Only twice in my life have I wanted to hug a chef after a meal. The first time was in Bologna, Italy, about 25 years ago. The second time was at Essence in Queenstown on August 22.
Essence jumped squarely into the psyche of New Zealand food lovers in June as the only restaurant to receive two Michelin stars. There is a beautiful moment at the end of the ceremony when it seems all the stars have been handed out.
Essence chef Paul Froggatt sat stony-faced as the single-star restaurants were read out. From all appearances, Essence had missed out on a star.
“But wait, it may not be over yet,” said the Michelin international director and event co-host Gwendal Poullennec as cameras travelled through the audience for a heart-stopping 30 seconds to find Froggatt sitting among many peers who had now earned a star (or not). First, there’s a wee smile. Then a grin. Then his face lights up.
“Essence, chef Paul Froggatt, two stars.”
New Zealand has a two-star Michelin chef – and it’s him. He stands, punching the air with his right fist as the crowd around him gets to its feet.
Essence has a simple dining room within the $70 million Roki hotel in downtown Queenstown owned by Australian Denis Mackenzie, who reportedly plans further lodges around New Zealand. It has just 15 suites, from $2800 a night to north of $30,000 for a top-storey suite with seven bedrooms. The hotel has a spectacular view of Lake Wakatipu, but Essence is more enclosed, with food as its star. The room seats more than 30 and is now sold out most nights, Froggatt tells me.
Each course is served with flourish by a small army of synchronised waiters placing our dishes then whipping away covers to reveal the wonders below. The wine list is massive, and the hotel has a cellar of about 20,000 bottles. New Zealand wine is listed by the label, year by year.
We start in the bar with cocktails. We could easily have stayed there slowly bankrupting ourselves with unique and delicious mixtures, but once our reservation time arrives, our party of three are the first to sit in Essence itself that evening. We are not alone for long.
Blue cod and venison.
The Journey tasting menu is $450 without wine matching. We opt for a bottle of cabernet franc on the sommelier’s recommendation.
The clientele seems a mix of locals celebrating special occasions, tourists, and a couple of phone-toting, distracted children of presumably the mega-rich.
The Journey is 11 courses, but that’s a misnomer because each plate has multiple elements. I’d suggest the meal has more than 100 different food preparations, from laminated bread with French butter through to multiple treatments for beetroot or kiwifruit. None of this is easy, and every aspect is carefully curated and technically excellent.
My guess would be there is little profit to be made for Roki on this meal.
Each dish has specific tableware, from porcelain oyster shells to the raku-fired dragon eggs and a pop-up book.
We start with a selection of small bites – a raclette-stuffed mini doughnut, a salmon tart with salmon roe, and a “cherry” that appears sweet on the outside but, on the first bite, reveals itself to be a buttery chicken liver parfait. “Wait a minute, that ain’t no cherry,” one of my dining companions pointed out. Those tricky tricksters.
“That ain’t no cherry.”
A granola cracker is offered on the side. The waiter explains that Chef loves breakfast and says it can be eaten any time.
French onion soup is a cup of warm broth topped with a cracker and a ring of beautifully cooked onions.
An oyster is lightly poached in cultured cream and paired with compressed kiwifruit, with the texture of a cucumber. Then a dollop of caviar, of course.
“Autumn walk” is translucent leaves of celeriac, pumpkin and Jerusalem artichoke that taste like crisps, with foraged mushrooms treated in several ways.
Froggatt says the dish is inspired by walking through the forest with his son. It is served on an upturned bowl threaded with dried grasses.
Minimalist descriptions on the menu make it difficult to recall every detail of 11 dishes.
For most foods, words don’t do it justice. The photo starts to.
“Broken rice” is served in a pottery dragon egg and is inspired by sour congee and features a delicate egg-yolk sauce, rice and more caviar.
Blue cod comes with a Jerusalem artichoke foam and a beurre blanc poured at the table, topped with truffle. It is astonishing. The luxuriousness of the butter sauce matches the salty tenderness of the fish. It might be the perfect dish.
Crayfish and broken rice.
Crayfish is matched with a surprising but good vanilla foam and a sweet-potato ravioli topped with Asian-style chopped fried onion.
A bread course includes a laminated bread roll my friend is talking about days later (he is a baker, though).
The venison saddle is wrapped in a chicken liver parfait and spinach leaves, then in a thin layer of sourdough bread. A venison Wellington. It is matched with a jus, and beetroot treated in a few different ways. It is served with its own bespoke knife.
