St Peter makes his mark on food and philanthropy

Peter Gordon. Photo / Supplied

New Zealand powerhouse Peter Gordon agrees to meet me at the end of a long, sunny Friday in his trendy Tapa Room eatery on Marylebone High St. The window of opportunity is small he says, via email. He won't be in London long before he's off travelling again. France? New York? Wales, actually.

Gordon and his partner Michael McGrath joined friends on a trek up Snowdon, Wales' highest mountain that weekend. "It's more a hill," Gordon says in his traditional down-played Kiwi way. "No really, it is," he offers when I suggest he's being modest, having no idea what Snowdon or its surrounding area, aptly named Snowdonia, is like. "Children and animals climb it," he says for emphasis. "There's even a railway that chugs up it."

Gordon has taken to spending the weekends out of London when he can. Hiking the hills of Wales is one such adventure. But for the busy restaurateur and chef, who has travelled back to his homeland three times this year already, juggling projects is all part of his routine.

Next month he will be back in Auckland in time to launch his new "food history" book, A Culinary Journey, before jetting across the ditch to star at the Sydney Food Festival where he will be doing talks and cooking demonstrations, including one at Surry Hills' famed Longrain restaurant.

The eatery's executive chef, Martin Boetze, is a friend of Gordon's and happily agreed to participate in his Dining for a Difference charity fundraiser in April.

Gordon has been a long-time supporter of New Zealand's Leukaemia and Blood Foundation and London's Hammersmith Hospital ever since he donated his bone marrow to his youngest sister Tracey in 1995. She has become a food writer and Gordon jokes "she attributes this to my marrow".

His famous gastronomic gala dinner in Auckland is replicated in London each year for the haematology unit for the Catherine Lewis Centre at Hammersmith Hospital. Called 'Who's Cooking Dinner?' it has so far raised more than ?A3;3 million.

Next March Gordon will be behind a lavish gala dinner at the newly refurbished Langham Hotel in London's Marylebone for the cause. In July, he cooked a gourmet BBQ for the Leuka Mini Masters golfing fundraiser at Dukes Meadows in Chiswick with actor Dougray Scott and supermodel Jodie Kidd.

Last night it was his pinot noir making a splash as it was uncorked at the Toronto Film Festival. Gordon is a shareholder in the lauded Waitaki Braids vineyard in North Otago's Waitaki Valley (next to Kate White's apiary, whose beeswax is used in Dr Hauschka skincare). He provided bottles of wine to good friend Niki Caro (her hubby Andrew Lister was the architect at Gordon's Bellota bar in Auckland) at the world premiere of her latest film The Vintner's Luck.

Gordon is no stranger to celebrities. Supermodel Claudia Schiffer has been Spy-ed sharing a table at his casual eatery, the Tapa Room. Apparently the restaurant was packed to capacity and Schiffer and co decided they'd rather sit at a table with complete strangers than miss out. That's hardly supermodel behaviour. Ray Fiennes cycles in on his bike regularly; Sam Neill and Helena Bonham Carter dined over a bottle of Neill's Two Paddocks wine when Carter got the call from hubby Tim Burton that she'd been signed for Sweeney Todd; Kiri te Kanawa hired Providores for a party; and George Michael once popped in and ordered a bowl of hokey pokey ice-cream and a side of chorizo sausage.