venue and the key note speakers are a great cross section of leaders across our community. An alumnus of young support facilitators will help drive a versatile outdoor and cultural programme. The activities, including confidence courses, Chinese calligraphy and Chinese traditional dance will ensure an intensive and fulfilling programme. The benefits will translate into the participants becoming more confident and capable young leaders within our community. The camp provides a stepping stone to our other NZCA leadership initiatives being the Leadership and Development Conference (for ages 18 -30) and the social business networking forum – Future Dragonz (http://www.futuredragonz.org.nz/index.html ). As part of the programme we will again have a presentation from the versatile Mayor of Gisborne, Meng Foon, as a keynote speaker. Meng is a talented NZ born Chinese leader who has grown up from a market garden background, speaks fluent Maori and Cantonese and provides a great mentoring perspective to the young attendees. Please spread the word to your family, friends, sons, daughters and wider network – and send in your expression of interest to attend to nzca.ylc.2013@gmail.com. In the interim please go to our Facebook page for some insights. http://www.facebook.com/nzcaylc Registration Form

Por Pors Cookbook by Carolyn King

Home cooking through the generations since Chinese Women Settled in New Zealand over the last 100 years This book contains over 140 recipes and 15 Chinese women’s life stories. Reviewed by: Margaret Agnew, Journalist, Past editor of The Christchurch Press, Weekend Supplement. “ Food is one of the strongest ties to our culture and this unique cookbook is an important link to the culinary past and present of our multi-generational New Zealand-Chinese community. The women (and men) have been cooking up a taste of home since they arrived from mainland China in the early 1900s. Modern Kiwis of Chinese descent will find this book especially fascinating for a taste of our Porpor’s past. A poignant and piquant slice of culinary history.” Kuan Meng Goh (ONZM, JP, Ph D, FRSNZ), Emeritus Professor, Lincoln University; Canterbury Branch President and Past National President, New Zealand Chinese Association “It is widely known that few other cultures are as food oriented as the Chinese. According to the famous Chinese scholar and archaeologist, K.C. Chang, “Chinese people are especially occupied with food and food is at the centre of, or at least it accompanies or symbolizes, many social interactions.” Traditionally, in Chinese culture, there is always an important relationship between food and health. This book adds a new dimension to the relationship by linking the experiences of Chinese grandmothers to their recipes. The recipes as presented are not only home-proven to succeed but are also authentic and achievable. Most people enjoy Chinese food and the recipes provide the opportunity to cook these delicious dishes. “ Meilin Chong, NZCA, Auckland Branch Committee Member. “This is a beautiful, well presented and illustrated Chinese cook book which is informative combined with family stories. It brings back fond memories of childhood days and the foods that our mothers and grandmothers cooked for us.” Home cooking through the generations since Chinese Women settled in New Zealand over the last 100 years Synopsis Through the generations the recipes have been passed down by SHOW and TELL We learnt by observation not by recipe. My aim was to record these home cooked recipes that we all love to eat. When the Chinese first settled in NZ, they used whatever fresh produce was available to them and added their own flavourings and seasonings. Aim of Cook Book;--Within the recipes sections; 1. to record the Por por’s recipes as well as my own recipes. 2. to record recipes for my daughter, and generation X & Y who now live all over the world and with their busy careers eat out more than they cook BUT yearn for the meals that they were brought up on. 3. to present and record Home Chinese cooking in NZ over the last 90-100 years. 4. to provide recipes using a base of healthy food ingredients for all New Zealanders who are interested in Chinese cooking . --With 15 Biographies of Chinese women to record 1. Life stories of grandmothers of varying ages the oldest 88yrs to the youngest of 65 years. 2. Their ancestral roots as related to first arrival to NZ. 3. Interests and achievements, contributions to their community. 4. 2-3 of their family recipes and any significant events or customs of the past. Market Potential---------This book should appeal to All Foodies who love to cook. Book lovers of biographies and cooking. New Zealanders and Australians who have had contact with Chinese families in their community. New Zealanders, young and old of Chinese descent, many now reside all over the world. Internationally, those who have roots from Southern China. Anyone interested in Chinese cooking. Background Information; In the 1901 NZ census, it showed that there were 78 Chinese women to 2, 885 Chinese men. The men folk had left their villages in Southern China due to poverty caused by famines, floods, attacks from bandits and civil wars. Upon hearing of gold in NZ in the 19th century and the chance of making their fortunes, they left their wives and families and came to New Zealand. They had planned to stay a few years and return to their families and live in comfort. Unfortunately this was not so. In the 1921 census there were 2993 men and 273 women. Chinese men worked wherever they could get a job, lived frugally and when they saved enough money, set up small businesses such as market gardens, fruit and vegetable shops and laundries. As Chinese women, either born in NZ or had come to live here as the government immigration laws permitted, the families lived off the bare necessities, raised their families and worked long hours with their husbands. It was not easy as they faced verbal abuse and racial prejudice. Many New Zealanders may not have understood what hardships the Chinese endured in the earlier years up to the 1960s. I received a small monetary grant from the NZ Chinese Poll Tax Heritage Trust which enabled me to commence this book. My Por Pors Cookbook meets the obligations of the trust as it records the lives of Chinese women, and recipes. I hope that this book will be a fine tribute to all these great women for their fine contribution to the New Zealand Society. September 25, 2013. Carolyn King. 5 Hefford Place, Ashburton. 7700. Ph. 03 3087022 email; carolynking@clear.net.nz Downloads POR PORS Cookbook synopsis Order form Cookbook Flyer Book Launch Auckland - 1 New North Road 9 November 2013 - at 2pm

