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Speaker 1: You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack team podcast

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Speaker 1: from News Talks at.

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Speaker 2: Be Mike Hardley is our travel correspondent.

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Speaker 3: Good morning, very good, thank you. I've just come inside.

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Speaker 3: I feel like I need baffles in my house because

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Speaker 3: the cicadas who had sort of gone into a slumber

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Speaker 3: when some had disappeared, some has come back with a vengeance,

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Speaker 3: and so have the cicadas. It's like the screaming.

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Speaker 2: Really yeah, yeah, yeah, Well, I mean it's good, I guess, yeah, good.

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Speaker 2: At least the summer's going to come back a little bit.

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Speaker 2: But yeah, it's been a funny old little period day.

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Speaker 2: Sure has you counting down to Flavors of Plenty, which

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Speaker 2: is by Plenty's big food festival. It's sort of become

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Speaker 2: one of New Zealand's premiere food festivals. So how long

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Speaker 2: has it been around now?

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Speaker 3: Yes, this year's bash will be its fifth, outing Jack

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Speaker 3: and it is quite amazing how a festival which is

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Speaker 3: still reasonably new, has just stamped itself on the culinary

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Speaker 3: calendar as a signature event. What I love about it

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Speaker 3: is that its strung right across coastal Bay Plenty from

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Speaker 3: Wayhi Beach to fakatane and there's just so many lips,

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Speaker 3: smacking e vents to sink your teeth into. I was

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Speaker 3: up in the Bar of Plenty two weeks ago just

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Speaker 3: to get a taster of some of the festival offerings,

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Speaker 3: and it's very, very diverse. So they've got lots of

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Speaker 3: restaurant tours involved, obviously, but the growers in the region

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Speaker 3: will feature heavily in the festival. So it all kicks

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Speaker 3: off in mid April.

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Speaker 2: Nice. Okay. When I think about Bay of Plenty, I

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Speaker 2: think about green stuff, so I think about kiwi fruit

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Speaker 2: and I think about avocados. They're kind of synonymous with

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Speaker 2: Bay of Plenty.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, totally to Pokey Kivy fruit capital of the world,

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Speaker 3: and the avocado capital of New Zealand undoubtedly is Kati Cutti.

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Speaker 3: So starting with the latter, I took this really good

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Speaker 3: tour on Tim and Michelle Rosamond's Avocado Watchard and Kati

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Speaker 3: Cutting a fortnight ago and it comes complete with great tastings.

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Speaker 3: I have to say. It's amazing, though, just on a

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Speaker 3: little orchard, how much you will learn about this marvelous superfood,

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Speaker 3: which of course is botanically classified as a fruit. I

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Speaker 3: know that can be controversial for some, but a lot

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Speaker 3: of our avocado's jacket exported to North America, and the

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Speaker 3: Americans just can't believe how good our avocados are compared

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Speaker 3: to some of the slushy stuff they get from across

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Speaker 3: the border. Is I strolled under Tim's trees. They were

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Speaker 3: just positively groaning in fruit, and I found this fascinating.

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Speaker 3: You can actually see this year's crop and next year's

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Speaker 3: crop on the same tree because the avocados can stay

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Speaker 3: on the tree for eighteen months. So wow, you just

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Speaker 3: learned so many things. But the guacamole that Tim whips

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Speaker 3: up is worth the trip alone. So it comes and

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Speaker 3: I thought I will pass this by you to see

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Speaker 3: if you think this passes Jack Thames Pub test. It's

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Speaker 3: avocado with kilipinos, red onion, lime juice and coriendo.

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Speaker 2: Oh cheeky.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's just extraordinary.

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Speaker 2: I feel like the jalapeno is kind of offsetting the

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Speaker 2: creaminess of the of the avocado as well. You know

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Speaker 2: you've got the heat and in the course oki yeah, okay,

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Speaker 2: plenty of salt in there as well. Salt what about truffles?

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Speaker 3: Yes? For a complete pellet change venture. To Truffle Watch

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Speaker 3: now they're based in Piegaraa and you can have a

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Speaker 3: wed dabble with sustainably grown black peregard truffle. So Truffle

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Speaker 3: Water is just one of a handful of commercial blocks

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Speaker 3: in New Zealand. Once again you can do a little

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Speaker 3: tour with Lance and Nicki who own it. They do

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Speaker 3: great tours in the truth year, which is the official

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Speaker 3: name for a truffle orchid, and it's got several hundred

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Speaker 3: several hundred English oak and hazel nut trees and then

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Speaker 3: the truffle spores attached themselves to the tree roots underground.

