Every year, I try to make it to the Auckland International Cultural Festival. It's not as big as Pasifika, and you can already get all sorts of ethnic foods from the Auckland Night Markets, but I tasted my first Ethiopean injera here, and live in continued hope of discovering something new.
This year, the festival took place on Sunday, and seemed smaller than I remembered it. Perhaps it was due to the rain beforehand, which left the fields a bit of a muddy swamp. The Brazilian stalls I saw at Silo Park's Rice and Beans Festival only the day before (and also at the Brazilian Day Festival at the beginning of the month) were nowhere to be found.
Cultural Dances and Sports
We were just there for the food, but we still managed to catch some of the shows and activities, such as French can-can dancers and some football games. There were random people wandering around in ethnic dress too.
Thai dancers.
Sugar Art
Tang Arts managed to mix food with art and culture. I found it fascinating watching the skilled craftsperson turn molten sugar into intricate Chinese designs, attached to a stick like a lollipop.
Making of sugar art.
Shared Meals
At the Ethiopean stalls, you were welcome to sit down and have a coffee. I was surprised to see a large group of people share an injera plate topped with a variety of stews too. This great community spirit even exteneded to someone just walking past.
Sharing injera.
Burmese Food
The most interesting food for us came from the Burmese stalls, mainly because we have had very little to do with it before. We watched one of the groups tie sugarcane into a teepee shape to advertise their freshly expressed sugarcane juice, which somehow seemed to have lemon and ginger flavour as well.
Sugarcane structure.
We also tried their round fried snacks called မုန့်လင်မယား (moun lin maja or mont lin mayar), which apparently means "the couple snack" or "the husband and wife snack". These were made of rice flour, boiled yellow peas, coriander and spring onion, and were hot and delicious, with crispy edges.
Burmese bite-sized snacks.
Other Food
Although many food stalls were ones you may have seen at other markets (e.g. the Turkish gözleme maker), there were also stalls that I have not come across elsewhere before, selling Kurdish dolma, Bulgarian baked goods, or Mexican tamales, for instance. We had to do a second round of the stalls before I noticed some of these.
For one weekend every year (last weekend this year), a part of Auckland transforms into a bustling celebration of Asian culture and commerce. Lanterns are clearly the highlight of the Auckland Lantern Festival, but there are also performances, trinket-sellers, and food, glorious food. Every year, the event gets a little bigger, and for the first time this year, it was even split out into two different locations. Most of the attractions were in and around Albert Park as usual, but this time, there were also outdoor movies and family activities on Queen's Wharf.
Advertising for the Auckand Lantern Festival on a bus.
We didn't even look at the programme before heading in to town, because we were mainly there for the food; the lanterns were around the whole weekend anyway. This did mean that we missed some great shows, including sand painting, a kite making demonstration, and the grand finale fireworks. We did however manage to eat, take pictures, and immerse ourselves in the crowd, albeit one which was not used to coping with the sheer amount of people. We even caught the lion dance, in which one of the three red lions somehow managed to turn a gold and a silver one, while moving to the rhythmic beating of drums.
The lion dancers somehow managed to make it past the crowd by the food stalls.
Food
Although some of the food at the festival consists of things you can get at restaurants or takeaways anyway, there was also a lot of street snacks (plenty of things on skewers), as well as items you don't normally see, like the toffee strawberries below, or freshly pressed sugar cane juice. The volume of people not only added to the atmosphere, but ensured food was freshly cooked where appropriate.
Fried dumplings and squid on a stick.
Hardest to get: Toffee Strawberries
People kept walking past with strawberry skewers held up high, some with up to 6 or so sticks in their hands. We found the source of this delicacy and placed ourselves in the shortest queue, salivating with every step forward. Unfortunately, once we got to the front, we discovered that we were in the wrong queue. They were only selling meat jerky from our line, despite being one and the same shop.
We left for a couple of hours and looked around before attempting to join the queue again. This time, after we had waited for a few minutes, they called out that they had sold out. At $3.50 for four little toffee-coated strawberries, the skewers were not cheap, but people clearly loved them!
