Author. Stone Soup — 31/ 10/ 2018
These images are based on two ideas.
Artisans create value through years of trial through time and effort.
Where is the line between a meal and a work of art.
The images are presented as questions of outcome.
Ellen J Hemmings
Author. Lottie Hedley — 19/ 10/ 2018
Barbecue is a serious pastime in Texas. In Austin, folks line up outside the doors to Franklin Barbecue at six in the morning so they are first in when it opens at 11. The barbecue enthusiasts bring camp chairs to sit on and coolers full of snacks and beer; they throw footballs and befriend the folks next to them who have also made the pilgrimage.
Author. Ruby White — 17/ 10/ 2018
We were welcomed with overwhelming stillness. The house was perfect; thatched roof, mud walls, aged wind turbines turning lethargically in the garden. We knew we were in the right place when we saw the front door, a triple glazed shoji. With the Japanese sensibility radiating from everything, I felt like I’d been spirited away.
Author. Stone Soup — 11/ 10/ 2018
What could be better as a chef than to have a direct relationship with the people who grow your produce and an influence over what they grow? Or as a grower committed to producing high-quality produce to have an assured market, which is passionate about what you do and how you do it?
Author. Aaron McLean — 11/ 10/ 2018
Matt Lamason didn’t realise when he started Peoples Coffee in Wellington 14 years ago that one day it would provide a platform from which he could do some utopian walking. But lessons from his adventures in pursuit of the perfect bean reinforced the principles he had been inspired by in his studies, and inspired him to aim for the horizon. And now, as they say, he’s ‘making a path by walking’, one that his community will be able to drive down propelled by biodiesel made by their cooperative action, out of the waste from Kāpiti’s fish & chip shops.
Author. Stone Soup — 08/ 10/ 2018
Alesha Bilbrough-Collins of Christchurch’s BearLion Foods lays down a challenge to her fellow restaurateurs.
I really have no idea where to start. Someone once told me when you’re trying to train staff, start with the negatives then end on the positives, so they take away something good and hopefully things will improve.
Author. Stone Soup — 03/ 10/ 2018
Alice Neville is a female human who likes to drink beer, and she’s just about had it up to here with your sexist shit.
‘Smash the beer patriarchy’ is a phrase I trot out good-naturedly whenever I encounter an example of everyday beer sexism — the likes of being immediately directed to the wine list at a dedicated craft beer bar, or when some bloke attempts to mansplain the IPA I’m drinking to me.
Author. Stone Soup — 03/ 10/ 2018
Finding good staff is no mean feat for restaurants in New Zealand. With much of our hospitality talent seeking experience abroad, we have a vacuum of local talent, which is eagerly filled by visitors from abroad.
Author. Stone Soup — 18/ 09/ 2018
We like crowdsourcing information as well as funding at Stone Soup. And we like celebrating exceptional food as well as hidden gems. So we asked some questions of possibly the best source of information about where to eat, our country’s most celebrated chefs and restaurateurs. These people are some of the most passionate, obsessive and fussy eaters around — as restaurants are what they live and breath.
Author. Stone Soup — 18/ 09/ 2018
Stone Soup is an age-old parable in which hungry, itinerant strangers arrive in a town with nothing but an empty pot. The villagers refuse to share any food with them, so they melt snow to fill a pot with water, drop in a stone and bring it to the boil over a fire in the town square. The curious villagers ask the strangers what they’re making. “Stone Soup,” they explain. “It’s delicious, as you’ll see, but would taste even better if you could spare a sprig of parsley!”
Author. Stone Soup — 28/ 06/ 2018
Sick Leave podcast: Honest and open discussions with Chef’s/leaders/owners/operators in the hospitality industry throughout New Zealand about their journeys with mental health, depression, and anxiety. Hosted by Shaun K Anderson
Author. Stone Soup — 05/ 03/ 2018
Rain & Shine is a celebration of modern soul, disco, jazz and gospel records that are previously unreleased or have never been reissued. We made an early decision to give all profits back to the artists/their families. Why? These beautiful people are living what is likely their last decade on earth, so it didn’t feel right to negotiate anything beyond cost recovery of pressing and distributing the records, so that we can maximise their earnings while they are still around! A small token of reciprocity for music that has been a big part of my life.
Author. Stone Soup — 03/ 03/ 2018
Beneath the zigzag matrix of divaricating shrubs a layer of leaf litter reveals a microcosm of life in the first light of dawn.
I can only just hear them rustle in the undergrowth above the celebratory dawn chorus, barely visible to the untrained eye. A myriad of creatures – springtails, millipedes, slaters, spiders, beetles, earwigs, worms and, if I’m lucky, a weta or gecko will accidentally reveal itself. What they all have in common is their pivotal role in maintaining soil ecology through their voracious appetite for plant material, and one another.
Author. Stone Soup — 03/ 03/ 2018
I could go on all day about the rich, fragrant and laborious beef pho that awaits you at Try It Out, an Auckland restaurant serving up one of the best and most mispronounced noodle soups in the city. I could divulge the secret to their signature made-from-scratch broth, which is boiled daily in a 60-litre stock pot and takes 15 hours to reach its best. Or I could shout the praises of an establishment that represents everything diverse, compelling and thriving about New Zealand’s multicultural food landscape…
Author. Stone Soup — 02/ 03/ 2018
You’d have to be hiding under a rock if you hadn’t heard the freaky statistics about plastic pollution in the environment.
Microbeads and microfibres in our waterways, plastic waste leaching toxic chemicals into our soil, more plastic by weight than fish in the sea by 2050: you can ignore those facts, but what you should not ignore is the fact that plastic has entered the food chain.
