From Viva’s dining out editor Jesse Mulligan to top chef Ben Bayly and Lazy Susan’s Anna King Shahab, food experts share the breakfast dishes that had an impact this year.
We all love knowing what and where our food heroes like to eat. Ahead of Pink Ribbon Breakfast month kicking off in May, some of our country’s top foodies have shared their insights on the most standout breakfast they’ve eaten this year to inspire Kiwis to host a Pink Ribbon Breakfast for women with breast cancer.
Ben Bayly
Ahi, Origine, Aosta, Little Aosta, Blue Door Bar and The Bathhouse
My eldest daughter Ella (14) and I have a Saturday morning ritual.
We do boxing training and then head to Vevo Eatery in Titirangi, just the two of us.
At Vevo, they have the most amazing breakfast dishes. Sometimes, if you are lucky, they will make freshly cooked handmade crumpets. This is our favourite! Fresh crumpets are nothing like what you buy in the supermarkets and are super-easy to make. A light batter, almost like a pancake batter is fermented with yeast until airy and foamy. A metal ring is placed in a non-stick pan with some clarified butter and heated. The batter is carefully spooned into the ring and the crumpet is slowly cooked and then finished in the oven. Our favourite topping is simply crushed ripe avocado, sea salt, black pepper, olive oil and aged balsamic . . . yummmm.
Angela Casley
Viva recipe editor
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Regular weekends away at Mangawhai will inevitably include breakfast at Bennetts. I love the European feel of the building, and sitting in the back courtyard next to the fountain. My menu pick is the creamy mushrooms, which are always full of flavour without being too rich. Served on delicious sourdough toast, it comes in a hearty portion that will set you up for the day. I also can’t resist nipping into the store for a take-home treat of their sea salt caramel chocolate. All my flavour favourites under one roof.
Kelsi Booco*ck
Food writer, cookbook author
We recently visited Morocco and went to the coast of Agadir to surf and stayed at The Lunar Surf Hostel. At the hostel, every morning they made these traditional famous crumpets known as baghrir, as well as their sweet nut butter called amalou. This combo was one of the best breakfasts I’ve ever had. I swear I went back for thirds. They also served these with fresh stone fruit and honey, which topped them off perfectly. We loved them so much we even did a cooking class learning how to make them from scratch. Turns out they’re pretty easy, so have become a bit of a staple since returning.
Giapo Grazioli
Co-founder Giapo Ice Cream
In the mornings, I find eggs particularly satisfying; they keep me energised until late afternoon. Recently, I had the opportunity to enjoy breakfast at two distinct venues: Kingsland Social and Esther, each offering a unique experience.
At Kingsland Social, the atmosphere was relaxed and welcoming, ideal for a business morning meal. Their English Breakfast stood out, complete with eggs (I opted for three eggs), bacon, sausage and beans, all served with a distinctive Kiwi twist. This hearty dish was both filling and delicious, complemented by a perfect cappuccino.
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Esther presented a more polished setting, reflecting the modern elegance of Viaduct Harbour. The breakfast of choice was shakshuka, paired with wood-fired bread. This dish, reminiscent of the Italian “Uova in Purgatorio” my mother used to make, featured eggs poached in a rich tomato sauce with spices. It evoked cherished childhood memories and provided an uplifting start to my day. At Esther, I chose kombucha for my drink. Both places are highly recommended.
Both breakfasts were not only about the food but also about the ambience and the memories they conjured, setting a pleasant tone for the rest of the day.
Alby Hailes
Cookbook author and The Great Kiwi Bake Off 2021 winner
As much as I love to go out for breakfast, I find morning deliciousness in the warming comfort of your own home always triumphs. My go-to crowd-pleasing breakfast when cooking for friends and whānau (or even myself!) is my Cilbir eggs with saffron yoghurt and curry leaves. It’s from the Energise chapter of my cookbook Good Vibes. Known as the breakfast of sultans in Turkey, the combination of creamy yoghurt, spiced butter and runny yolks is simple yet oh-so-satisfying. The saffron gives the yoghurt a beautiful yellow pigment and flavour, and the curry leaves add welcome texture to the chilli-flecked butter (that includes a final dash of maple syrup which rounds out the savoury flavours perfectly). Breakfast never looked or tasted so good.
Leslie Hottiaux
Co-owner and chef, Apero
In January we went to Marrakesh in Morocco, and I must say the breakfast served where we stayed was amazing! Freshly squeezed orange juice (the oranges over there taste just amazing, you can’t compare with the oranges we get here in New Zealand). A really tasty sheep’s milk yoghurt served with a refreshing fruit salad, seasoned with Moroccan flavour (cinnamon, orange blossom). Fresh homemade crepes with orange blossom reminded me of my grandma’s crepes. The marmalade (orange again) was excellent. They also served a delicious marble cake. It was all so simple, but so tasty and that’s what I love. I also prefer sweet to savoury for breakfast, so it was perfect. Getting served was also a big win.
It was a great memory because I was on holiday in a different country with my family. The act of sitting down to eat breakfast as a family was not only a great way to start the day, but also exciting because it was when we made our plans for what we were going to do that day. I know breakfast is important, but when we are at home, mornings are pretty rushed for us, so we don’t have time to do it properly.
Lauraine Jacobs
Food writer
I was fortunate to travel to Morocco in early February with expert food guide and importer Catherine Bell, founder of Garden to Table. The food, with its subtle spicing, abundant locally grown fresh vegetables and fruit, and slow-cooked savoury dishes collided in some spectacularly tasty meals.
But it was at breakfast that my attention was truly taken as the riads we stayed in within the city walls in Marrakech and Essaouira offered beautifully set tables with simply the best orange juice ever, a selection of local fresh from the oven breads, eggs, jams, fresh fruit and yoghurt and hot coffee or tea each morning. Heaven!
