The Food Nomad – Travels to New Zealand

For our annual 2 week long year-end holiday, we decided to embark on our first roadtrip together  in New Zealand.  The beauty of living in Hong Kong is that we are relatively close to Australia (which we’ve explored on several occasions already) and New Zealand, so while we’re here in this part of the world, we decided to take the opportunity to travel through this kiwi nation.  What we discovered is a country rich in natural beauty (and plenty of adventure sports!) with a down-to-earth people that reminds us of another place with ultra friendly inhabitants – Canada!  Here are some snapshots of our food journey from the North to South Island.

Our first meal of the trip – up in the air around 30,000ft, enjoying delicious tuna sashimi 

Our welcome Maori feast in Rotorua, cooked in a floor pit!  The roasted lamb shank and chicken were juicy and tender, rounded off with baked potatoes and local sweet potatoes

Welcome to Marlborough!  Beautiful vineyard estate we stayed on called Straw Lodge, producing their own label “World’s End”.  

A sample of our daily breakfast at Straw Lodge B&B, and all while enjoying the vineyard view! 

Dinner at Herzog vineyard, highly recommended gourmet dinner accompanied by their own wine.  We loved it so much we shipped 12 bottles home to Hong Kong!  

Amuse Bouche 

Seared beef carpaccio layered with swordfish sashimi 

Of course, a visit to Marlborough isn’t complete without a few days spend wine tasting.  The vineyards are all quite close together, so we spent 2 days touring the wineries on mountain bikes, which gives a whole new meaning to drinking and driving :) 

At Seresin Estate, we brought back some buttery sauvignon blanc with us.

Stopped for a great winery lunch at Wairau River.

At Forrest Vineyard, where we did a blind tasting and picked up a few bottles of their nobel rot.

At Picton, Marlborough Sounds, sampling their world famous green-lipped mussels.

These were the biggest mussels I’ve seen thus far!  Cooked perfectly with shallots and white wine, yielding a succulent, tender giant morsel of mussel!  

Another run at a mussel shack, a dozen mussels baked in different toppings.  Our favourite was the parmagiano and lardon topping!  

Perfectly seasoned ribs in Nelson.

The aftermath – you can tell the ribs were really good :) 

Our camembert and salmon frittata for breakfast.

Let’s talk about the most famous burger in New Zealand – Ferg Burger in Queenstown!  This place is ALWAYS packed, with a lively atmosphere.  We went back several times, our most adventurous choice being Chief Wiggum, thick porky slices with pork crackling, sandwiched between 2 hearty buns and topped with sweet apple relish.

The legendary Ferg Burger :)