Kate Fay from Cibo makes Canvas a whitebait omelette.
Each week Greg Bruce challenges a chef to make him lunch in less than 10 minutes.
Throughout the interview I tried to conduct with Cibo head chef Kate Fay, which Cibo owner and maitre d' Jeremy Turner wouldn't leave -and largely dominated, he referred to her as "Fayzie", which, in its bantery informality, offered a bit of a clue as to the nature of their relationship.
Fay had had no interest in taking part in this feature; Turner had more or less bullied her into it. Although Cibo has long been one of the city's most well-known and admired restaurants, Fay has never been much interested in the media attention that follows so many of Auckland's leading chefs.
It was probably appropriate that they did the interview together. Their lives have been professionally intertwined since they started working together at Cibo in 1999. During the interview they did a lot of possibly good-natured bickering.
"We can have our spats, man," Fay said, "we sometimes have our spats."
"We do have our spats," Turner said, "most definitely."
I asked them how they dealt with those spats. To appreciate Turner's answer, it's important to note that I had forgotten to bring a photographer to the restaurant, which was a fairly major mistake, given that it precluded Fay's making of my lunch, which was the primary purpose of the visit.
"Admitting your faults is always good, Turner said. "We're not perfect. Like, look at you, you f***ed up."
When Turner asked if I wanted a glass of water, Fay said: "Don't give him a f***ing glass of water when he f***ed up."
This was probably all good-natured, but it isn't possible to know for sure. This sort of banter, which so defines the relationship between Fay and Turner, can conceal all sorts of emotions, and the concealment of emotions might be quite important when tensions are high and you have 100 booked for dinner.
Not long after, though, Turner said something unexpectedly sweet: "I don't think I've ever met a chef more humble than Kate."
"Really?" I asked.
"No, no, no," he said, spitting the words out quickly, "She's very humble." He then changed the subject, as if trying to forget what he'd just said.
He had already made me one coffee and now he stood to offer me another. I said, "No thanks." Fay said: "Yeah, because the other one was so memorable."
The conversation turned to cooking. Fay said: "Jeremy's cooked for me once and ..."
"We haven't done it again," Turner said.
"What did you cook?" I asked.
"Chicken and rice," he said. "Raw chicken and very badly cooked rice."
The discussion of this meal went on for a while. It's probably fair to say that this one exchange yielded more information about Turner's cooking than the rest of the interview did about Fay's.
When I came back the next day with the photographer, Fay made us Cibo's signature whitebait omelette with its sweetly oozing sauce. They sell hundreds of these things a month and have done for years. They say they could never take it off the menu. It was good, honest food, completely lacking in pretension. It wasn't trying too hard. It didn't need to prove itself to anyone.
Kate Fay's scores (out of five):
Honesty of dish: 5 Originality of dish: 1 Willingness to be bullied into this: 5 Quality of whitebait: 5 Quality of banter: 4
Recipe: Whitebait omelette with ginger soy lime butter
Crispy whitebait with a whitebait omelette by Kate Fay, head chef at Cibo. Photo / Getty Images
Ginger soy lime butter
1/2 white onion, peeled and finely sliced 1 piece of ginger peeled and finely sliced 2 Tbsp coconut vinegar 50ml white wine vinegar 50ml chicken stock 1/2 red chilli finely sliced 2 Tbsp soy sauce 2 Tbsp kecap manis 2 lime leaves crushed 50ml cream 150g diced unsalted butter chilled Salt Juice of 1/2 lime
Combine the first nine ingredients in a saucepan and place over moderate heat until reduced by half.