And then there was a night in a tented hotel in the Agafay Desert. In the centre of our breakfast table was a plate of hot spicy eggs, barely stirred and cooked over the flames in an earthenware Moroccan pottery dish. A taste to remember and, of course, recreate back home on a relaxed weekend.
Jesse Mulligan
Viva dining out editor
My wife and I are so busy getting four children fed and off to school we often skip breakfast ourselves. But recently a friend, Gaurav, told me about a South Indian breakfast buffet in Brown’s Bay, half an hour north of Auckland city. I picked the right Sunday morning and headed out there with my mouth watering. The food was even better than I anticipated, with a range of incredible vegetarian delicacies — some of which I had heard of and some I hadn’t.
I loved the idli (steamed rice cakes) drizzled in ghee and sprinkled with curry leaf powder then dipped in sambar (a sort of South Indian dahl equivalent) but my favourite of all was the bisi bele bath, a one-pot lentil and rice dish which had a bit of crunch to each bite. Best of all, it was just $20 and I could go back as many times as I wanted! I can’t get enough of Indian food although that day, eventually, I had enough.
Sid Sahrawat
The French Café, Cassia, Kol and Anise
The best breakfast I’ve eaten this year is a grilled cheese butty at Fort Greene on K Road. It’s a mix of four cheeses grilled with chilli fries and pink pickle on Fort Greene’s country sourdough. I usually work out in the morning so I feel like I can carb load on this cheesy gooey grilled sandwich after with a hot long black. It reminds me of a chip butty crossed with a grilled cheese on toast. Nothing like indulging once in a while, even if it means you have to work out extra hard the rest of the week.
Vaughan Mabee
Amisfield chef
The best breakfast I had this year was on my brother’s farm in the Far North. A kilo of whitebait, mixed with one egg on super-tooth-marked, buttered white bread with a drizzle of hot sauce on top, staring over the bay. Fatty, salty lemon and spicy delicious with a smile of whitebait, it’s the best breakfast in the world! Even better with a glass of champagne. Simple but nothing quite like it, nostalgic for my family.
Charlotte Muru-Lanning
Food editor, Metro
You’ll likely spot RRK’s Madras Cafe, a compact day and night-time eatery in the heart of the Sandringham shops, thanks to its vibrant orange facade. Inside, the table tops are a matching shade of orange — and there’s something about that specific hue that’s a relentlessly cheering way to start the day. Recently, I shared a late breakfast (around 10.30am) with my boyfriend here, and the experience has lingered on my mind ever since.
On the varied menu, which largely specialises in Southern Indian dishes, we opted for the ghee roast dosa; a thin, crispy and slightly sour (thanks to the fermented rice and gram flour batter) disc served alongside sambar and chutneys to be mopped up by hunks of the dosa.
We also ordered what I presume is RRK’s most frequently ordered items: the ghee podi idli, which arrived as a pair of fluffy steamed idli which had been tossed in ghee and dusted in podi (a dry spice mix of lentils and spices). Like the dosa, these were accompanied by the requisite trio of delicious sambar and chutneys — but in my opinion, they’re so delicious they could stand alone. In between the mouthfuls of dosa and idli we sipped on their extraordinarily well-priced ($2.99) cups of filter coffee. I can’t think of a better way to start the day.
Anna King Shahab
Lazy Susan, food writer
Ponsonby Rd darling Daphnes just launched a breakfast and brunch menu and I particularly love the taramasalata, egg, anchovy and capers on toast. If you like a savoury breakfast that’s not focused on meat, I reckon the punchy umami that certain seafood brings to the occasion hits the right notes. The taramasalata is made in-house (chef Alfie Ingham says they’ve just found a new supplier from Nelson so it will soon be made from hapuka roe smoked in Nelson) and it is glorious, cut through with a lick of lemon juice to add a touch of tanginess. An egg, halved, with a perfect custardy yolk rests on top, draped with good anchovies. Lest it all get too saline, reliable old toast steps in to balance out the richness.
Annabelle White
Food writer
Okay, it’s a breakfast sandwich but when you are as serious a breakfast sandwich enthusiast as yours truly, this is in the top league and needs to be shared.
Rollers Bakery in Auckland’s Northcote makes its own sesame pide rolls and fills them with perfectly cooked egg and bacon and a kiss of its own homemade tomato relish. The soft rolls are smeared with Rollers’ own homemade mayonnaise instead of butter, and the secret to the mayonnaise is that staff add pickle juice to give it extra piquancy.
When you come in and spend your $11 on the sandwich, it’s in the cold chiller, so they put it in the microwave for 30 seconds and then in the toasty press for one minute and 15 seconds — unbelievably delicious and easy to replicate at home if you follow these guidelines. Enjoy!
Host a Pink Ribbon Breakfast
The Pink Ribbon Breakfast is Breast Cancer Foundation NZ’s biggest fundraising campaign of the year, where big-hearted Kiwis get together to host special fundraising events throughout May for the charity’s vital work.
The money raised from every Pink Ribbon Breakfast goes towards supporting patients, ground-breaking research, and education campaigns to promote the importance of early detection.
“Pink Ribbon Breakfast is the ultimate show of support for the 3500 Kiwi women diagnosed with breast cancer every year,” says Ah-Leen Rayner, chief executive of Breast Cancer Foundation NZ.
“Breast cancer is the most common cancer for Kiwi women, and each year we lose around 650 of our wāhine to this disease. By hosting a Pink Ribbon Breakfast, you’ll be making a huge contribution towards our ambitious goal of zero deaths from breast cancer.”
Sign up to host at Pinkribbonbreakfast.co.nz
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