MORGAN MCGLONE

From fishing in the Coromandel to summers with his whānau in the Hawke's Bay, Ngāi Tūhoe chef Morgan McGlone reflects on a childhood spent between Aotearoa and Australia.

I’m from a small town called Tokoroa. My parents owned a fish and chip shop called Tiki Takeaway, which they had for 10 years. Everyone drives straight through Tokoroa to Lake Taupo¯, but they’d always stop at Tiki Takeaway for fish and chips.

After school we’d go to my parents’ shop and sit on the freezer with chips and tomato sauce and a milkshake in a giraffe cup. They had two Space Invaders machines in the shop so all the kids used to come in and play. My parents were always so busy as it was a really successful fish and chip shop. My dad still makes the best steak sandwich with his special “salsa”, which is made from chopped tomatoes, onion, parsley and lemon juice.

For the Easter holidays, we’d always visit my dad’s father, who moved from Tokoroa to a place called Whitianga in the Coromandel. He wanted to fish and live by the water so he bought a bach [beach house] by the water, which I have inherited and it’s absolutely beautiful. We had a really cool relationship with him. He was Irish, so he ate a lot of corned beef, colcannon and mustard sauce. If we didn’t catch any fish, we’d be eating corned beef. It was extremely rural and picturesque, and I remember I’d just cruise around with bare feet. There was a lot of seafood. We’d go out to the front of my grandfather’s bach, throw a rod out and catch snapper, or dig for pipis in the water. That was pretty normal for us. I was there two years ago with Matty Matheson, and other than getting a Thai restaurant (which is pretty damn good) nothing much has changed.

We moved to Australia when I was seven but my parents sent me back to New Zealand for being a ratbag. After my Year 10 formal, the party kicked on at my house while my parents were in Queensland. We had a really big party. Next thing you know, my dad rolls in at five in the morning. He told me to clean up and then he went out and came back with a one-way ticket to New Zealand and told me I was going to live with my mother’s father. He was very, very religious so we went to church a lot. It was pretty strict but I guess it was good for me during that rebellious stage. I’ll always remember the things we did in the young men’s group – we’d go fishing for eel using a h¯ınaki [a traditional M¯aori eel trap]. We’d also go fishing, diving, and hunting for wild boar.

Even though I was born in Tokoroa I spent a lot of time in Hastings in the Hawke’s Bay. My M¯aori side of the family lived there, so we had lots of h¯angi and spent time at the beach diving for p¯aua [abalone], crayfish and sea urchin. I also learnt the importance of only taking what you need. Obviously there’s a quota, but we never took more than what we needed. It was like having a fish market at your fingertips.

Hastings is the fruit bowl of New Zealand.

You can go to orchards and pick your own fruit – apricots, peaches, and loads of kiwifruit. I remember my summers were always spent eating lots of stone fruit. Peaches warmed by the sun. There was a really famous ice-cream shop in Hastings called Rush Munro’s, and they would do real boysenberry ripple; my favourite flavour of all time.

My mum has 10 siblings and is from a big M¯aori family. We used to go wild boar hunting in the winter. I have a scar on my knee from where a boar tusk cut me. We also had an eel smoker, so in winter we’d smoke things like kahawai and snapper. Smoked fish is a big part of the M¯aori diet. The smell of smoking woodchips is very nostalgic for me.

My mum used to cook a lot of stuff from the Edmonds Cookery Book – ginger crunch, afghans, caramel slice. And M¯aori fried bread, covered in lashings of maple syrup and slices of butter (in New Zealand you cut the butter).

The first thing I do when I go back to New

Zealand is have a mince and cheese pie. Usually from a gas station – they’re the best. Mrs Mac’s is the brand. It’s quite gooey, I’m pretty sure it’s processed cheese. I like to take the lid of the pie off, put Wattie’s tomato sauce in and scoop out the inside – I never eat pies whole. Then

I’ll have a coffee, like an Allpress, and one of Al Brown’s Best Ugly bagels.

After school we’d go to my parents’ shop and sit on the freezer with chips and a milkshake.