AIR Meatball superseded by a stuffed sausage
When people come to visit you in Hawke’s Bay, there is a bit of pressure.
The pressure mainly comes from the fact I have sold Hawke’s Bay as the leading gourmet destination and the only place in New Zealand where you can get a Hawke’s Bay meatball. Sure we’ve got beautiful restaurants, and some of the best wine in the world….but to me it’s the humble meatball that really brings in the people.
My sister and her friend Sam were staying with us for a couple of days from Christchurch for the Elton John concert and we had an action-packed itinerary planned. There was the Mission Concert, and Sam wanted to relive her childhood so we had to get a photo with Pania, and do a drive past Fantasyland, then there was shopping, and Angkor Watt Baker. I had timed our meatball visit perfectly I thought….for around 11am on the morning after the concert. Enough time to get out of bed while you think you are still feeling good, do a spot of shopping while you think you are still feeling good, and then just when the headache really starts to kick in.….you get yourself a meatball.
“What exactly is a Hawke’s Bay meatball?” Sam asked, as we strolled into the bakery. My sister (who is of course a convert) and I mumbled our way through (because really, how do you describe it), but the resounding tone was “a Hawke’s Bay meatball is god”.
And then something extraordinary happened that I had not factored in to my holier-than-thou meatball crusade, and that, my friends, is the stuffed sausage. It sits in the hot food cabinet, beside the chicken kebab and the lasagne topper. I just give it a perfunctory glance, because my eyes are fixed on the prize, the ball. To my horror, Sam picked up her tongs and put a stuffed sausage beside her meatball. We found a booth, sat down, Sam took a bite of the meatball and said “I don’t know what it is, but its good”. Phew. And then she stuffed the stuffed sausage into her gob. She chewed, I waited, and then the words that I had been dreading came out of her mouth — “Omg, that’s the best thing I have ever tasted!” Talk about throwing a sausage among the meatballs! So now I have to add a stuffed sausage to the Hawke’s Bay meatball tour. I can see the placard now — “Welcome to Hawke’s Bay, home of Adam & Megan, the mighty meatball and the stuffed sausage!”.