The very popular toffee strawberry stand, which also sold beef and pork jerky.
We returned the next day, and went straight to this stall before purchasing the savoury components of our meal. We finally got to try toffee strawberries, and they were indeed delicious, with a sweet, crunchy outer shell that gives way to a warm, fruity explosion.
Most tempting food we did not try: Fried Pork Buns and Dumplings
It was really interesting watching the buns and dumplings being cooked by Chinese Dumpling King Restaurant (shop in Mount Albert). While the bottoms of the products were frying on a hot pan, the tops were being steamed under a metal cover. I imagine the food would have been hot and fresh and delicious, and good value too ($5 for 6 buns or 10 dumplings), but the queue was a deterrent, and we figured that we could simply go to the restaurant after the festival anyway.
Fried pork buns and dumplings being cooked.
Most expensive item: Grilled Crayfish Tail
The most expensive dish we saw for sale was the grilled crayfish tail from Oceanz Seafood. On Saturday night, it cost $18, marked down from $20. The next night, however, the price was down to $15, so we decided to spoil ourselves. There's supply and demand in action for you.
Grilled crayfish tail from Oceanz Seafood.
This was actually a good choice, as the crayfish was delicious in garlic butter. You also got a bit of seaweed so it feels more like a meal.
Cheapest items: meat kebabs, deep fried things
A number of stalls were selling meat skewers for $1 per stick. For $1 you could also buy deep fried things such as durian rolls and taro cake.
Durian rolls, taro cake, spring rolls and dumplings at a vegetarian stall.
Most represented cuisine: Taiwanese Food (runner up: vegetarian food)
The range of food on offer at the festival included such cuisines as Chinese, Malaysian, Filipino, Vietnamese, and Thai, but we were surprised by how strong the Taiwanese representation was. From pearl milk tea to Taiwanese sausages to popcorn chicken to rice tube pudding, we saw maybe 10 stalls selling Taiwanese food, and that's not including the stalls that sold pearl milk tea along with other things like Hong Kong Curry Fish Balls.
Taiwanese fried chicken.
In comparison, we only noticed one Vietnamese stall, and a couple each of Thai and Malaysian ones.
The other type of stalls we saw a lot of were the ones promoting vegetarian food, often run by Buddhist organisations. They seemed to be more intent on proving that ethical vegetarian food can taste good, rather than providing any healthy offerings. As such, there were very few salads to be seen, but plenty of deep-fried snacks and imitation meat.
Oily vegetarian food.
Most disappointing item: Tofu Jelly
One of the stalls offered tofu jelly or tau fu fah, which is not something that you often get to eat here, unless you make it yourself or go to a fancy Chinese restaurant. Although there was an attractive picture shown on a wooden pail, however, the actual dish offered was nothing like it. First of all, it didn't come from the pail, which actually only contained the sugar syrup for the dish. Secondly, the jelly had the wrong texture, somewhat curdled and grainy, rather than being silky smooth. Then came the flavour, which had a slightly bitter aftertaste, as if they had added too much gypsum. Finally, the syrup was not golden brown as shown in the picture, but a clear and colourless sugar water. What a waste of a perfectly good $5.
Syrup for tofu jelly and bottle of black soy milk.
Best food for having later: Fresh Fruit
Most of the food at the festival was intended to be eaten straight away. We took home some deep-fried coconut buns from a vegetarian stall, but we wished we had remembered to purchase some cherries, lychees and longans for later too.
Fresh fruit and young coconut water for sale.
Most attractive non-Chinese food: Ice Cream in a Fruit Cup
For those who do not care for Chinese food, there were still plenty of options at the Lantern Festival, from gourmet food trucks like Urban Escargot selling pork belly burgers, mussel fritters and snails in green curry, to the standard vendors of hot chips, hot dogs and kebabs. The seafood mentioned earlier, including the grilled crayfish tail, would appeal to all, but perhaps the most popular non-Chinese food was in the dessert category.
Mini donuts flew like hot cakes, children walked around with candy floss, and ice cream in watermelon (which you find at many festivals including Pasifika and the Grey Lynn Park Festival) was jazzed up to include paper peacocks and served using a variety of fruit, including rock melon and pineapple.