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Speaker 3: And I mean, man, if you have a bumper crop,

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Speaker 3: you will feel like you have won Lotto Division one

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Speaker 3: because one truffle gram sells for at four dollars one gram. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: I mean, it's such a mercurial sort of industry. Every

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Speaker 3: season is so different, it can be so hidden miss

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Speaker 3: and the amazing thing about it in the New Zealand context,

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Speaker 3: possums are our biggest truffle thieves. They are a menace.

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Speaker 3: They will sniff them out, they'll dig them up and

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Speaker 3: they'll happily binge on several thousand dollars worth of truffles overnight.

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Speaker 2: That I necessarily knew that possums could dig, but of

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Speaker 2: course they can do you know. That's yeah right, okay, So,

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Speaker 2: I mean it's quite a secretive world, the truffle world day.

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Speaker 3: Oh, it's actually quite menacing. There is so much sabotage

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Speaker 3: overseas in the truple World in France. Lance was saying

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Speaker 3: to me that in France a lot of truffle pigs

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Speaker 3: and dogs are just stolen or mysteriously disappear or are

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Speaker 3: found shot because the rivalry between producers is just so fierce.

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Speaker 3: There's very little collaboration, right, and even New One Set,

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Speaker 3: even in New Zealand, people tend to keep to themselves interestingly. Yeah, so,

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Speaker 3: Lance said to me that the only fellow producer that

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Speaker 3: they've managed to sort of swap notes with and glean

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Speaker 3: a bit of advice from is a family in Oregon,

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Speaker 3: and that is after that family had actually created one

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Speaker 3: hundred million dollar in your business, and then well we

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Speaker 3: can start to share ourselves around a bit. Yeah right, yeah.

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Speaker 3: So the other really cool thing about truffle World is

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Speaker 3: alongside the actual raw truffles, they also do some really

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Speaker 3: cool products. So try things like truffle infused oil, truffle salt,

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Speaker 3: and best of all, they're wonderful truffle balsamic vinegar. That

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Speaker 3: really hit the spot for me.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, cool. So what are some of the headline

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Speaker 2: events in Flavors of Plenty this year?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, well, wildly popular is what they call the Battle

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Speaker 3: of the Snack. This is a bit of me and

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Speaker 3: I'm sure it's a bit of you, two jeck. So

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Speaker 3: basically it's a whole lot of really st snacks and

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Speaker 3: canterpase and you can just graze heartily all over Plenty

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Speaker 3: in pursuit of the Battle of the Snack. So what

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Speaker 3: the organization does is they team up a top local

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Speaker 3: chef with like a rising culinary talent, and these pears

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Speaker 3: will compete against each other to get the nod for

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Speaker 3: the best snack. The other big competition is called Plates

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Speaker 3: of Plenty, So they'll have about twenty eateries going head

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Speaker 3: to head, and each eatey receives a box of local

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Speaker 3: produce and products and they've got to just confine themselves

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Speaker 3: to those items to create a signature dish, and then

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Speaker 3: diners ultimately vote for the winning dish.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, oh mate, that's so good. Any novelties that are

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Speaker 2: worth mentioning this year?

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Speaker 3: Well, I was grazing the program and there are just

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Speaker 3: so many events over the eighteen delicious days of Flavors

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Speaker 3: of Plenty. But yeah, some really cool temptations. I like

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Speaker 3: the sound of the big fat Greek Cypriot lunch. I

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Speaker 3: really like the sound of a cake and cocktails picnic.

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Speaker 3: But different. Because you're so partial to all things Mexican, Jack,

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Speaker 3: I thought of you with respect to Rosy's Red Hot

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Speaker 3: canteena which is in the Mount Great Joint. In the

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Speaker 3: Mount they are hosting the Wings of Fire Challenge, So

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Speaker 3: I think Coney Island and hot dogs with hot sauce, wow,

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Speaker 3: escalating spice levels of hot locally made hot sauces on

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Speaker 3: each chicken wing to find out who can win the

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Speaker 3: you know, the battle of attrition.

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Speaker 2: Basically, yeah, great, oh, fantastic, Okay, cool, this sounds really good.

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Speaker 2: I've never been to Flames of Plenty. That could be

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Speaker 2: a be a bit of me, I reckon, especially for

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Speaker 2: eighteen days that superb.

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Speaker 3: So.

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Speaker 2: Mike's article is up on the News talks 'v website.

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Speaker 2: If you want to know a bit more about Flavors

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Speaker 2: of plenty. We've got all the details for this year's

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Speaker 2: festival there. Thank you very much, sir. We we'll catch

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Speaker 2: again this time next Saturday.

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Speaker 1: For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame. Listen live

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Speaker 1: to news talks it'd be from nine am Saturday, or

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