Friday, July 12, 2013

Zespri Kiwi Dinner

All Singaporeans like to eat. I’m a true blue Singaporean and I love to eat too!

This is the first time Kless and I attended the Zespri dinner event, we missed it last year with much regrets. The event was held at a very nice restaurant, Fern & Kiwi located at Clarke Quay. It’s a New Zealander restaurant that offers the best of New Zealand food, wines, beers, music and live entertainment. Definitely a place I would like to revisit in the near future. And it seems so apt to hold a kiwifruit event in a New Zealander restaurant too. Perfect!

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We were one of the earlier guests to arrive and had a chance to talk to the person-in-charge from Zespri and got some pretty cool information about kiwifruit that we have never known.

- kiwifruit is a seasonal fruit, we get it mainly from New Zealand between May to Nov
- all the growers / farmers in NZ grows and sells their kiwifruit to only Zespri (it’s by law)
- there are about 3000 growers currently in NZ, producing about 100 million trays of Zespri kiwifruit for export (each tray is about 30-40 kiwifruit)
- there are currently only 2 types of kiwifruit available in the market (green and gold), but there are 60 types of kiwifruit in research in NZ now
- this year’s green kiwifruit is considered the ‘vintage’ harvest because in the beginning of 2013 (Jan to Mar), there was a drought in NZ and thus the fruit will tend to be sweeter and with more flavour

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Here are the amazing kiwi dishes.

Appetizer
Seafood Salad
Marinated Prawns, Scallop, Snapper tossed with Zespri Kiwifruit

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Mains
Pan seared Pacific Snapper Loin served on a bed of Lyonnais Potato and Kiwi Coulis OR
‘Canterbury Plans’ Charred-Grilled Lamb Cutlets served with Mashed Potatoes and Kiwi Relish

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Dessert
Duo of Kiwi Panna Cotta accompanied with Fresh Kiwi Compote

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What is a Zespri feast without the Kiwifruits?

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Yummy!!

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