With the help of her faithful four-legged assistant, Jean Teng disregards commonsense and ‘only for pet consumption’ labelling to review dog food fit for a king (or at least a cavalier king charles spaniel). First published June 2, 2020 Three months ago, I was reviewing fine-dining restaurant The Grove. Today, I’m reviewing vacuum-sealed frozen dog … Read more
Accusations of cultural appropriation in the restaurant world have made headlines in recent months, but why aren’t we talking about the white-owned ‘Asian fusion’ eateries that continue to trade off casual racism? One day, I walked past Auckland restaurant Monsoon Poon. I’ve ambled past the area plenty of times, but never with any real interest; … Read more
When Covid-19 forced New Zealanders to live most of their lives online it exacerbated the effects of digital exclusion. Jean Teng spoke to the organisations that kept vulnerable communities connected during the pandemic. From job hunting and banking to watching TV and scrolling through the news, there is hardly a corner of modern life untouched … Read more
When Covid-19 forced restaurants to shut, they had to find new ways to feed their customers. At Auckland’s Cotto, their take-home service remained popular even after they opened their doors again. Alert level three seems so long ago now, but I still remember that bone-deep relief as its announcement opened up the prospect of takeaways: … Read more
The small team behind the much-lauded Pasture is opening a bar – and true to form, it’s going to be unlike anything we’ve seen in New Zealand before. Jean Teng got a sneak peek. You enter Boxer via a text message. Well, that’s not strictly true. If you have the foresight to book beforehand, you’ll … Read more
Jean Teng has had a lifetime of people telling her they despise tofu, when really they just don’t know what to do with it – or it’s been cooked for them by someone similarly clueless. While everyone else was breaking their back kneading for crusty sourdough during lockdown, all I wanted to do was make … Read more
The much-awaited downtown retail and hospitality precinct finally opened its doors last week. The hospo offerings have been hyped for years – so where should you head first? It’s been a bit of a construction eyesore for a while now, but downtown Auckland’s waterfront area finally has its new shiny toy: Commercial Bay. Slats of … Read more
As public sentiment turned against Uber Eats, a new local operation emerged promising a more ethical alternative to help New Zealand’s struggling hospitality industry. But now Eat Local NZ has suspended trading after falling out with its Australian partner Mr Yum. So what happened? A dispute between local hospitality platform Eat Local NZ and Australia-based … Read more
With the help of her faithful four-legged assistant, Jean Teng disregards commonsense and ‘only for pet consumption’ labelling to review dog food fit for a king (or at least a cavalier king charles spaniel). Three months ago, I was reviewing fine-dining restaurant The Grove. Today, I’m reviewing vacuum-sealed frozen dog pizza. Such is life. Dog … Read more
Jean Teng gets a lesson on the best ways to make top quality coffee from the comfort of her bubble. During lockdown, with more of us isolated from our local cafes and fancy work espresso machines, making coffee at home became a necessity – a fundamental matter of funnelling caffeine into our bodies. But I … Read more
Since Covid-19 hit the hospo industry hard, the tide has been turning against Uber Eats. Jean Teng looks at why people are increasingly anti the app, and checks out some (hopefully) less problematic alternatives for sating level three hunger. Even before Covid-19, we thought food delivery was pretty damn great. For the time-poor among us, … Read more
If you’re the type to judge those who queued up for a post-lockdown Big Mac, perhaps it’s time to ask yourself some hard questions about why you really disapprove so much. Since we moved to alert level three, there has been a flurry of attention on fast food – namely that after five weeks of … Read more