Janet McAlister: Balance, harmony and breathing space

By Janet McAllister 10:50 AM Saturday Oct 19, 2013 Thanks to Art Week I had a crash course in appreciating Chinese-style scroll painting, trotting along to Parnell's Artreal Gallery for a painting demonstration by Wei Lun Ha. I was already intrigued by Ha's kauri forests, shown at Lopdell House - it's not every day that Aotearoa is represented in a non-Maori, non-European artform. (Ha says the most nightmarish thing about switching landscapes was working out how to paint the ponga, fern tendril by fern tendril.) Nor is it every day that overt politics are shown in traditional Chinese art. But for this year's Wallace Awards, Ha painted a startling blood-red protest against shark-fin soup. Sea fauna are a current concern: in another work the traditional art subject of koi carp become snapper, as a comment on the quota debate, while a steep, stylised Rangitoto rises from fierce waves (a parody/homage of Japanese painter Hokusai's 1832 masterpiece, The Great Wave, showing Mt Fuji). Ha turns out to be a smiling, sociable 25-year-old, an art teacher happy to explain. Unlike many in New Zealand's small traditional Chinese art community he's young and not from mainland China, instead identifying firmly as Kiwi, as he has been here since he was 2. The family's ancestral roots are in China but his parents are from Cambodia and Vietnam. Ha's work is inspired by the Lingnan school, which he says uses broader brushstrokes and brighter colours than most Chinese art. Ha is happy to chat while he's working. "I'm used to kids breathing down my neck," he says cheerfully, having sketched quickfire requests at the Lantern Festival. "They shout out whatever: shipwreck, tree, Pokemon." But today Ha is interested in creating balance, harmony and movement in a depiction, about 3m long, of the Milford Sound. "Clouds and trees work with wind to create the landscape," he says, the direction of the leaves and branches being very important. A mountain sits slightly "off to the side" as the focal point. Symmetry is not the same as balance, he says. Instead, the aim is to guide the viewer's eyes smoothly through the work in a figure-eight, yin-yang movement, "like qi that never dissipates". The long scrolls - Ha's record thus far is 100m - are used because "a square space is hard to move around". Leaving white "breathing" space is important, too. Below the mountain is a vast absence of paint - a lake. It doesn't contain any reflections because he's trying to give "the feeling of something being full rather than trying to fill it up". Less is more - and more mysterious. Most of his art students are young Pakeha. Ha says that "New Zealand Chinese think they don't need to have anything to do with China." He disagrees. "China is going to be big; I see the future moving that way. If we don't learn this, how are we going to communicate?" He's not necessarily talking about learning painting itself, but the ethos that underlies many Chinese expression forms, including tai chi: balance, harmony and movement. By Janet McAllister Email Janet http://www.nzherald.co.nz/arts-literature/news/article.cfm?c_id=18&objectid=11142833

Peter Calder: Around the world in eighty stalls

At the entrance to the car park at Westfield Glenfield, they are handing out tiny pamphlets with a silver fern and the words "THE TEST" on the front. But it's not about the footy. "There's a free chocolate if you complete a small survey inside," says the woman who presses one into my hand. As someone who has always understood the phrase "we're doing a survey" to mean "I have an ulterior motive", I'm instantly suspicious. Not without reason. The survey inside invites me to tick boxes to indicate which of the five commandments they've listed I have broken. I get a perfect five. Later, I will walk past the stall where they're giving out the chocolate. People are sitting at desks deep in conversation, and I decide to pass on the treat. My mother taught me not to take sweets from strangers. The other stalls that fill the crowded covered car park don't try to dissemble about what they're selling. In any case, you can smell it before you see it. This is the Sunday night market, an event that, I suspect, I'm the last person in Auckland to become aware of. It's a riot of aromas, and it's crammed with customers. The fruit-and-vegetable stalls are few, as are the tables of cheap cellphone cases and the like, though there's everything from watch repair to wellness evaluation. Along one wall there's a tarot card reader and henna tattooist, the cultural descendants, perhaps, of the ones who plied their trade in Cook St in the 1960s. A guitarist works one end of the room and a magician busks amid the mayhem. But mostly it's a food hall on steroids. Dozens of national cuisines are represented by stalls that sell various nations' street-food staples. Before I've moved 50m, I've salivated at the sight of the extruded doughnuts the Spanish call churros and succumbed to the lure of a couple of glistening beef siu mai, those dumplings that are a yum cha standard. This is multicultural Auckland in all its gastronomic finery. Signs proclaim everything from Indo-Fijian and Thai to southern barbecue and burgers. In a stall called Falafel Bro's, Assa Kohavy keeps up a rapid-fire patter as he accumulates a stack of orders in his head ("I can multitask, sir," he says when I hesitate to add mine). Kohavy and offsider David Salama, both from the Israeli port city of Haifa, sell Israeli falafel and kofta sandwiches, much spicier than the Turkish standards thanks to a Yemeni hot pepper sauce called zhug. But interestingly, the people behind the counters often attest to a widespread cultural omnivorousness: Portuguese pastel de nata is made by Bulgarians in a stall with an Italian name; the man in charge of the churros, Damir Klun, is from the former Yugoslavia. When I ask the latter what he is doing cooking Spanish food he smiles: "It's a good business," he says, with a "what can I say?" shrug. "People like what we sell and we always have a very big queue." Next to him Fusae Kudo runs a stall selling Japanese crepes which are described as harajuku-style, after the hip Tokyo fashion district. This is not traditional Japanese food, she admits; crepes are French, but in the 1970s the Japanese filled them with fresh fruit, rolled them up and made them into food you could eat while walking. The manager of Auckland Night Market, Paul de Jonge, tells me that he and his Chinese-born wife Victoria ("the brains behind the operation") run four markets across the city: in Onehunga on Thursday, Papatoetoe on Friday and Pakuranga (the original) on Saturday as well as the Sunday Glenfield one. He was inspired by the thriving markets in Taiwan - and the long queues at food stalls in an antique market here. Each has a slightly different flavour, he explains, according to the area's demography and the night of the week: "Papatoetoe on a Friday night, a lot of people are buying their groceries; here on a Sunday night, people are out relaxing. Families often don't have a place to go that everyone likes." Marissa Bell has come from Te Atatu Peninsula with her husband Kieran and their 2-year-old son Cohen, "because I didn't feel like cooking". We normally go out south," says Kieran. "This is the first time we have come here. There's a lot of different cultures and you can try a bit of everything. It's good to do something on a Sunday night." For more information: www.aucklandnightmarket.co.nz By Peter Calder 12:02 PM Wednesday Oct 16, 2013 The Sunday night market at Glenfield, one of four across Auckland, is a riot of aromas and customers.

