For what must be at least a decade now, MrsinFrame has been coming up with a special 12-day menu to celebrate the “Twelve Days of Christmas”.
She alternates each year between the traditional and the New Zealand version, otherwise known as “A Pukeko in a Ponga Tree”.
This year was the Kiwi Christmas Deliciousness Edition.
Most of the dishes have a direct correlation to the songs (Five Big Fat Pigs = Pork/Ham/Bacon), others use a fair chunk of artistic license – I’ll do my best to explain as we go.
This year’s menu plan actually went missing just a few days before we were to begin and resurfaced (albeit too late) on Christmas day (It’s a Christmas miracle!), so while we managed to remember most of the initial dishes, there were a few we made up on the run. As a result there may be a few dishes we re-do and post later on – We’ll let you know!
So sit back and enjoy as I reveal what my true love made for me over the Twelve Days of Kiwi Christmas Deliciousness for 2016:
A Pukeko in a Ponga Tree
Blue Cheese and Spinach Parcels:
The blue of the cheese represents the Pukeko, while spinach represents the foliage and the flaky pastry looks like flakes off like Ponga Tree bark.
Two Kumara
Sweet Potato and Marshmallow Bake:
While this dish is more common on American Christmas and Thanksgiving tables, we like to mix up our meals a bit and Kumara is a sweet potato, so it was a good fit.
Three Flax Ketes (“Kits”)
Baked Bread Basket:
Woven flax Kete are used as baskets and bags, so this delicious bread basket filled with feta, spinach, olives tomatoes and prosciutto matched up nicely.
Four Huhu Grubs
Caramel-filled Éclairs on Chocolate Cake Dirt:
Huhu grubs are a creepy crawly delicacy at most “Wild Food” festivals, mainly for their gooey-squishiness when you bite into them, so filling small éclairs with gooey caramel seemed a wonderful take on the idea.
Five Big Fat Pigs!
Sloppy Porchettas:
Five big Fat Pigs make a lot of pork mince, While all the vegetables that go into the accompanying giardiniera would keep your average Captain Cooker or Kuni-kuni quite happy.
Six Pois a Twirling
Spaghetti and Meatballs:
We had some (ok, a lot of) pork mince left over, so meatballs seemed a logical step to represent the ball part of the poi, while the spaghetti represents the string.
Seven Eels a-Swimming
Garlic Butter Mussels:
While Green-lipped Mussels aren’t great swimmers, more just hangers-on they, like the Longfin Eel, are native to New Zealand.
Eight Plants of Puha
Faux Pho-ha:
Puha is a green, leafy green, wild vegetable that usually grows near water, so we made a Pho soup with mint, coriander (leafy green herbs) and meatballs.
Nine Sacks of Pipis
Pipi Truck-style Pizza:
The Pipi Pizza Truck is a bit of an institution her in Hawke’s bay, so tonight’s pizza paid homage to the Pippi truck and the bivalve mollusc.
Ten Juicy Fish Heads
Thai Fish Curry:
I can’t stand having my food staring blankly back at me, and MrsinFrame wouldn’t let us have fish and chips, so a lovely Thai fish curry was a great compromise.
Eleven Haka Lessons
Black Pudding Sausage with Eggs and Fresh Pea Mash:
The Haka is, of course, synonymous with New Zealand’s national rugby team, so it was fitting that we had (All) Black pudding sausage, with the innards of rugby ball-shaped eggs and the Pea Mash representing the green rugby field.
Twelve Piupiu Swinging
Skirt Steak with Broccoli and Mashed Potato:
Piupiu are a Maori grass skirt, so skirt steak seemed a suitable way to close out this Twelve Days of Kiwi Christmas Deliciousness.
We hope you’ve been inspired to try some of these, or your own version next Christmas.
From the Napier in Frame family to yours, we wish you a Merry Kiwi Christmas and a safe and happy New Year!
