Fusion Cuisine: The New Zealand Experience

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Fusion Cuisine The New Zealand Experience

• C. Michael Hall
• Contact Department of Management, College of
  Business Economics, University of Canterbury,
  Christchurch, New Zealand Michael.Hall_at_canterbury.
  ac.nz
• Department of Geography, University of Oulu,
  Finland
• Formerly University of Otago, cmhall_at_business.otag
  o.ac.nz

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Understanding Fusion Cuisine

• Arguably unless a cultural group has existed in
  complete isolation all cuisine and foodways are a
  form of fusion cuisine
• Issues of scale of analysis - particularly in
  time - so as to understand cuisine change and
  defining cuisines
• The importance of commodification and
  institutional practices in defining cuisine

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Sources of fusion

• Movement of people affecting production and
  consumption
• Plants and animals
• Foodstuffs
• Technology transport, food, refrigeration,
  cooking
• Taste/fashion

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Fusion Cuisine

• there is a need to differentiate between
• organically developed fusion cuisine, i.e.
  foodways that have developed without a conscious
  desire to commodify foodways, that are often
  described as creole
• commodified fusion cuisine, i.e. cuisine that has
  been consciously developed from different
  foodways in order to commodify the product for
  consumption.

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Fusion Cuisine

• The two types should be seen as occurring on a
  continuum as there will be mutual interaction
  over time, as commodified fusion cuisine enters
  the foodways of popular culture and vice-versa
• role of media and communication in this process
• ongoing role of human mobility
• ongoing role of fashion and taste

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Fusion creole

• Some creolised cuisines that are sometimes
  described as fusion are in a sense pre-modern
  in that they developed prior to a conscious
  reflexivity on food and identity and the
  institutionalisation of foodways although these -
  as in the case of Macau, Singapore and New
  Orleans are increasingly becoming commodified and
  institutionalised

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Why New Zealand?

• Seen as one of the key sources of fusion cuisine
  - particularly Peter Gordon
• Migrant society, range of geographical
  environments important contributing factors
• Chef producer mobility / consumer mobility
• Export economy - tourism, agriculture and primary
  produce - innovation as part of export economy

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Layers of Fusion

• Availability of different ingredients -
  environmental fusions
• Availability of a range of different types of
  cuisine to consume - increased choice for
  consumption
• Commodified fusion cuisine also related to the
  availability of ingredients, fusion cuisine
  created from the larders of the world
  (www.newzealand.com - describing Peter Gordon one
  of the guides of The gourmets garden virtual
  tour of 100 Pure New Zealand)

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Destination-NZ.coma true taste of New Zealand

• FRESH FUSION - NEW ZEALAND FOOD
• The inhabitants of these islands are relaxed and
  open-minded in their approach to new foods and
  different styles of cooking. New Zealanders are
  as likely to own a wok as they are a barbeque.
  Yet the nation is gradually developing a style
  all its own. Fusion cuisine - blending flavours
  from nations around the Pacific - is a fresh and
  vibrant style that has found its way to the style
  capitals of the world thanks to trend-setting New
  Zealand chefs such as Peter Gordon and their
  award-winning restaurants, but New Zealand
  remains a natural home.
• Fusion cuisine works particularly well in New
  Zealand due to the abundance of high quality
  fresh produce available.

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Viewlondon.co.uk

• Fusion cooking has emanated from the desire to
  make food more diverse and interesting and to
  ignite excitement in new ingredients and fresh
  combinations of ingredients
• The kitchens of Australia and New Zealand are
  responsible for fusion cuisine. A combination of
  classically trained chefs, fresh local produce
  and close links with South East Asia led to the
  development of a new approach to cooking (Carlina
  Macdonald 2006)

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Fusion Cuisine dishes

• Examples used by Greg Heffernan, Advisory Chef NZ
  Beef Lamb Marketing Bureau, in 1998
  presentation at World Association of Cooks
  Societies.
• These dishes are indicative of the variety of
  flavours and sources of inspiration drawn on by a
  Pacific Rim chef. They are a good example of the
  fusion of defined cultures blended by a typical,
  classically trained Pacific Rim chef

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Four examples

• Lamb steaks with Chermoula, Chickpeas and
  Aromatics (Mediterranean influence)
• Shortloin of Lamb with Tortilla Cake and
  Fire-Roasted Tomatoes (Mexican influence)
• Pan-fried Sirloin Steak with Cous Cous and Lavash
  (North African/Middle East)
• Spicy Marinated Beef with Green Beans and Red
  Miso Salad (Japan/NE Asia)

