This Country Is So Small, It’s Been Left Off World Maps — But the Food Can’t Be Ignored

Winding through the mountains between Queenstown and Wānaka, my Reko private guide Neil Robinson points out how we can physically see New Zealand’s tectonic plates moving where the mountain bases are busting through the road’s barriers. He assures me the South Island is overdue for a catastrophic earthquake that can happen at any time, and we proceed to pretend that reality isn’t terrifying, as the locals apparently do, hoping this adventure to experience the country’s cuisine is worth the risk.

Robinson has 40 years of experience farming and 20 years shepherding. He is unequivocally the first freelance shepherd I’ve ever met, and he shares endless insights about the hectares upon hectares of grazing sheep, cattle, and red deer around us — all tenets of New Zealand foodways.

It’s easy to not eat meat in New Zealand. The fresh Pacific seafood is sensational, especially in the winter, but the local lamb represents the land and is integral for travelers seeking true terroir. I have saddle and shoulder at Ahi in Auckland, loin at Tantalus Estate on Waiheke Island, and tail in a taco at Amisfield in Queenstown. Each is paired with a red wine from the same land — 2020 Rippon Mature Vine Pinot Noir at Ahi, 2014 Évoque Merlot/Malbec/Cabernet at Tantalus, 2006 Amisfield Pinot Noir at Amisfield — and the harmony makes for remarkably memorable meals.

I’m visiting for the first time from New York — 9,000 miles away — for just that, a meal to remember. Kiwi chef Ben Bayly traveled the country meeting fisherpeople, hunters, growers, makers, and purveyors to develop the menu at Ahi as he planned the restaurant’s 2020 opening. I’ve followed his immersion in native cuisine on the TVNZ docuseries, A New Zealand Food Story, throughout my trip amid jet lag. I watched each element of his New Zealand tasting menu come together and have the privilege of tasting it at a one-night-only restaurant on native land.

Pou-o-Kai, the restaurant promising the most literal stars in the sky, pops up on Kura Tawhiti (Castle Hill) amid stunning rock formations and beneath a breathtaking celestial show on the South Island in Canterbury near Christchurch. Indigenous Māori people welcome about 50 guests from around the world on their land with a native spoken greeting, and we respond with a native song we learned on the bus ride here, while Bayly and his team practice the Māori cooking method called hāngī, cooking food underground in a pit.

“Listening to the stories of the old people who prepared food and lived in Aotearoa New Zealand is fascinating,” Bayly tells me. “Using Māori cooking techniques like hāngī open up new opportunities for the unique New Zealand flavor. I have so much gratitude for the passing of this knowledge to me by people like my great friend Rewi Spraggon — The Hāngī Master.”

Metal crates of pāua (sea snails) and southern rock lobster (crayfish) laying in seaweed and medicinal plants are lifted out of the ground in a smoky, aromatic scene to begin the evening's six-course meal at candlelit tables around a firepit. While Tourism New Zealand hosted the exclusive event to promote the cuisine that’s overlooked by the Michelin Guide to visiting content creators, anyone visiting the country can taste courses from the menu at five of Bayly’s restaurants through August 2025 — Ahi and Origine in Auckland, Aosta and Little Aosta in Arrowtown, and The Bathhouse in Queenstown.

And there are many other ways to get a true sense of Kiwi food.

From the water, everywhere you turn, comes blue cod, crayfish, kina (sea urchin), kingfish (yellowtail amberjack), monkfish, Ōra King salmon, oysters, pāua, scallops, sole, and whitebait. From colorful ceviche starters to waterfront oyster platters, the local seafood brings new life to grassy Sauvignon Blancs from Central Otago to Marlborough and beyond.

A ferry ride away from Auckland, I sample local olive oils at Allpress Olive Groves on dreamy Waiheke Island, with views of vibrant green vineyards, water sparkling in the sun, and the city skyline glimmering in the distance. Outside of touristy Central Queenstown, I sip coffee roasted in-house at Black Lab Coffee in Frankton — a cafe so sustainable, there are no takeout cups — with bags of coffee beans from Brazil, Columbia, Central America, and Ethiopia piled next to a shiny Roastmax. In picturesque Arthurs Point, I order an ombre tasting flight on the riverfront patio at Canyon Brewing, which is growing its own malt for a lager, using New Zealand hops in a Pilsner and IPA, and aging beer in used barrels from a local winery.

