North Canterbury Forage 2017

I was so lucky to have gotten the chance to participate in the coming together of so many different people during the north Canterbury forage. It was such a diverse community, and the idea that people from all over the world came to work together for a day and put aside differences to just focus on the food and the concept of living off the land was so moving. Although I wasn’t the most educated or largest participant, everyone greeted me with a grin and was happy to teach me about what was being done or what crazy food was sitting on the table. I was able to talk to another girl who was from the states during the wine tasting. She talked about her life as a now kiwi resident and how she believed that even though there is so much chaos in the states right now, there are still faint glimpses of things to be proud of being from the U.S. This was so fulfilling because I had been a little too focused on the current events instead of the wine that was in front of me and it blew my mind that a simple conversation could turn my mood around so quickly.

Every year, wineries and farmers of the north Canterbury region host sommeliers, wine writers, food critics, chefs, and media writers to participate in a food forage and dinner in the region. All of the different people get sorted into groups and go to different areas in the region to collect wild food and then they come together at Pegasus Bay winery to celebrate and cook/eat it all. The different groups go hunting, fishing, diving, foraging, and collecting.

Pegasus Bay winery grounds

swan pond

eels live in the pond and I fed them the fish heads we filleted earlier

giant eel that lives in the pond

view of the winery from the pond

One group came to AislingQuoy to “forage” milk and cheese to cook in the dinner. We brought them into the dairy and made coffee and tea and squirted milk straight from the sheep (which they thoroughly enjoyed.) I also did a demonstration on how to make ricotta cheese and Lyndal gave a little cheese tasting before they had to go to their next location.

Once everyone reconvened, the chefs looked over what everyone collected and decided what to make with it all. The wineries that participate also did a tasting of all of their current release wines that I also got to participate in which was super cool. Unfortunately, they only gave two tickets to the actual dinner to AislingQuoy so I didn’t get to go, but I got to stay the entire afternoon and filet fish, walk around the grounds and talk to people, drink lots of wine, and learn a lot about the local food and drink scene. I tried around 20 different kinds of wine, ranging in price from $25-$95 and overall, it was the less expensive ones that I liked more. (Maybe I have poor taste, or maybe the wine industry is ripping everyone off? Who knows.)