Lanterns
After you have eaten your fill and the darkness of night takes over, it is time to enjoy the lantern displays!
Turtle orchestra lanterns.
Dragons around a post lanterns.
Tips
Avoid driving. You have better things to do with your time than sitting in traffic, or going round and round a parking building very slowly. Walking is a good option, as is riding a bike. Trying to catch a bus may be problematic if you are at one of the last stops, and all you see are full buses that just keep going past.
Gridlocked cars in parking building.
Go with friends so you can share, when you are forced to buy food in larger quantities than you want to eat. Failing that, be prepared to take food away, so that you can try more items.
For even greater variety, come back on multiple days. Not only will you have more stomach space to play with, you might see some new stalls too.
Don't go right towards the end of the evening. The more popular items might be sold out, and they turned out the lights at 10:30pm (in the food area, not the lanterns in the park) even though the place was still buzzing.
Relax and enjoy. This is particularly important because someone is bound to be in your way, or accidentally bump into you, in the crowd.
If you love street food, the closest you can get to the experience in Auckland is at the Auckland Night Market, held weekly in Pakuranga on Saturday evenings. We first discovered this thriving bunch of stalls (not so much on the street as in the covered parking area of the Westfield mall, underneath The Warehouse) nearly half a year ago, and were totally blown away by the variety of food available. From Philippine meals to Italian desserts, to all sorts of Chinese snacks, you couldn't help but get excited.
Lots of people at the Auckland Night Market, especially if you go at dinner time
We returned again last evening, and while some stalls have changed, there were just as many people as ever. There was even a live musical performance.
Unique Offerings
Here are some things I saw for sale yesterday, which I have not seen anywhere else in Auckland:
1) Goose eggs
[Added 14 January 2012: I have since seen goose eggs for sale elsewhere, from Dahua (79-83 Dominion Road) to the Avondale Sunday Market.]
Large goose eggs in a basket
2) Freshly pressed sugarcane juice, available for $4 a cup at a stall selling a strange mix of snacks.
Man squeezing sugarcane through a pressing machine
3) Hong Kong stylegai daan jai (雞蛋仔), a.k.a. eggettes, egg puffs, bubble waffles, HK cakes, Chinese egg balls, etc. These could do with a bit more crunch, like the best ones in Hong Kong, sold from a little store in North Point, but they had the right flavour. Yours to try for $3.
Egg waffles as sold in Hong Kong
[Added 14 January 2012: I have now discovered these for sale in town also, from a little shop in the Mid-City Arcade called Citizen Ice Shop. There, they charge $4 for these "QQ Egg Cakes", which were unfortunately filled with raw doughy bits. I guess they need a bit more practice in the cooking of these waffles, but at least they cooked them to order.]
[Added 26 Feb 2013: Errm, and the Citizen Ice Shop is no more.]
[Added 20 April 2014: You can now buy "Egg Puffs" for $4 from Togoo on Lorne St. They are a bit more spongey than I am used to, but they still taste pretty good, with a bit of crunch at the edges, and an optional sprinkling of black sesame seeds.]
4) Dragon's beard candy (龍鬚糖), a.k.a. Chinese candy floss; sugar pulled into tiny strands, in this case rolled and filled with chopped nuts, dessicated coconut, etc. in front of you ($4 for a box).
Freshly rolled dragon's beard candy
You don't actually get to see the formation of the sugar strands at the market, but YouTube has an amazing video of the Korean version of this candy being made:
A Fantastic Range of Foods
Of course, there were also many items which could be found elsewhere, but which you perhaps wouldn't normally go out of your way for. Although many of the stalls at the market were Chinese, there was a good range of specialties from different ethnic groups:
1) Sri Lankan appa, thin, bowl-shaped pancakes made from a fermented batter of rice flour and coconut milk, and filled with a topping of your choice. These were made by the people of 7 Siri, a restaurant in Mount Roskill. I ordered the egg one ($3), and watched as the lady oiled the pan, swirled the batter around to coat it, then cracked an egg inside. It was delicious with the spicy sauces served on top.