I find the most noteworthy presentation of the country’s cuisine at Amisfield winery’s restaurant in Queenstown. Chef Vaughan Mabee introduces himself with dishes like a duck’s "foot," made from dehydrated and fried duck with claws made from truffle. The meal showcases boar, eel, hare, lamb’s tail, deer milk, and pāua from his own abalone farm in showstopping dishes with sublime proprietary pairings. Mabee incorporates Sauvignon Blanc into an emulsified butter and Pinot Noir in a syrup and raspberry preserves.

“I try to express in my dishes the sense of the beauty of a bird in flight, or a deer’s antler, or the head of a wild boar — the cycle of life,” Mabee tells me, saying his stark visuals are often inspired by New Zealand photographer Fiona Pardington. “Our focus is to capture the region for our guest and immerse them into our place. We are a new country in terms of cuisine and also an island, so we have a lot of unique flavors from here, that are only here.”

Amisfield holds a special place among the world’s best restaurants, executing fine dining that feels effortless and fun, despite the painstaking measures that must go into developing the creative, sustainable tasting menu. Mabee only works with fisherpeople who practice zero waste, and brings refreshing humor to a seriously impressive meal.

“What is New Zealand cuisine?” Mabee writes in an Instagram caption. “It’s the delicious memories of the endemic wild. It’s our farms, gardens, and ocean flowing through our generations then redefined to tell our own story of where we are from to the world of guests through our food and wine.”

A culture of generosity connects the country’s food community. Despite the potential for rivalry, Auckland’s award-winning Paris Butter (where chef Zennon Wijlens was named New Zealand’s 2023/2024 Chef of the Year by Cuisine magazine) names Amisfield among recommendations for other restaurants, bars, and cafes in New Zealand in a takeaway leaflet at the end of my meal. The restaurant’s menu credits everyone in the kitchen who presented the meal — an act of inclusivity that I’ve never seen.

In the same spirit of sharing, my menu from Pou-o-Kai promotes each purveyor behind the meal — pāua from Ocean Speared, black winter Perigold truffle from Kings Truffles, Fiordland crayfish from Wild Legend, sustainable Lumina lamb from Minaret Station, pineapples from Geneva Fruits. And Bayly serves bonbons from downstairs neighbor Honest Chocolat for dessert at Ahi — which was named Cuisine magazine’s 2024 Restaurant of the Year.

Among many more examples of generosity, Paris Butter sends me home from a remarkable six-course meal with two jars of the restaurant’s signature granola, with the ingredients listed in my recommendations leaflet. I enjoy the treat for a fireside breakfast while watching the sunrise from a cozy geodome at Cross Hill Domes near picturesque Lake Wānaka, where my host goes off-site to source almond milk for me, when any other kind would have been fine. In the evening my cheese plate is paired with Maude wine “from just over the hill” as the stars begin their show.

My biking guide, Dave Goadby of NZBikeTrails, takes me to popular Pembroke Pâtisserie after a scenic ride, volunteering to share local flavors he loves. Likewise, my server at Sherwood Queenstown — where I dine on-site with a view of Lake Wakatipu and produce from the hotel restaurant’s garden — says her friends grow the mushrooms from Remarkable Fungi that I try here and at many stops on my trip.

I recognize the mushrooms in the charming Royalburn Farm Shop in Arrowtown, where celebrity chef Nadia Lim and her husband Carlos Bagrie sell lamb, produce, eggs, and wool from their regenerative, ethical farm, Royalburn Station. I have the opportunity to hear their story in their home kitchen, which Bagrie sums up by saying, “All we do is think about food, so we’re farming for the plate.”

The couple supplies local restaurants with their premium eggs and meat, turns barley into Swifty beer, and stars in another docuseries called Nadia’s Farm (also known as High Country Farm if you watch on an Air New Zealand flight). I paired my viewing with New Zealand snapper, cheeses, and wines from the airline’s A Taste of Aotearoa menu.

Despite my general food television fatigue, I’m glued to scenes like Bayly shooting his first deer and Lim electing to kill one of her chickens that’s pecking hens, ultimately making coq au vin from the ordeal. There’s a raw, genuine approach to food here because New Zealand’s identity is in the ingredients, not signature dishes. And while sheep and deer grazing are part of the trademark scenery, the reality that these animals will be food isn’t hidden in overcrowded, chemical-laden, mass-production farms. It’s the way of life.

Travelers can dine with confidence in sustainable and ethical sourcing, choices that many of my hosts remind me may be small on such tiny islands but can have a big impact when each visitor carries their experience elsewhere. New Zealand has an undeniable taste of place that will have you forgetting all about the impending earthquake.