Former mistress Bevan Chuang known for courting publicity

Auckland Mayor Len Brown has just arrived at Government House, his first proper engagement since he confirmed he had a two-year affair with a former colleague. Mr Brown has so far refused to resign from the city's top job, following the scandal that broke just more than 24 hours ago. He refused to offer any further insight into his long-term extra-marital affair with former council colleague Bevan Chuang. Ms Chuang is known for courting publicity. "I think he should resign and I think he should put himself up for re-election to regain a mandate by the people of Auckland," says former Mana Party mayor candidate John Minto. That's echoed by voters in Mr Brown's town, south Auckland. "I think he has to step down because nobody respects him anymore," says one voter 3 News spoke to. "I've love that job with a passion," Mr Brown told Campbell Live last night. "I love this city and I want to stay in that job. So, yes, it is my intention to stay as the Mayor." His 32-year-old former mistress faces an uncertain future. She's well known in the Chinese community and chairs different boards. But it's a largely conservative community and most aren't impressed. "I'm a bit shocked and disappointed because she had a lot going for her, in terms of what she's achieving and the profile she's getting, and this is a real setback," says Chinese Community Centre chairman Kai Luey. "She will not be remembered by the good work she does but for this whole episode." Two weeks ago she tweeted a 3 News reporter about the US shutdown, saying: "Last time Monica Lewinsky overshadowed the shutdown. What's in store for 2013? Very Naughty." Ms Lewinsky had an affair with US President Bill Clinton. This morning Ms Chuang shut down her twitter account. "I'm not looking for a guy who makes a lot of money or who is really good looking," she told a Maori TV programme earlier this month. She has long courted publicity, openly talking about her love life – or lack of it – on television and radio. But since the story broke yesterday afternoon, she's laid low. She gave all her evidence to Cameron Slater's Whale Oil blog. Mr Slater's dad was the campaign manager for John Palino, Len Brown's political rival. He insists that had nothing to do with him publishing the story. "It's actually irrelevant who my father is," said Mr Slater. "I've put up with this my entire life. Frankly it's boring now." 3 News Read more: http://www.3news.co.nz/Former-mistress-Bevan-Chuang-known-for-courting-publicity/tabid/1607/articleID/317495/Default.aspx#ixzz2hrXrfRED

Calvin Sang

My name’s Calvin Sang. I make movies with friends, for clients and for YouTube. Contrary to my name, I’m a terrible singer. But I’m an alright filmmaker and you can have a look at my subtly positioned awards list below. Yeah, it’s just down there. At the bottom. Sweet. I grew up in Auckland, New Zealand, and I’ve been making films ever since I found our old VHS camera when I was nine. Today, I make everything from films to commercials to cakes. http://www.calvinsang.com/

Calvin Sang

Calvin Sang is 19 and lives in Auckland. The short film was filmed in the sleepy suburb of Ellerslie. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyY8kqPl5Jc Published on Apr 20, 2012 The full length zombie-comedy-action-drama movie. Made with a budget of around $100, between school and during holidays. Tweet this video! http://clicktotweet.com/2A6Th Subscribe for more http://bit.ly/S3QCuw Check out http://calvinsang.com for more! Directed by Calvin Sang Starring Reuben Bray Jeremy Tant Philippa Stephens Technical stuff for the filmies: Shot on the Canon 60D using 50mm 1.8 and 18-135mm lenses. Edited on Final Cut Express, After Effects. Dir: Calvin Sang Starring: Reuben Bray, Jeremy Tant, Philippa Stevens Available: www.calvinsang.com / YouTube A Kiwi curveball that fuses a rock ‘n’ roll aesthetic with a distinctly dry sense of humour, Holdout’s impressive prosthetics, swift action sequences and budget-belying slayings all make for a satisfying snack of zombiedom. Ultimately though, it’s the sweet tale of companionship around which the carnage is crafted that makes it so commendable. Director Calvin Sang is something of an indie scene grafter: having started making films at the age of nine, even he can’t recall how many he’s produced. With such a prolific resume, he was bound to stumble into the genre sooner or later. “After I had seen Shaun Of The Dead and Zombieland, I thought ‘what the hell’ and just went for it. I have friends that are good at makeup and blood and all that so there was really no excuse not to.” The minimal funding (approximately $100) proved the biggest challenge in getting the film made. “Being the longest – and most ambitious – film that we had done, it wasn’t something we could film over a weekend like we normally did. We had to do it in the school holidays, chunks at a time, over the span of a year. One time we had to delay filming for a few weeks because one of the leads cut his hair really short. That’s the limitation of a zero/low budget film.” The convincing special effects, however, look anything but cash-starved; so just how was such a high quality achieved on such a low budget? Explains Sang: “Computers and software are so powerful nowadays – it’s kind of amazing what you can find people doing online, just in their spare time. I have some films that rely heavily on effects, like some action films on my YouTube channel. And I have character driven films that don’t have any effects at all. Holdout was a marriage of the two I guess. At the heart of it, it’s about friends and isolation. But it’s also a zombie movie, so it needs to have that kinetic, gory aspect to it as well.”

