Bites to eat ... Christchurch restaurateur Javier Garcia.Credit: Erin O'Dwyer
Christchurch and the nearby Waipara Valley have built a reputation for new dining ventures courtesy of chefs bringing the world back home, writes Erin O'Dwyer.
CHRISTCHURCH restaurateur Javier Garcia is like a character dreamed up by quirky Spanish film maker Pedro Almodovar.
The fast-talking Madrileno has a featherweight's physique, tobacco-stained fingers and nails chewed down to the quick. Today he is talking about his mother. For more than a decade, the elderly matriarch has been sending spicy care packages to her son, stuffed full of paprika and saffron.
"When I first came to New Zealand I could not find chorizo anywhere," Garcia says, pronouncing the peppery Spanish sausage with Castilian flair, chori-tho. "So my mother, she sends me paprika from Madrid. I make all my own chorizo from pure pork meat. It is the only real chorizo in all of New Zealand."
He pauses, as if pondering whether to let us into his secret. "Come with me," he says finally.
"I show you something."
In a cool room behind Garcia's Curator's House Restaurant are rows and rows of curing meats. The half-moon sausages hang in four neat lines, tied with stripy red string. Later, in the restaurant, we get to taste it. Tangy, dense and smoky, served with sweet plum chutney. The real thing indeed.
"I didn't cook much in Madrid," Garcia admits.
"I lived close to my mother. She was always cooking and I always was watching her. Chorizo, paella, everything in the Spanish style." By the Spanish style, Garcia means lashings of olive oil. He cooks with little else, allowing the rich flavours of his ingredients to shine. The secret, he says, is fresh local produce. House specialties include slow-roasted lamb and Mandarin duck, both sourced from the Canterbury region, and flash-fried West Coast whitebait, which Garcia tenderly calls the "little fellows".
Fresh local produce has long been the essence of the New Zealand food scene. Christchurch cuisine is no different. But what marks the city for special mention is that those at the top of the food and wine game are bringing home styles they have learned overseas.
A tax lawyer from Madrid, Garcia came to Christchurch 15 years ago. He wanted to study English in the US but the American embassy queue was too long. In Christchurch, he fell in love with his English teacher and together they started the restaurant in the 1920 Tudor-style Curator's House, in the middle of the city's Botanic Gardens. Today, it is one of Christchurch's best fine diners and Garcia is famous across New Zealand for his paella and chorizo.
"Paella is all about the rice," he says. "If someone leaves the prawns and mussels and only eats the rice then I am happy. If they eat the seafood only, then I am asking them, what is wrong?"
An hour's drive north of Christchurch is the Waipara Valley, a lesser-known New Zealand wine region that draws its flavours from gravel and limestone soils. At the Mud House Winery & Cafe, the winemaker conducts the tour. Simon Waghorn has worked in California's Napa Valley as well as wineries in Marlborough and Hawkes Bay. He starts us off in the winemaking backroom, treating us to wines that are yeasty, cloudy and straight from the fermentation tank.
Frankly it's undrinkable. But it gives a sense of the patience involved. Back at the cellar door, Waghorn cracks open a few bottles of the finished product. He's won prizes for his riesling, sauvignon blanc and pinot noir. "You can see by the bottles, they've got a bit of bling on them," he says. "I wouldn't work anywhere else."
In the Mud House cafe, pies are the specialty. Beware though, there's no pie warmer in sight. These are gourmet pies, served with salad, vegetables and paired with wine by the glass. The menu is divided between wild pies (boar, goat, venison and monkfish) and tame pies (chicken, lamb and Canterbury beef). Save room for the sweet house specialty: Mud House mud cake, rich, velvety and served with a sticky.
Dining at the Square Restaurant can be wild, too. Chef Trevor Griggs has come home via stints in London and Sydney. His ethos is "the fewer ingredients the better". His menus abandon flowery descriptions and use just one word to sum up the dish. For our four-course set menu, we get just four words: lamb, venison, salmon, chocolate. It is delicious and Griggs has a point: who would order lamb sweetbreads on carrot risotto? Death by chocolate? With five wickedly chocolately dishes to boot?
Griggs is hopeful that one day he will take his diners on a magical mystery tour. For now, only one item on the restaurant's a la carte menu is the so-called "chef's choice".
"It takes a bit of courage to take people with you," he says.
The writer was a guest of Accor Hotels, Christchurch Tourism and Pacific Blue.
Trip notes
Getting there
Pacific Blue flies from Sydney to Christchurch, priced from about $360 return, 13 67 89, flypacificblue.com.au.
Staying there
Novotel Christchurch Cathedral Square has standard rooms from $NZ110 ($89) a night. +64 3372 2111, accorhotels.com.
Eating there
Spanish style: Curator's House Restaurant, 7 Rolleston Avenue, Botanic Gardens, +64 3379 2252, curatorshouse.co.nz. Mains $NZ36 ($29)-$39.
French style: The Square Restaurant and Bar, 50 Cathedral Square, +64 3372 2111, accorhotels.com. Mains NZ$29-$38.
Vegetarian: Dux de Lux, corner Hereford and Montreal streets, +64 3366 6919, thedux.co.nz. Mains $NZ22-$25.
Gourmet pies and fine wines: The Mud House Winery and Cafe, 780 Glasnevin Road, Amberley, +64 3314 6900, mudhouse.co.nz. Pies $NZ16.50-$20.50.
Gourmet sightseeing: Board the historic Tramway Restaurant for a three-course meal served on a ride through the city centre. 7 Tramway Lane, +64 3366 7511, tram.co.nz. Four-course meal package, $NZ73.
More information Christchurch & Canterbury Tourism, christchurchnz.com, 15-31 Cathedral Square, +64 3379 9629.
Three places for a drink
Fat Eddie's 1920s-style loft bar with live jazz, burlesque cabaret and a New Orleans-inspired menu. Take your dancing shoes. Open 5pm until late every day except Monday. Upstairs in SOL Square, 179 Tuam Street, fateddies.co.nz.
Bangalore
Polo Club Christchurch's newest drinking den, with lush colonial-style decor, a lengthy wine list and quirky cocktails. Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner and until late. 136 Oxford Terrace. +64 3377 9968, bangalorepoloclub.co.nz.
Bailies
Oldest Irish bar in Australasia. Irish and New Zealand ciders plus local and international ales on tap. Boasts "husband's creche" for ladies who love to shop. Open daily, 50 Cathedral Square. +64 3366 5159, bailiesbar.co.nz.
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