Egg appa, topped with delicious spicy sauces
2) Steamed rice noodle rolls (豬腸粉), a Cantonese dish served with sesame paste, sweetened soy sauce and optionally chilli sauce ($3). I love sesame paste! The same stall offered combos with hot and sour soup (which was also delicious), as well as soy sauce chicken wings and fish balls, which we didn't manage to try.
Steamed rice noodle rolls, simple yet satisfying
3) Japanese takoyaki, okonomiyaki, andobanyaki; octopus balls, savoury pancakes and filled sweet cakes respectively. There was sushi for sale too, but I guess people prefer to eat more interesting hot foods, given the option.
Piping hot takoyaki balls
4) Maori hangi, and rewena bread; a smoky mix of root vegetables, chicken, beef and pork ($8.50), and potato bread ($1 per slice). The hangi had unique flavours, for sure, but having food pre-packaged in plastic boxes and reheated in the microwave didn't really help to sell it. The bread was fresh and moist, but not something you really want to fill up on when there were so many other things to taste.
Hangi food stall
5) Lángos, Hungarian deep-fried flatbread ($5 - $9). I've seen this stall before at the Grey Lynn Park Festival, and even at the Opening Day of Wynyard Quarter earlier on in the day, and it's always had huge queues. Not here at the Auckland Night Market however, even with free samples offered, perhaps because you could buy Chinese deep-fried bread sticks for less money just a few stalls down.
Man offering a sample of langos
6) The Chinese deep-fried bread sticks, mentioned above
It was fascinating watching the dough expanding and being twirled around in the hot oil
7) German style sausages from Fritz's Wieners, served in a bun with onion or sauerkraut. I'd noticed that their tiny Customs Street shop was no longer around, so it's good to see that they are still trading from a mobile stall.
Bavarian style sausage stand
8) Korean pancakes, at two for $5, even cheaper than the hugely popular No. 1 Pancake corner shop in town. A variety of fillings are available, from the sweet (choco, red bean paste) to the savoury (beef, pork, potato & cheese).
Korean pancakes are tasty fresh and hot
9) Wok-fried seafood. Not sure what kind of food this was supposed to be or whether it tasted any good, but the flames and action of the cooking definitely drew the punters in.
A dash of fire with your mussels?
Let me tell you there were many, many other stalls that I have not described. I tried to ignore the desserts (profiteroles, cakes, frozen yoghurt with fresh fruit) and baked goods, as well as the fairground junk food like popcorn, candyfloss, potato chips, deep-fried spring rolls and mini donuts, and there were still many dishes to be tasted.
Products From Past Visits
Given the huge amount of items on offer, we weren't able to try everything that we wanted to. Choose wisely, because something you are saving for your next visit may not be available then. Here are some dishes that we have seen before, but which we were not able to find last night.
1) Hand-pulled noodles
Man pulling noodles for beef noodle soup
2) Fresh Malaysian satay
Malaysian satay stall
3) Chinese sticky rice dumplings (糉子), a.k.a. zongzi, wrapped in bamboo leaves. You could choose to buy them hot (for eating immediately) or cold (for taking home) and they came in both the sweet (plain glutinous rice treated with lye water) and savoury (filled with mung beans and pork) varieties. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to take a photo.
4) Bibimbap from a van, oddly enough sold with coffee. I was hoping to try this last night to see how it compares to those from Korean eateries around town, but it was not there this time.
Unusual food van offering of bibimbap and coffee
5) Skewers of chocolate coated fresh fruit pieces, not that it was particularly amazing, but variety is always good.
Possible Improvements
I think the Auckland Night Market at Pakuranga is great already, but there are some things that would make it even better:
1) The atmosphere of the venue could be improved
If this could be held outdoors, or somewhere that doesn't look like a garage, it would be that much more pleasant to eat there
2) More vegetables in the offerings
Yes, there are already vegie stalls, but I am thinking a bit of greens for dinner. The stand selling three ripe avocados for $3 made me wish for a bit of Mexican street food! At least let me pretend I am having a somewhat balanced meal, please.