Por Por's Cook book

Por Por's Cook book - Book launch soon - Home cooking through the generations since Chinese Women Settled in New Zealand over the last 100 years This book contains over 140 recipes and 15 Chinese women’s life stories. Reviewed by: Margaret Agnew, Journalist, Past editor of The Christchurch Press, Weekend Supplement. “ Food is one of the strongest ties to our culture and this unique cookbook is an important link to the culinary past and present of our multi-generational New Zealand-Chinese community. The women (and men) have been cooking up a taste of home since they arrived from mainland China in the early 1900s. Modern Kiwis of Chinese descent will find this book especially fascinating for a taste of our Porpor’s past. A poignant and piquant slice of culinary history.” Kuan Meng Goh (ONZM, JP, Ph D, FRSNZ), Emeritus Professor, Lincoln University; Dave Canterbury (Pathfinder)Branch President and Past National President, New Zealand Chinese Association “It is widely known that few other cultures are as food oriented as the Chinese. According to the famous Chinese scholar and archaeologist, K.C. Chang, “Chinese people are especially occupied with food and food is at the centre of, or at least it accompanies or symbolizes, many social interactions.” Traditionally, in Chinese culture, there is always an important relationship between food and health. This book adds a new dimension to the relationship by linking the experiences of Chinese grandmothers to their recipes. The recipes as presented are not only home-proven to succeed but are also authentic and achievable. Most people enjoy Chinese food and the recipes provide the opportunity to cook these delicious dishes. “ Meilin Chong, NZCA, Auckland Branch Committee Member. “This is a beautiful, well presented and illustrated Chinese cook book which is informative combined with family stories. It brings back fond memories of childhood days and the foods that our mothers and grandmothers cooked for us.” Home cooking through the generations since Chinese Women settled in New Zealand over the last 100 years POR PORs COOKBOOK Carolyn King Order enquiries Email: carolynking@clear.net.nz

Anthony Hoy Fong

Small Business: Restaurateurs - Anthony Hoy Fong

Small Business: Restaurateurs - Anthony Hoy Fong By Gill South 3:30 PM Friday Sep 27, 2013 Chef Anthony Hoy Fong is Auckland-born and educated, learning about food from his family's Mt Roskill fruit shop. Now a New York based chef, he has cooked for the US President, appeared on Oprah and cooking shows across America. Hoy Fong was in Auckland last week for the launch of new Wattie's Creations Cooking Sauces with Food in a Minute. The former IBM IT consultant has set up Top Chef University, an online culinary school that was designed for aspiring home chefs, foodies or anyone who wants to learn how to cook better. It offers people a culinary school program experience in a convenient and entertaining format. The online video-based training is taught by real professional chefs in a curriculum that mirrors a traditional culinary school. The business started three years ago and now the original online product has evolved into line extensions of an iPad app with over 150,000 active users from over 16 different countries ; a box-set DVD retail line in Target and Costco stores across America and next month the chef is launching Top Chef University Lite - an abbreviated iPhone version of the app - his first foray into an ad and brand sponsored content model. Do you think that chefs can make good business owners? Article continues below Absolutely. Chefs in general are passionate, creative and hard working. Good chefs are always supremely organized and focused too which are all key components to being a good business operator. The restaurant business is a tough industry with so many variables so any chef that has opened or operated and sustained a restaurant business successfully has to be a good business person, not just a good chef. Is it true that most chefs don't make any real money unless they have their own restaurant? It's a hard slog being a chef. When I started out in my first gig in New York, I was making $7.50 an hour working 6 days a week, 10 till closing which in NY can be as late as two in the morning. It is tough when you're starting out, like any industry, the hours are long and the pay is not good. So, yes, of course you can make more money when you own your own business just like any job. But of course that comes with greater risk and greater burden but if all goes well then yes, there can be a greater return. It's not the first year a restaurant opens, but the second and third years which are the hardest. Do you agree? In the first year, there's always that buzz about a new opening, it's exciting and there's always a lot of curiosity and attention around a new restaurant, so you're always going to get that foot traffic in the first year. The key to longevity is consistency in quality, while also keeping things fresh and new to sustain interest - listen to your diners and listen to what's going on in your neighbourhood to stay abreast. How can restaurant owners work with social media to help create a buzz about their business? The industry's constantly changing and dining and food as a culture and interest is so popular now. People used not to care about who the chef was or where their salad greens on their plate came from or how the beef was raised and what it was fed. Now people want the full experience and the story only adds to an incredible and enjoyable dining experience which is fantastic. Social media provides a vehicle in which chefs, restaurants and brands can communicate with their customers directly further breaking down that wall between chef and diner. Who doesn't want to see a tweet or photo posted to them of the chickens being roasted that day on the menu tonight, or the chef picking up the greens from the market? What sorts of approaches do you see to running restaurants in New York that we could learn from here - in terms of getting the word out about a new restaurant? The dining scene in general, and especially in New York, is a noisy environment. Diners there have so many choices, so in order to influence a diner to make that choice to dine at your restaurant, you have to have a presence in the dining publications or blogs - whether it be sites like OpenTable, Yelp, Zagat, TastingTable or simply good press - it definitely helps to get the word out. On the other hand, some chefs like those in the West Village simply have developed a cult following so every time they open a new place their crowd flocks to it. How do you create the niche of a good neighbourhood local? Keep it simple and in line with the neighbourhood. Like any restaurant location/concept, you have to listen to your customers in the locale and give them what they want. In Brooklyn, New York, there's a really laid back but hipster scene that's taken hold. All the young, hot chefs are doing small, interesting plates with innovative combinations that tease the palate. Dining is super casual but very cutting edge and hip. It's caught the attention of locals - and they can't get enough of it. NZ has chefs who create good profiles for themselves on TV and then open restaurants or new food businesses off the back of that. Does this happen a lot in the States? Yes. In general the US is quite a celebrity driven culture - endorsements help marketing and reach. I can't stress enough what a noisy business environment it is there especially in the food scene so anything you can do to get a competitive advantage or have your business/product be heard, helps. TV and profile all help. Of course, it's important that what you do matches with your values and beliefs. I'm currently working with Wattie's which to me feels like a great fit. Wattie's are a Kiwi icon - I grew up with their products in the cupboards and spaghetti or beans on toast were a weekend staple before playing sports. And I guess, coming from a background in produce, for me Wattie's commitment to using locally grown produce is really important. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/restaurants/news/article.cfm?c_id=304&objectid=11129255

