Last month, Peter Gordon’s acclaimed Auckland restaurant Homeland closed its doors to customers. While the top New Zealand chef is on the hunt for new premises, he is continuing to run the cooking school there for now – in part because he cares so deeply about the work he does.
“My gran Molly instilled in us an ethic that if you can help others, you must,” explains Peter, 61. “She had three kids – John, Mary and my dad Bruce – and Mary was born with intellectual disabilities. Gran was told Mary wouldn’t live past her teen years, but Gran was determined to give her the best life she could.
“She taught her and others with disabilities how to knit beanies and gloves, and they’d go to building sites in winter and give them to the workers. The workers loved it, and it gave my Aunty Mary and the others a real sense of purpose, and a knowledge they were giving back. I guess that’s how I learned how important it is to help others if you can.”
Mary went on to live to the ripe age of 89.
Many people who need to learn how to make good food from very little attend Peter’s Community Day cooking classes.
“We teach people to use what they have to create delicious meals,” says Peter, who created Homeland with his partner Alistair Carruthers in 2020 on their return from the UK. “Everyone’s story is different, whether it’s a group on a limited budget or refugees who’ve just arrived from Afghanistan with nothing. At one Community Day, we had a group who we were told had to learn how to make a meal in 45 minutes. I assumed that meant they were time-poor, but no – they only had 45 minutes’ access to electricity.”
Peter is now showcasing these skills in an upcoming episode of the TV3 show Food Rescue Kitchen, in which top chefs work with volunteers to create a three-course meal for up to 50 diners using ingredients otherwise destined for the rubbish.
“The show and the classes we do at Homeland align really well,” he says. “We have so much food in New Zealand, but we have a lot of waste and so many hungry people.”
The figures around food waste in Aotearoa are sobering: one-third of our food – 160,000 tonnes – ends up in landfill. “I do find it shocking how much we throw away. However, now there are companies like Kiwi Harvest and LegaSea who are working hard to change things.”
One big area of wastage is fish, tells Peter.
“Once the fillets are removed, the heads and frames all go in the bin. At the school, we’ve cooked up a 3kg kingfish head. We got 800g of really delicious meat off it, which you can use for a fish pie, curry, fishcakes, anything. The frames can also be boiled up in a pot to make an amazing fish stock, then used as the base for soups and casseroles.”
During the show, producers gave the chefs boxes of produce destined for the bin and task them with making a three-course meal.
“We shock people with what we can do. We made grilled corn with a chilli roast apricot butter, with pickled daikon and turnips, and the most delicious fish head soup. The biggest challenge was the cupcakes covered in fluorescent hundreds and thousands. We managed to convert them into a bread and butter pudding with hot cross buns and other random bakery!”
Peter’s passion is to continue teaching people how to make the most of the food they have.
“I did this programme because I hope everyone can learn something from it. There are a lot of handy hints in it that will help everyone – not just low-income households. New Zealand also has a food waste problem and shows like Food Rescue Kitchen go a long way to help make it better.”
Peter’s food budget busters
- The freezer is your friend! Freeze anything you aren’t going to use immediately.
- Bananas freeze well. Put them in the freezer whole until needed. This also works well for feijoas.
- Boil up odds and ends like half an onion, a carrot or parsnip to make stocks, soups or purées. Freeze until needed, then add to shepherds pies, pastas and mince dishes.
- Don’t throw away carcasses and bones: they are also full of collagen. Put in a pot, cover with water and simmer, covered, for an hour. My gran would use the bones from a roast and boil up with seaweed for a nutritious soup.
- Mix two parts butter with one part Marmite. Spread thinly on sliced bread and bake at 160°C until crunchy. Keep in a jar as a handy snack.
Food Rescue Kitchen is streaming now on ThreeNow.