Dessert has three courses, and each has multiple elements.
One course is a long rectangular shell filled with a chamomile ice cream and caramel centre on a dual crust – fennel pastry with shortbread base (I think!). This is topped with chamomile flowers and candied fennel seeds and served on a large ice cube to keep it chilled. It melts remarkably quickly as you eat, encouraging you to chomp it down like a dessert-starved toddler.
Crackers and mochi in the Greenstone Valley pop-up.
The next course is served on a pop-up book of the area in the Greenstone Valley, where a large pounamu was found sitting near the hotel entrance. In that spot, Froggatt likes to take his family and friends with simple snacks like cheese and crackers.
His restaurant version is elevated into a butter-caramel cracker with a sweet cheese-and-chocolate topping. There’s also a soft mochi filled with lemon curd and a chocolate quenelle.
It is amazing that Essence opened only last September. Even more so that it won two Michelin stars in June. It feels like it has been around and improving constantly for a decade.
The Roki Collection offers a luxury lodge experience on the Queenstown waterfront. It is aimed squarely at the international luxury market. The publicist is in New York. The only comped reviews seem to be in Australian luxury magazines.
But the diners seem to be at least half locals.
Froggatt is a repeat winner of Luxury Lodges of New Zealand Chef of the Year for his 10-plus years at Huka Lodge and then again at Kauri Cliffs.
He is present in the dining room, overseeing the serving of individual dishes and chatting with guests before darting back into the kitchen.
During dessert, one of my dining companions said the ice cream tasted like a Jaffa. Froggatt overheard and explained it was meant to taste like a Jaffa, or even a Terry’s Chocolate Orange.
The essence of Essence is that exceptional technique boosts everything it touches, rather than overwhelming it with flashy touches.
As we leave, Froggatt is waiting at the exit, a gift of Essence granola and the menu for each of us. I give him a hug.
Lucie Hrdina with Edna.
Dogma! It is gin for dogs
Gin distillery Vicar’s Son has released a one-off range called Dogma to raise money for the dental treatment of 12-year-old rescue dog Edna.
This is my brother Stewart Martel and his partner Lucie Hrdina’s distillery just south of Whangārei in Mangapai. It is one of the few grain-to-glass distilleries in New Zealand – most gin distilleries buy the base alcohol; Stewart makes it from South Canterbury grain.
The gin is great, having won numerous awards including trophies in Australia and New Zealand. It is now the in-room house gin at Kauri Cliffs. They make it in batches of only nine bottles.
Edna was in the pound in Auckland. Stewart says she is sweet-natured and had been loved at some stage, but was now covered in mange and not in a good way. Paws Restart rescued her, then Stewart drove her to a new home with Francine, who runs K9Luva Dog Training and High Needs Home Stays.
Francine takes on hospice dogs and gives them a good end of life. “That’s incredibly brave of her, and she has taken on six or seven so far,” he says.
Francine found that Edna needed expensive dental work and thought she would have to save up to pay for it. So Stewart and Lucie decided to sell a special range of gin to help. Dogma was born.
“Now Edna’s at her new home; she has a new lease on life. She’s running around like a puppy.
“It is really about raising money for Edna’s dental treatment. Buy a bottle of gin, and she can get her teeth done.”
The gin is $69, and all of that goes to Edna. Stewart and Lucie are covering the cost of the excise tax, manufacturing, etc.
They describe Dogma as, “packed full of rich, natural orange essential oils. Dogma exhibits a glorious, silky louche (a gentle, milky cloudiness), a visual hallmark of an un-chilled, highly concentrated botanical spirit.”
It is great on a negroni, or just poured over ice.
Buy at https://vicarsson.co.nz, or they are open on Sundays from noon- 5 pm at 108 Monk Rd, Mangapai, Northland.
And at the other end of the dining spectrum …
If your crypto investments have tanked and your South Korean memory stocks are as sad as mine, it is probably time to look at gold again.
KFC is launching a boutique pop-up at 177 Ponsonby Rd, Auckland, on September 3 and 4 to promote its new liquid gold dip. This sold out in Australia.
To get free fried chicken, you just need to take anything gold-ish to the Colonel’s Liquid Gold Exchange. According to KFC marketing director Leanne Too, “dipping is having a real moment”.
As they say in the world of gold, crypto and meme stocks, buy the dip.
The author dined at Essence at his own expense. It was worth it.