The changing face of architecture

Phoenix Wang, The stereotypes - all egos, round spectacles and black turtlenecks - reflect the statistics: while equal number of male and female grads leave architecture school, only 18 per cent of registered architects are women. And yet, this is slowly changing, in part from groups like non-profit Architecture+Women NZ, which aims to raise the visibility of women in architecture. What does this new face of New Zealand architecture look like? Three women at various stages of their architecture careers, working across commercial architecture, housing and interiors in full-time and part-time roles, show a new direction for the design industry. Phoenix Wang's projects include the Comvita and Glassons shop designs Phoenix Wang's projects include the Comvita and Glassons shop designs Architect Phoenix Wang works at Studio Gascoigne - an award-winning architecture firm specialising in retail and commercial interiors. You used to work on high-end houses, now you work on commercial and retail interiors. Has that been a big switch, or do the same design principles still apply? It has been a switch, they're two different mind-sets on the way you design and the time frame that you're given. When I worked on high-end residential I worked very closely with my clients. That way I was given an insight into the way they live and what their interests are. It's was very personal journey. With retail and commercial design, I'm often designing to create an impact, and a response from the end user. Do you have a favourite project? I think one of my favourite jobs so far would have to be a small interior villa alteration project I worked on a few years ago. The client gave us a simple brief and pretty much let us have free rein on the design front. They fully trusted us to create a design that is suitable for the house. It's a very freeing feeling and privileged position to be. Most of the time, clients can question and doubt what you've designed for them, and the end result can be a watered-down version of your original idea. What do people not understand about architecture that you wish they would? Architecture is a response to the surrounding environment and has a permanent impact to the context it is within. Each design decision we make and each detail we draw interlinks closely on how it affects the rest of the building, so when clients ask us to just quickly draw a few sketches, or make a small change, it requires a whole thought-process of weighing up the pros and cons, and will take more than just a couple of minutes to do. People can assume interiors are easier than architecture. Is this the case? I think people see interior design as more of a surface decoration that is added into the base building, and it is not as complex in terms of its design process as designing a building. I find interiors both interesting and challenging in the way so much of it is to do with human behaviour. Through carefully crafted spaces you can attract people to enter a space, you can influence what they will interact with, and what their attention will fall upon. By Nicola Stock 7:30 AM Thursday Sep 12, 2013 It's really fascinating. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/viva-magazine/news/article.cfm?c_id=533&objectid=11122401

TE HA O TE WHENUA THE BREATH OF THE LAND Simon Kaan 13 September – 20 October Opening: Thursday 12 September, 6pm Artist talk: Saturday 14 September, 10.30am In this current series of new work, artist Simon Kaan references whenua (land) issues. Through multiple art disciplines the exhibition investigates the connection of land with water, to consider the responsibility of belonging to a place. Set in Kaan’s landscapes are visual motifs inherited from his Kai Tahu and Chinese ancestry. MRS CHRYSANTHEMUM PATIENTLY WAITS… Kim Lowe 13 September – 20 October Opening: Thursday 12 September, 6pm Artist talk: Saturday 14 September, 10.30am Kim Lowe is an artist and printmaker of New Zealand Chinese and Pakeha descent. Lowe’s latest exhibition features new works that allude to a fabricated family narrative based loosely on historical events and snippets of her family's mixed history. KIM LOWE + SIMON KAAN | 2 ARTIST TALKS Saturday 14 September, 10.30am - 12pm Join Dunedin-based artist, Simon Kaan and Christchurch-based artist Kim Lowe as they discuss the relationship that being culture-hybrid has on their art. Lowe will also speak about how the 22/2/2011 Christchurch earthquake led to her involvement in the Sendai-Christchurch Art Exchange BEAUTY THROUGH THE FOUR HANDS Sang Sool Shim & Keum Sun Lee 13 September – 20 October Opening: Thursday 12 September, 6pm Sang Sool Shim and Keum Sun Lee are self-taught potters. Together they collaborate on large and small scale ceramic works. Hand thrown by Shim and intricately decorated by Lee, they work with both traditional Korean and contemporary ceramic techniques. Their works are influenced by their cultural heritage and a life set in Waitakere Ranges. http://www.ceac.org.nz/exhibitions/current_exhibitions.aspx