Author. Aaron McLean — 02/ 03/ 2018
I recently interviewed an inspiring group of food thinkers – chefs, critics, farmers and eaters* – and asked them whether we could define New Zealand’s food culture, whether we had a distinct cuisine and whether it mattered.
Author. Kate Richards — 02/ 03/ 2018
It wasn’t until I told my workmates that I’d been testing aphrodisiac foods on them to see if they would fall in love with me, and someone pointed out that that was a weird thing to do, that I thought anything of it. Before that, it made perfect sense: interactive workplace fun.
Author. Stone Soup — 02/ 03/ 2018
Photography: Charlie McKay. Styling: Jess Murphy. Models: Ophelia King & Nina Lloyd.
Author. Stone Soup — 02/ 03/ 2018
Over the simple act of growing and preparing food, a Lebanese social entrepreneur is bringing peace and prosperity to people whose lives have been impacted by war. In Beirut, Jo Bates meets with Kamal Mouazawak, a man whose pared-back philosophy commits to profound change.
Author. Stone Soup — 02/ 03/ 2018
Brendan Manning channelled his inner-Julia Roberts in June to realise a long-held goal of seeing what all the bloody fuss was about with Italy.
Daniela met us underneath a shaded tree surrounded by Fiano vines on one of their plots in Irpinia, Campania. It was a hot June day at the onset of what would be a particularly brutal Italian summer. We were jaded from the drive from Naples and navigating the back country roads that Google Maps has yet to conquer; and Daniela’s offer of a glass of wine on arrival – produced from the same grapes that surrounded us – was understandably welcome.
Author. Here's Barney — 02/ 03/ 2018
I stumbled across Samoa’s Finest because I was always op-shopping at the massive Savemart that sits just behind it in Waitangirua, Porirua. It was fate; I spotted their huge Samoan flag, pulled in, and introduced myself. Now I hit Waitangirua for the op-shop AND the food.
Author. Aaron McLean — 02/ 03/ 2018
Avondale, originally called Te Whau, is famous among food lovers for its Sunday market, and in fact was the site of early Auckland’s market gardens. I recently visited Avondale old boy Tom Scott of Homebrew, @Peace and Average Rap Band fame.
Author. Stone Soup — 02/ 03/ 2018
“Providing for today as well as tomorrow”
By Rōpata Taylor
(Ngāti Rārua, Te Ātiawa, Ngāti Tama, Ngāti Koata)
Author. Leisha Jones — 01/ 03/ 2018
Every Monday night in Auckland’s St. Kevins Arcade a small crowd gathers at the top of the stairs as the clock inches closer to 6pm. Most people seem to know each other one way or another – from the government housing on Grey’s Ave, from sleeping on the streets, or from the surrounding offices, restaurants and shops – but they are all here for the same reason, to have some dinner.
Author. Stone Soup — 28/ 02/ 2018
All you need is Love
Author. Aaron McLean — 04/ 11/ 2017
When we first caught up with baker Jerome Ozich a year ago he had a seriously DIY enterprise, baking eight loaves of slow fermented sourdough a day in his home oven which he personally delivered to those who bought it from him via Instagram.
Author. Stone Soup — 06/ 10/ 2017
The connection between bees and food. Every piece of food we eat can either embody gratitude towards bees for their efforts, or it can add another metaphorical weight to their backs, according to how it was produced. Decidedly the best way to give thanks to bees is by sourcing or growing food that uses a biological method.
This sums up the life-changing understanding I have gained in learning about the connections between bees, plants and soil with For The Love of Bees – a city bee collaboration.
Author. Stone Soup — 06/ 10/ 2017
One of my favourite quotes is from the mouth of the assiduous and generally awe-inspiring Dr Jane Goodall, “The greatest danger to our future is apathy”. My family have been farming on the foothills of a mountain called Maungatautari, in the Waikato for over a century. Today, the land is a medium-sized organic dairy farm and apiary. And, if you count the 15 metres of garlic we planted at the weekend, we’re in the beginning stages of having a modest market garden in a year or so.
Author. Stone Soup — 06/ 10/ 2017
When I first stepped foot in Nick and Angela’s kitchen, I felt as though I had stepped into a still life Cézanne painting, only there was nothing contrived about the scene. Everything atop the counter – from the empty jars and the elegant wine bottles, to the food scattered on the cutting board and the lone baguette – told a story of a creation in the making. There is nothing still about their life, either: the Gill-Clifford household buzzes with activity from dawn until well past dusk.
Author. Stone Soup — 06/ 10/ 2017
I first met Fiona Stewart when she and her business partner Bailey Perryman approached me with their idea for an inner-city farm situated on a lot left vacant by earthquake demolition. The organisation that I was working for at the time, Life in Vacant Spaces (LIVS), manages private property on a rolling monthly basis while the landowners work through their future plans.
Author. Stone Soup — 05/ 10/ 2017
There are two types of people – those who love beer and those who couldn’t care less. In my line of business I am fortunate to know a lot of people who are extremely passionate about beer. They (who am I kidding, obviously I mean ‘we’) often look to that second group and feel a little sorry for them. “They are missing out on SO MUCH” is generally the vibe from us evangelists. It’s not that we want to force beer down people’s throats, we just love our friends and we love beer and we want to see them happy together.
Author. Mika Reilly — 05/ 10/ 2017
Tokyo is a superlative city by many measures – most populous urban area in the world, biggest metropolitan economy of all the world’s cities, home to the world’s busiest train station – but anyone who’s been to Tokyo knows there are two things the city does particularly well: food, and public transportation, and food in public transportation.
