The Meats have found their champion in Shane Jones, who was self-appointed to the role much as he appointed himself to the role of Champion of the Regions.
Jones is prone to hyperbole and decided having school children taught to eat less meat would result in the collapse of the New Zealand economy and have children force-fed tofu, facon and ficken.
The Kiwi way of life was in peril and Jones was there to save it.
In times of trial, Jones tends to spout strings of adjectives regardless of whether they actually make sense and this was no exception.
Those suggesting less meat were "eco-bible bashers" and "medieval torture chamber workers [who] don't want you to talk about adaptation".
Jones' benefactor Winston Peters also lobbed in.
He suggested those making such suggestions were extremists, and it could result in job losses of up to 50 per cent.
He and Jones were the boys from down on the farm, they really loved their cheese.
NZ First's policy was crystal clear: it was double double cheese cheese burger burger please.
Shaw simply responded with the word "science" and emphasised a suggestion did not amount to forced veganism.
He dismissed Jones' outbursts as electioneering and predicted that as election day neared "there will be a lot more nonsense that people spout as well".
By "people" he meant Shane Jones. In this Shaw spoke the truth.
There were plenty of bigger issues to be tackling.
But Jones' ballistic missiles of "nonsense" were far more targeted than it might have seemed.
In his former life as a minister in Helen Clark's Labour government, Jones was charged with considering restrictions on shower head flow and light bulb wattage.
The backlash gave him an allergy to anything that might be considered "nanny state".
He also realised you could get votes out of crying foul over it.
So when he saw something from the government he is a part of that could be taken as an attempt to guilt trip people into giving up the Sunday roast, he was quick to bring it to people's attention by decrying it.
He was not speaking to the urban liberals whose votes were long lost to him. He was speaking to those who liked New Zealand the way it once was.
It was simply Jones picking up Peters' baton of defending a time past when "smoko" breaks meant just that and dinner was called tea, and tea consisted of meat and three veg, or veg and three meat as Jones would prefer.
It did at least provide a change in diet from rolling updates about Meghan and Harry – who becomes the second man in history to be known as "the artist formerly known as Prince".
Like Jones, British families have proved excellent at filling the news void in New Zealand with their antics.
The conscious un-royalling has been to this summer what the infamous British Unruly Tourists were to last summer.
Those tourists ended up being deported.
Few were sad to see them go.
The same could not be said of Harry, who proved popular on his visits to New Zealand. He was funny, and good fun.
Prince Harry shares a hongi with Kairanga kapa haka group performer Riria Arapere during his visit to New Zealand in 2015. Photo / Mark Mitchell
At one of his very last public engagements – conducting the draw for the Rugby League World Cup – he did it again.
Moving up the reception line, he was introduced to the Kiwi Ferns captain Honey Hireme.
It seemed completely spontaneous – Hireme later said it had taken her by surprise.
He and Prince William reinvigorated a relationship between monarchy and far-flung subject that had become stale at least, and potentially revolutionary.
That perhaps was Harry's greatest value to the Queen in her efforts to shore up the Commonwealth beyond her own reign.
His walk-out has prompted republicans in New Zealand and Australia to point out that if Harry can so easily leave the monarchy for a new, independent life, why can't the former colonies?
Many will not begrudge his decision. But some of us will be a tad sad about the decreased likelihood of future visits by Harry.
