A new flavour For summer
Po¯ hutukawa Honey Roasted Peach Vanilla or Anzac Crunch? Two top chefs have brought a fresh New Zealand approach to their ice creams – and, writes Felix Desmarais, they want you to take their taste test.
SHAUN Clouston is lactose intolerant.
The chef and dedicated ice cream inventor kept that quiet while he lugged litres of po¯ hutukawa honey roasted peach and vanilla ice cream up to Sunday News’ Wellington offices for staffers to try.
‘‘I’m not so good with dairy, though I still try it,’’ Clouston said. ‘‘Small amounts are fine.’’
This week Clouston faced off against fellow restaurateur, Leith Wix, for the ultimate summertime challenge: invent the new hokey-pokey or rum-and-raisin and leave the vote to the public
(and a few personal opinions from journalists turned ice cream reviewers).
The summer double-scoop occupies a special place in every lactose-tolerant Kiwi’s heart, completing the classic Kiwi image. Jandals? Check. Beach? Check. Ice cream in hand? Check. Kiwis consume it by the truckload according to national figures.
According to The NZ Ice Cream Manufacturer’s Association (NZICMA), by 2010 ice cream and ice blocks accounted for $1 of every $44 spent on food in New Zealand households, so it’s no surprise we scoff more than 23 litres each every year. That’s about 110,262,000 litres, or 44 olympic-sized swimming pools of cookies and cream.
And that makes us one of the biggest eaters of ice cream in the world, ahead of Australia and the USA – to where we export millions of kilograms worth of every year – which seems in order considering our dairy-laden reputation, but also shows a penchant for embracing something and making it our own.
European settlers bought ice cream to NZ in the 1800s and its basic recipe – sugar, milk and ice – made it a staple.
Such was the initial furore over the iced-goods that newspapers had to resort to all-caps exclamations with the the Wellington Independent in 1866 trumpeting: ‘‘MR. JAMES OSGOOD has great pleasure in notifying his friends and the public at large, that he has imported, at considerable expense, an article never before introduced into Wellington, LAKE WENHAM
ICE . . . will be in constant use at the EMPIRE until further notice. ON SATURDAY (THIS DAY), ICE CREAM FROM ELEVEN A.M.’’
In 1912, The Robinson Ice Cream Company established an ice creamery in Auckland’s Arch Hill, and Le Grand Marble Bar popped up in Gisborne in 1916, boasting of having 22 globe lights, extensive mirrors and ‘‘fancy sundaes’’ on its menu. In 1951, Tip Top took over Peters Ice Cream and two years later the NZICMA was able to count 49 ice cream manufacturers in the country.
In 1997, the first annual New Zealand Ice Cream Awards were held, judging for appearance, taste, texture and melting properties to crown the the inaugural supreme winner as Mel-O-Rich Boysenberry Ripple.
Fast forward to the present day and we’re relatively bold in our tastes: the latest NZICMA ice cream awards saw a black sesame ice cream take out a top gong (though 21 years after its first-up victory, classic boysenberry ripple again snaffled the overall prize).
Because Kiwis it can be good to stop and rethink the classics, we challenged two of Aotearoa’s best chefs to take a month to come up with a new Kiwi flavour.
‘‘Even the failures were delicious – it’s ice cream, isn’t it?’’ Leith Wix of newcomer Wellington restaurant Arcimboldi said of the 200 flavour options he mulled over before settling on Anzac Crunch.
‘‘Pinning down which flavour to do, that was the hardest part, we did a whole lot of test batches but we all ate Anzac biscuits as kids – it’s about as Kiwi as it gets.’’
An initial vanilla base was replaced ‘‘as it was too boring’’ with cereal milk – made from soaked granola – which ‘‘gives it an underlying sweetness and goldenness. And good texture with the coconut and the oats – it’s almost like a praline through it’’.
The treat is topped with a
golden syrup swirl with toasted coconut and oats.
Meanwhile Clouston, of Logan
Brown and Grill Meats Beer, dreamed up a po¯ hutukawa honey roasted peach and vanilla ice cream, eventually choosing it over a pear and blue cheese option.
The peaches – served firm to make the ice cream tart – are roasted with po¯ hutukawa honey, which isn’t as sweet as regular honey, and made into a vanilla ice cream with a po¯ hutukawa honey roasted peaches swirl through it.
Featured on top: hundreds and thousands made out of freeze-dried fruit, lychees and pineapple, boysenberries and raspberries, a little bit of chocolate and a touch of salt.
‘‘When you think of po¯ hutukawa, you think of summer in New Zealand,’’ Clouston said.
Both men are kind in their praise of one another’s treats. Clouston described Wix’s ice cream as ‘‘really, really amazing’’ while Wix was equally effusive, calling his challenger’s ice cream ‘‘delicious’’.
The pair reckon location is everything when it comes to getting the public in to vote too: ‘‘I think he might has it sewn up because his restaurant is by the sea,’’ said Clouston.
Wix: ‘‘They have the edge. They’re in the city.’’