The emerging Chinese middle class

Chinese dream: As people pour into the cities, they bring with them millions of dollars worth of growth – and issues such as pollution and overpriced housing. china Lucy Wu, who moved to Shanghai from New Zealand, says she sees in her friends the stress that comes from wanting to succeed. Asia A 500 metre tower is growing out of the park where Lucy Wu, 28, used to catch the ferry across Shanghai's Huangpu River to play on the green grass with her father. When she moved with her family to New Zealand 20 years ago the Pudong area was underdeveloped agriculture land. It is now the heart of Shanghai's financial district and the city's most exclusive neighbourhood. China was once the world's most powerful economy. As late as 1820 China produced a third of the world's GDP. But when it failed to harness the industrial revolution, the West rose and China sank. By 1979 China's share of global economy was around 5 per cent and income per capita was just $260. So Wu's family moved to New Zealand to find more freedom and opportunity. "Twenty years ago, China was a very communist country, it was like North Korea," said Wu with an obvious Kiwi accent. But soon after her family migrated things began to change fast. When China opened to foreign trade and economic reform at the end of the 1970s, a 30-year period of remarkable growth lifted China to the world's second largest economy by 2010. This economic miracle was built on exports. Now, the growth will be fed by domestic consumption as millions of Chinese are lifted out of poverty and thrust into middle class with disposable incomes and aspirations for a happier, healthier life. China is still poor. More than 900 million, mostly rural, people still live on less than $5 a day, according to the World Bank's latest statistics. But for every peasant who moves to the city, there is an immediate injection of around $2000 to the domestic GDP. And with 10 million people moving to cities every year, urbanisation alone adds $2m of growth. China's President Xi Jingping calls this the Chinese Dream. His vision is as hazy as Beijing's sky, but the mission of a moderately prosperous nation by 2020 has captured the imagination of the Chinese people. A demographic whose parents were condemned to poverty can now see a China with stable jobs, good education for their children and a chance to live a more enjoyable life. A T A grubby supermarket half an hour from the bling of central Shanghai you can see the Chinese Dream. On the ground floor, Fonterra saleswomen scan the bone health of customers, customers who are much more likely to suffer from bone disease than their western counterparts. Up the escalator posters of Bond Girl Michelle Yeoh line the walls, selling Anlene, Fonterra's high calcium milk that can help prevent osteoporosis, to people who could never afford dairy in the past. The milk is sold in gift packs, which young, newly affluent, urban Chinese take home to their parents as presents on Chinese New Year. Bakeries are popping up around Chinese cities, the reciprocal version of Asian takeaways stores in the West. "They are all getting wealthier, not just in money sense but in world sense," said Kelvin Wickham, Fonterra China's managing director. Ad Feedback Wu moved back to the pace of Shanghai three years ago to work as business analyst for Fonterra China. "Things I experienced in the first six months here work wise, it would have taken me two years in New Zealand," she said. Her parents' life was regimented and restricted. Now China is open and free, far beyond Western perceptions, she said. Last year she went to a J Lo concert where the crowd knew every word. In May, the Backstreet Boys played took their comeback tour to Shanghai. But in such a rapidly moving mass, Wu sees pressure on her friends to succeed. Especially when the one-child policy means you are the sole output of your parents. If you are successful it is a sign they were successful. Her parents' friends in China call them in New Zealand asking why Wu hasn't got married. "When I first came to China I was 25. I felt fine in New Zealand. There were no pressures, we were all single girls having fun. I came to China, and all of a sudden I was old," she said. A CHILD IS also a significant investment. Education is expensive. And with the privatisation of the health sector and insurance sectors a wealthy child is the most secure retirement plan. Sitting with a double espresso in Beijing's Flat White Cafe, Jingyang Li is happily in the middle of the middle class. He is one of its lucky members. At 32 he is married, he has a newborn son, runs his own Mandarin Language school with 20 employees. His family has two homes in Beijing. One bought with a bank loan he will spend the next 20 years paying back, one gifted to his wife by her grandparents. They live in a good neighbourhood with good schools. "My life is better than my parents, and I think my son's will be better than mine," he said. But he sees many people struggling to make a new life in urban China. His sister moved to Beijing for greater opportunity, but her son does not have a Beijing ID card. This means education and health services are harder to get and more expensive. Li seems guilty his son has a local registration. As urbanisation increases, house prices in the cities - especially in areas with good schools - have become unaffordable. Government intervention in Shanghai and Beijing, including limiting married couples to owning one property, increasing minimum deposits for loans and a 20 per cent capital gains tax, have failed to relieve the property market. The cities are crowded and the pollution is real. The Beijing sky glows purple behind the smog and China's air pollution was linked to 1.2 million premature deaths in 2010, by the Global Burden of Disease Study. Food crises seem to crop up in the news each week. The people have growing power to get want they want in China. The middle classes appear happy to wait for political rights, but they want clean air now. They will pay a premium for safe traceable food and beverage. A savvy and active online community build and break brands' reputations. Launched on Friday, the NZ Pure Shop is an e-commerce platform selling New Zealand-made food and drink directly to China through its most popular online retailer, Tmall.com. The online store will reach more than 500 million registered users, selling Marlborough King Salmon, Sanitarium and Nelson Honey, in the hard to reach corners of China. China is becoming more and more aware of New Zealand's brand story of reliability and quality, said Aldo Miccio, chairman of NZ Inc Shop. "I think it is pretty cool that people are in China having Weet-Bix and New Zealand milk for breakfast," Miccio said. The middle class in China is still relatively small. "Mainstream consumers", those earning between $22,000 and $46,000 a year, made up just 6 per cent of the population in 2010, according to management consultants McKinsey & Co. This is still 80 million people. But if growth continues at its current rate, the current lower middle class will change the world. Within 12 years the world's middle class will double based on China's growth alone, according to John Ross, senior fellow at Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies. In China hundreds of millions of people will own a car, domestic and international tourism will become high priorities and life expectancy will increase as access to a good diet becomes universal. "If you look at the point of view of sheer numbers, the effect is going to be incredible. By then you will have a middle class of hundreds of millions," said Ross. China's growth still amazes Lucy Wu every day. "Look at how fast that Shanghai Tower is built. Every time I go across there it seems bigger," she said. Due to be completed in 2014, The Shanghai Tower will be 632 metres high, the world's second highest building. By 2030, and probably even earlier, the emerging middle class will again make China the world's largest economy. This is the third in a series of stories by Simon Day, who is in China to report on the growing relationship with our No 1 trading partner. Simon Day travelled courtesy of the New Zealand China Friendship Society. SIMON DAY Last updated 05:00 09/06/2013 http://www.stuff.co.nz/world/asia/8768722/The-emerging-Chinese-middle-class

