His first job out of school had been on the Whitelock family dairy farm in Manawatu, which helped give him his work ethic and taught him the value of organisation.
His first introduction to professional cooking came in 1998 after he started work as a waiter at the Citadel restaurant owned by Grant Kitchen, also a Maori chef, in Palmerston North.
``Grant inspired my ideas on deconstruction and introduced me to cookery. That's when I first saw you could sell a boil-up in a restaurant using marketing and the right terminology.'' Mr Peeti said the restaurant had an open kitchen and as a waiter he had often talked to the kitchen staff and watched them at work.
``I enjoyed watching their creativity. They made things look so easy and appealing. I've always seen the kitchen as the soul of a place and to me the soul of a restaurant was in that kitchen.'' He took a professional cooking course at UCOL Palmerston North and his debut competitive outing sealed his industry path, he said.
``I had a lot of European lecturers and one Maori lecturer and that was important because it gave me a whole range of concepts and cuisines and different ideas and methods. ``But when I won the first gold for the school, that really sold me the career.''
Some of his UCOL Wairarapa students competed in Napier at the beginning of this month and in Wellington last weekend, returning home with a clutch of gold, silver and bronze medals and merit prizes.
All eyes are now trained on the 2013 New Zealand Culinary Fair that will be held in Auckland in August, he said, when the most prestigious titles in the country will be decided like Chef of the Nation and for tertiary students, the Toque d'Or.
Mr Peeti, who still competes every second year, is entering the open lamb class in the national contest, using produce from Wairarapa.
He said sharing his expertise with students was a way to help return the encouragement his lecturers had showered on him and the sense of personal achievement he had enjoyed as a student.
After his graduation, Mr Peeti had worked for Novotel Hotels in Palmerston North and also trained apprentices. In about 2005 he was asked to take a class for a UCOL cookery lecturer who fell ill, he said, and his career turned a new corner.
In 2007 he started as a senior chef at the Gin Trap in Napier, where he worked for two years, and then started teaching cookery to youth for Workforce Development and assessing practical aspects of secondary school cookery classes throughout Hawke's Bay.
Despite his experience as a seasoned lecturer and industry veteran, he said, his own time as a student is still far from over. He is studying toward a bachelor of education and hopes to also soon take up an inaugural masters degree in indigenous knowledge at Te Wananga o Aotearoa.
He is heartened more Maori students are today working in tertiary cooking classes and competing, and more traditional Maori fare is finding its way on to competitive and commercial menus. ``I think more Maori competitors are coming through and also more Maori cuisine is coming through with the more traditional types of kai in the industry at the moment.
``There's horopito, which is a really peppery leaf used quite a bit now as a dry rub, and the more traditional kumara peruperu, which is more purple and quite a nice-looking kumara.
``I think using those traditional ingredients shows the fusion and a successful introduction of our local dishes to non-Maori cooks, which is fantastic,'' he said.
An ambition he had carried into his career in the kitchen was to found his own company, he said. He had also completed study in business computing while working and in 2010 established Kai Catering and Solutions.
Mr Peeti was born in Christchurch, where he shared with his family a close relationship with the sea.
``I do remember as a kid the amount of paua we used to eat at home. I remember the kaimoana. Dad swam a lot for kai - he was a gatherer - and he was always cooking at home. I didn't help in the kitchen until I was older.
``It wasn't until I returned to Wanganui and went back to Kawhaiki, my own marae, that I saw a lot in terms of kai. At that age, it was a case of that old saying `there's always a teatowel with your name on it' and I'm still only the kitchen hand whenever I go home today because we have heaps of on-to it ringawera (hot hands). It's an area I'm really passionate about, you know, bringing that whole marae kai concept back to the community.''
In Hawke's Bay he helped develop the annual Kai in the Bay Maori & Wild Food Festival, which is in its fourth year, and completed a three-course meal as a fundraiser for Kahuranaki Marae in Hastings.
He is today eager to establish a marae-based catering programme that dovetails with the traditional ethic that ``the marae is the nucleus of the community''.
``When you look at industry kitchens and marae kitchens there are similarities and while the structure is totally different, Maori have always known how to deliver for the masses, which is something that is worth research and study. How is that done?''
In Wairarapa he has ``touched base'' with Papawai Marae in Greytown about staging a similar fundraiser and he is also conducting cookery demonstrations. He also will be working in Wairarapa in October to showcase regional produce and skills alongside other Wairarapa chefs, he said, at the inaugural Koromai Creative Festival .
