Aug 19, 2010
Press Release: New Zealand Herald
Despite the god-like image some chefs garner, none drop fully formed from the sky. Each and every one must cut their culinary teeth somewhere - be it through a kitchen cadet-ship, or in specialist training institutes.
Auckland sports six such training schools for chefs. Most let students test their skills on family, friends and the public. The schools serve up a mixture of breakfast, lunch and dinner and are a great place for a cheap lunch and a culinary treat. We visited four training restaurants for a taste of what to expect from New Zealand's next top chefs.
North Shore International Academy (NSIA)
The only North Shore stop on our itinerary was NSIA, a private academy housed in an unassuming warehouse space in the industrial backblocks of Albany.
Behind its utilitarian facade, NSIA is a slick, uber-professional and gleamingly modern affair. More impressively, the school was set up by hospitality industry godfather Otto Groen QSM, the man best known for gaining New Zealand's very first restaurant liquor licence way back in 1961 and thereby dragging the local dining scene out of the dark ages.
Groen has always taken the classical European approach - that dining should be a complete package, composed of the very best service, ambience, food and wine. This philosophy was evident in every aspect of our lunch at NSIA.
As is the case with all of the schools we visited, the NSIA restaurant represents a convergence of courses and levels of study. But from the perspective of a diner, the experience was almost seamless and better than I've had in many professional restaurants of late.
We remarked more than once that NSIA is preparing its students not just for the hospitality industry per se, but the very highest end of the industry. The framed testimonials of past alumni lining the school's corridors confirm this, with placements in many of the world's great hotel chains and resorts.
Only one main was available by the time we were seated as the rather intriguing risotto verde had sold out. So we dined on fresh market fish with fennel and orange salad and potato-artichoke gateau.
The fish was sublimely fresh and perfectly sauteed in butter. The potato gateau was akin to a very delicate frittata, with perfectly cooked slices of waxy potato offset by the nutty complexity of artichoke. The accompanying salad of fennel bulb and orange was a perfect partner to the subtle flavours of the fish and a foil to the dense and weighty gateau. A lovely dish and of a standard I would be happy with anywhere.
The desserts on offer were tiramisu and apple, pecan and pinenut torte. These were true to the region du jour and were reliable crowd-pleasers. Both were prettily plated and precisely executed dishes.
NSIA is not merely a hospitality school but a fine dining academy, and although a little out of the way compared to the other schools we visited, it is well worth the effort. It offers outstanding value at $7.50 a head for the two-course lunch and an almost flawless experience by any measure.
- Virgil Evetts