Diamond chips are real gems

You could say takeaway shop owner Norman Num is a chip off the old block. Mr Num’s mother originally owned the fish-and-chip shop that is now Diamond Takeaways in Epsom. He bought into the business with his sisters 35 years ago, and turned it into a Chinese takeaway, which also does traditional Kiwi fish and chips. It was recently named Auckland’s best chip shop in the That’s Life Best Chip Shop competition. "We are very proud and privileged to have an award like this, because we are not a specialty fish and chip shop," Mr Num says. The chip king’s mother has now retired but his wife and children have become involved in the Great South Rd business. He says the award is a tribute to the effort the family has put into achieving high standards. The shop has picked up other awards in the past, including Metro magazine’s best Chinese takeaways and a radio station’s best take-away as voted by listeners. Mr Num says the staff members who are not family are from the same area of China as himself, Tai Shan county in the Guangdong province. It was formerly known as Canton and the food at Diamond Takeaways is based on Cantonese cooking. But chips are definitely an integral part of the business, he says. "A lot of things go hand in hand with chips. We always try to go for the best quality." The family started out peeling and pre-cooking their potatoes but now the chips are bought in and fried in top quality vegetable oil. "We have very discerning customers." Heart Foundation registered nutritionist Judith Morley-John was involved with setting criteria for the competition. Diamond Takeaways had to meet strict standards for the fat content, colour, crispness and cut of its fries. The chips were bought by a mystery shopper and analysed in a laboratory. This year’s six winning shops’ chips had an average fat content of 7.1 percent, down from 7.6 percent last year. "We’re just really impressed with what the takeaway shops are doing," Ms Morley-John says. The national winner was So Fine Seafoods in Wellington. - © Fairfax NZ News Last updated 11:49 27/11/2008 http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/central-leader/737144/Diamond-chips-are-real-gems