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The evolution of new zealand cuisineNew
Zealand Beef Lamb www.nzbeeflamb.co.nz

• The last decade has seen the gradual emergence of
  fusion cuisine a fusion or blending of culinary
  cultures Fusion cuisine is a result of the
  accessibility of the Global Village. Increasing
  numbers of people are travelling, experimenting
  and experiencing. Many have settled permanently
  in new countries, introducing the cultures and
  traditions of their homelands.
• Pacific Rim cuisine reflects our proximity to
  the kitchens of South East Asia, the Pacific and
  Japan. It is a fusion of ethnic Pacific and Asian
  cultures with our own traditional Anglo-Saxon
  heritage. Chilli, wasabi, coriander, noodles and
  sushi are an intrinsic part of contemporary Kiwi
  culinary language and represent the advent of
  Global cuisine down under.
• The integration of gastronomic osmosis will
  continue to drive the evolution of cuisine, as
  will the determination of those at the coal face
  whose dedication to the search for edible
  perfection, shapes our culinary future

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Yet how big is it really?

• www.thekiwiholiday.com/view-restaurants has
  listings (and ratings) of 504 restaurants
• Eclectic 2
• Fusion 3
• Pacific Rim 12
• Contemporary 24
• International 65
• Compare American 3 Chinese 25 French 7 Indian
  / Pakistani 32 Italian 27 Mexican 7 Thai 32
  Turkish 8 Vietnamese 5.

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Historical dimensions

• A content analysis of New Zealand Womens weekly
  indicates that the diversity of ingredients in
  the early 2000s is little different from that of
  the 1930s
• Some changes in cooking styles and produce,
  particularly noodles
• Range of meats and meat cuts is now less diverse

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Is fusion cuisine a cuisine?

• Is it describing as some would suggest just
  experimentation and innovation? - cross-cultural
  invention access to new ingredients
• Certainly not alone in seeking fresh ingredients!
• Can fusion cuisine be readily codified as other
  cuisines have been? - and have such codifications
  accepted? - The simple fact is that the catch
  phrase of fusion cuisine has taken hold only in
  places that have not developed their own great
  cuisine. The term is as commonly heard today in
  Australia, New Zealand and Canada as it is in the
  United States (Daniel Rogov - the dubious past
  of fusion cuisine)

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A Cooks Tour

• Undoubtedly there is a lot of food
  experimentation, innovation and diffusion going
  on
• As much to do with finding a competitive niche in
  the market as it is with an intrinsic love of the
  new - the role of media and place marketers is
  intrinsic to the promotion of fusion cuisine
• Perhaps if its repeated often enough then we come
  to believe it? The role of the tastemakers in
  cuisine therefore becomes very important. But
  perhaps there is confusion between a wider range
  of different cuisine styles and actual fusion
  between those styles in terms of what is being
  served on the restaurant plate?

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Much Ado About Nothing?

• Intellectual representations of restaurant,
  hospitality and export commodifications vs
  realities
• Yet there is a wider selection of eating styles
  and cuisines yet the extent to which they have
  become confused or fused is open to debate
• As much an intellectual and competitive construct
  as it is to do with the realities of cuisine and
  foodways in New Zealand (and elsewhere?) that
  reflect a modern outlook on issues of identity,
  fashion and taste

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More gastronomically

• Fusion cuisine is a fluid concept. It is cuisine
  continually in the process of becoming for which
  sanctioned codification and institutionalisation
  has not occurred
• Fusion cuisine has always existed at metropolitan
  places and locations where foodways meet. The
  difference is that it has now been recognised as
  a source of differentiation in consumption
  (taste) and production (competitiveness)

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• In a mobile world all food is local now (at least
  for those that can afford it or want it!) - yet
  not all foodways are becoming a global fusion
  cuisine because of
• resistance local food focus,
• institutionalisation and
• the nature of globalisation itself -
  globalisation is a complex, chaotic,
  multiscalar, multitemporal and multicentric
  series of processes operating in particular
  structural and spatial contexts

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GLOBALISATION
global foods brands food fusions by
combining styles ingredients promoting
otherness difference globally
RATE OF CHANGE IN CUISINE AND FOODWAYS
differentiation on the basis of local produce
cuisine buy local campaigns / resisting
global products brands reduce food miles
LOCALISATION