A Great Experience
Overall, I would highly recommend a trip to the Auckland Night Market. Parking isn't an issue, as long as you are happy to walk a little, and it is definitely an experience that you won't find anywhere else in Auckland. Don't forget to bring lots of cash (although some stalls offer Eftpos), and go with a group of friends so you can share the food and try more dishes (finding a table to sit together at could be difficult though)! I can't tell you what stalls will be there when you visit, but you will be sure to find something interesting and delicious.
Every time you go out to eat, you are in search of a wonderful meal. But sometimes, just sometimes, you come across something that you have not seen anywhere else before, something different and exciting. Below are some foods that I have been surprised by, mainly pleasantly.
I love eating hot potato chips, so when I saw polenta chips on the menu at Coco's Cantina, I had to order some for comparison, even if it meant downgrading to an entrée for dinner. I was not disappointed. The long chunky chips were fragranced with rosemary, and stayed crisp and hot for much longer than you would expect. They were absolutely delicious with or without the accompanying aioli. Just be careful you don't burn your tongue!
Polenta chips with aioli
Available for $8.50 at Coco's Cantina
376 Karangahape Road, Newton, Auckland
(09) 300 7582
Turesdays to Saturdays 5pm - late
Just up the road at the Wine Cellar, a basement bar in St. Kevins Arcade on K'Rd, I tasted feijoa cider for the first time when a friend played a gig there nearly a year ago. Not only was it a proper cider rather than feijoa mixed with wine, it also came on tap. It was fruity and intoxicating, and absolutely the best cider I have ever had. Made from organic feijoas from Purangi, it tasted different every time I returned. It was not always available, and it was never as good as I remembered again (sometimes it had a bitter aftertaste, more like beer) but I still go back once in a while to see if I can taste the most fantastic cider again.
Available (call first to make sure) for $7 a glass or $9 a pint at
Wine Cellar
St. Kevins Arcade, 183 Karangahape Road, Newton, Auckland
(09) 377 8293
I had never even heard of chirimoya before seeing its juice offered at Mexican Specialties. This South American fruit (I bought a whole one to admire, and the chef picked out a ripe one for me that was ready to be eaten that very day) is related to the custard-apple, and looked green and scaly. The juice was sweet, with a tropical flavour. It wasn't available last time I visited the restaurant, so I am guessing it is out of season (I had it a couple of years ago, around October), but with other items on the drink menu such as cold chocolate, tamarind juice, pineapple and coconut, and lemon and lime, I wasn't about to complain.
Having studied Latin throughout high school, I could only associate the word pan with bread. In India, this word means nothing of the sort. Pan, or paan, refers to the betel leaf, which is commonly used to wrap a an assortment of fillings. The sweet variety does not contain tobacco, and the lady at Ras Vatika assured me that this would be refreshing and good for the digestion. As I was feeling full from dinner and wanted to find out more about this novelty (I hesistate to call it a dessert, even though it is sweet and eaten after dinner), I took one of these little green packets home.
As I was completely clueless about sweet masala pan, I decided to do some web research. Were you supposed to eat the packet whole, leaf and all? Were you supposed to chew and spit, or actually swallow the thing? What is this betel business anyway? What I discovered put me off altogether. Apparently, the areca nut, commonly known as betel nut, which was listed as one of the fillings of my pan, can cause oral cancer. Now, I know that there are a gazillion things in the world which can give you cancer, including burnt toast, but that doesn't mean I want to take my chances.
By the time I plucked up the courage to try some meetha pan, I had left the thing in the fridge so long that the leaf was shrivelled up and more unappetising than ever. Cautiously, I opened up the leaf wrapper, to investigate the contents. It smelt of mint and rose, and I saw dessicated coconut, fennel seeds, unidentified coloured candies, a reddish brownish sauce and some bark-like sheets that I assumed was the areca nut. I admit that I only had the tiniest ever little pinch of the filling, but it tasted as it smelt, of menthol and flowers. I may give it a proper go some day, but I suspect this is one of those things that may be an acquired taste.