Ethnic dining in Christchurch

Christchurch is spoilt for choice of international cuisines, but are we making the most of what's on offer? A culinary journey I suspect I'm not alone when I associate the words "eating Chinese" with takeaways and plastic containers of chicken chow mein, steak fried rice or sweet and sour pork. While a plastic pack of Chinese cheerfully fills a Friday night gap in the supermarket shopping for us, it hardly qualifies as expert advice on where to go for the very best Chinese food in Christchurch. For help, I turned to someone much better informed than me. Grant Torrie, marketing manager at The Press, lived in China for two and a half years and is married to Jessie Wang, whose "home town" is the bustling city of Harbin (population: six million and rising). Of the numerous Chinese eateries in Christchurch, this couple have a clear favourite - Daphne's Restaurant at Church Corner. Curious to know why this one is special, and to get a feel for the real deal, I joined Grant and Jessie for dinner there. Over green tea, they told me Daphne's menu scores top marks for its authentic array of regional food, including hot and spicy Sichuan dishes from the southwest - popular throughout China - and also salty, pickled delicacies that echo the cuisine of Jessie's home province of Heilongjiang in northeast China. Harbin has a very cold winter so the local people preserve a lot of their food, using plenty of salt. Wheat is a more prominent part of their diet than rice, and is used in dumplings and pancakes. "Just wait until you bite into a Sichuan peppercorn - it'll make your lips go numb!" Grant said as we sipped our tea. He was right, of course. It was to be a night of spicy discovery. Starting with soup is not a northern tradition; Jessie prefers to kick things off with cold dishes. Tripe, beloved in the north, was on the menu, but instead we began with servings of pickled vegetables - cubes of salted turnip, dribbled with chilli oil - and sliced beef with chilli pepper dressing. The latter has a kind of fierce delayed heat to it, but is regarded by Jessie and Grant as merely "averagely spicy". I found it helped to have the green tea at hand to cool the mouth. Our third entrée roughly translated as "saliva chicken" - so tasty, one's mouth waters in anticipation of the next mouthful. In Harbin, it is also customary to begin with a bowl of roasted peanuts in the centre of the table. "You know you've been in China for a long time if you prefer to eat your peanuts with chopsticks," observes Grant, (although I was personally relieved not to face that challenge). Hot spicy flavours dominated the main course selections of Sichuan-style poached sliced beef in hot chilli oil, along with another fiery southern dish popular in Chongqing, griddle-cooked spicy chicken in a hot pot. Also on the table was a serving of a Daphne's house dish of deep-fried tofu on a sizzling plate with sweet chilli sauce. With a soft scrambled-egg consistency inside, these tofu bites were mercifully milder than the rest. Ad Feedback In short, it was Chinese food, but unlike anything from the corner Chinese takeaway - hot, full of chilli and not a noodle in sight. Dining at Daphne's reminds Grant and Jessie of memorable nights out on Beijing's celebrated "Ghost Street" or Gui Jie, home to more than 200 restaurants and some of the best specialty food in China. Daphne's is well-priced, too, with our three entrees, three mains and tea costing just $70 in total. For diners who don't like it hot, Daphne's does offer less challenging options. "Our goal is to bring real Chinese food to the local market, but if we have a group of Kiwis coming in, we do remind them that we can make it less hot and adjust the flavour if they wish," says Daphne Kiriaev, who owns and manages the restaurant. Daphne hails from mainland China, near Shanghai and her husband is Russian/Chinese. Other Chinese restaurants rated highly by Grant and Jessie include The Big Chef Kitchen in Burnside, specialising in dry, hot and spicy food from China's south-central province of Hunan, and the Shanxi Noodle House in Addington. Just like the plastic tub of Chinese takeaways, some of what passes for Indian food in Christchurch bears little resemblance to the original dishes, according to Bombay-born Aaron Sanchis, who has lived here for a decade. It can be difficult, for example, finding a good authentic butter chicken in Christchurch. Too much butter, cream and off-the-shelf tomato puree invariably spoils the flavour, he says. "Kiwis say they like the cream and butter, but the result is not butter chicken; it's more like a curry that is quite sweet and fatty." For a true Indian-style butter chicken, he suggests a visit to Corianders Restaurant in Edgeware, his favourite destination for "a taste of home". "It's pretty much authentic and the ingredients are fresh." Corianders also serves up two other "must-haves", namely delicious Bombay chicken (diced chicken fillet with freshly ground spices and herbs) and murg kadai (chicken cooked in thick gravy with crushed tomatoes, cream and fresh coriander). If seeking a hotter dish, he will sometimes order lamb rogan josh, (lamb chunks cooked in whole spices with onion, ginger and garlic, finished with a touch of coriander). "It's quite peppery and if you chew on the meat, you get the full flavour of the curry inside it." Aaron says no Indian restaurant worthy of the name ought to be serving up naan flat bread, tandoori chicken or chicken tikka not prepared over charcoal in a tandoor oven. "If your naan has not come from a tandoor oven, don't order it - and herbs like coriander should be fresh, not from a packet." He says New Zealanders also tend to think of "hot and spicy" as one and the same, where a lot of Indian food might be "hot or spicy". It is a mistake to think Indian food consists only of hot curry flavours. Other favourite dining destinations for Aaron are Two Fat Indians in Merivale - "again, it's beautiful food" - and Bombay Butler on Colombo St, which has "butler's venison" flavoured with Indian whole spices and herbs, along with a tasty chicken biryani and a good selection of vegetarian curries. He also recommends the Maharaja on Papanui Rd, Indian Sumner and the Indian Ocean in Ferrymead. Japanese-born Koji Miyazaki, owner of Form Gallery @ 468 Colombo St, has lived in New Zealand for more than 20 years, but still enjoys the flavours with which he grew up. His leading tip for finding a good Japanese restaurant is to simply ask where the chef is from. If they're from Japan, chances are they'll know how it's done. His top pick is Riccarton's Cookai, which brings "a little twist" to traditional Japanese food. "I like the way they present their food, the sushi and tempura," says Koji, who enjoys starting with sashimi. "It is simple fresh food - really nice." His recommendations from the a la carte menu include crispy tempura chicken with lemon soy sauce, and ginger pork. Donburi rice dishes - beef or chicken and egg - also feature on his list of favourites. For something a little more traditional, Koji suggests dining at Kinji Japanese Restaurant on Greers Rd, while a good lunch spot is the Samurai Bowl on Colombo St. "Try the beef gyudon for something a bit different." For tips on the best Thai restaurants in Christchurch, we went to Khunita Khemarangsan (Kang), 27, who is from Thailand and has lived in New Zealand for 12 years. She and her husband, Boris Kang, dine out for lunch most days and for dinner twice a week. One of their regular destinations is Thai fusion restaurant Spice Paragon, owned by Khunita's brother, Titi Khemarangsan. Spice Paragon mixes up the flavours of Thai cuisine with influences from this country's modern cooking style and is popular with both Kiwi and Thai diners. "There's a bit of Kiwi food in there, too, so, for example, the menu might include lamb shank mussaman curry and mashed potato, as well as fish green curry and rice," Khunita says. "My favourite starter would be the miang spinach leaf, which is topped with prawn or crispy belly pork or smoked salmon. We order that every time we go there. For the main, we always order the mussaman curry of slow-braised lamb shank on Asian sweet potato mash or the pad thai in egg net with free-range chicken, tamarind sauce, peanuts and lime." For a real taste of authentic Thai flavours, Khunita also loves dining at Hammersley's Thai restaurant (Shirley Rd). "They can make it pretty hot if you like lots of chilli! For Thai people, the food there is really spicy, though they usually tone it down for Kiwi clientele. It tastes a lot like the food I'd eat back in Thailand, so I'd recommend it if you're looking for that genuine taste of Thailand." Her "must-try" recommendation from Hammersley's is the tom yum chicken noodle soup. Sema's Thai Cuisine in Richmond is another favourite. "It's another fusion restaurant where a lot of Kiwi and Thai people go. It's really popular and the prices are very reasonable." She suggests trying the pad thai (stir-fry rice noodles) from any of these restaurants. For insight on the finer points of Italian food, I headed to Massimiliano Capocaccia's architecture studio in Sumner. Massimiliano, also known as Max, was born in Rome and has lived in Sumner for five years. He eats out several times a week, but finds many restaurants claiming to be Italian lack the authentic touch. He says Italian food sold here is frequently "over-complicated", weighed down with too many ingredients and flavours. Pizza is a big problem, Max says. "Take the margherita pizza. It should just have tomato and mozzarella, but instead I often find the topping is quite overwhelming and has lots of ingredients - and, unfortunately, the base is usually more like pie than pizza!" Similarly, too much sauce tends to be served with pasta and the sauce itself is often overloaded with too many ingredients and flavours. Max says Italians love to keep it "quite simple" with the four essentials: garlic, olive oil, chilli and tomato. For a true taste of Italy, Max heads to Tutto Bene in Merivale. "There I can speak Italian with the waiters and the owners and taste some real Italian food." His favourites include best-ever lasagne (with Tuscan rich meat sauce, vegetable and cheese sauce); mixed gnocchi (served with Napoli sauce or rich meat sauce); and bistecca florentina, (grilled T-bone steak served with rosemary and garlic vino rosso sauce or mushroom sauce). "It even looks very Italian there and they often play Italian music." Freemans Dining Room in Lyttelton gets rated highly, too, even though it is not a specialty Italian restaurant. "I've tried both their cannelloni and ravioli - delicious." I asked Max if he had a favourite dish from his days in Rome. He had to spell it out for me - salti in bocca alla romana - which is veal with ham and sage tied together with a toothpick. The name of the dish apparently translates as "jump in the mouth". And so ends my international food journey. All that remains is to decide which of these recommended dishes will "jump into your mouth" on your next dinner date. A guide to the city's international cuisine KIM NEWTH Last updated 08:40 29/11/2012 http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/christchurch-life/avenues/features/8008570/Ethnic-dining-in-Christchurch