The Bistro owners Jude (left) and Tiffany Messenger (right), with children Kayden, Kalyaya, and Julio (at back), and Pagelyn and Cohen at front. Photo / Rachel Canning
The Bistro owners Jude (left) and Tiffany Messenger (right), with children Kayden, Kalyaya, and Julio (at back), and Pagelyn and Cohen at front. Photo / Rachel Canning
SPONSORED CONTENT The Bistro is a family-owned restaurant accessible to the community, and we love that we can provide Taupō locals and visitors alike with a European-style dining experience at a price the average Kiwi can afford.
The menus at The Bistro are created out of an appreciation for the ever-changing seasons. As new ingredients become available our dishes take new shape and evolve. We pair our integrity in the kitchen with relaxed, non-pretentious service to provide our guests with moments that last a lifetime.
Owner Jude Messenger has spent time in various demanding kitchens both here in New Zealand and abroad, including Taupō's Huka Lodge, and he was head chef at the award-winning Bach Restaurant.
In the USA he was at the Multnomah Athletic Club, an exclusive member-only club in Portland Oregon, and went on to Peter Gordon's Sugar Club in London. It was a cooking scholarship over 20 years ago that was to springboard Jude's overseas work experience, which took him to the USA where he met his wife Tiffany. From there they headed to the UK together.
Now living back in Taupō, the couple has six children. You may recognise the older ones in the kitchen washing dishes, serving tables in the dining room or making cocktails. Jude and Tiffany are passionate about giving back to the community, be it coaching sports teams, contributing to fundraising efforts or attending school field trips, they love to get involved but above all family is what drives them and keeps them grounded.
The Messenger family in 2012 when they opened The Bistro. Photo / Supplied
What do you love about operating in the Taupō region? The Taupō region and central plateau area have so much to offer, we love raising our children in a place where we can take the boat out and go fishing in the morning and then shoot to the mountain for a ski in the afternoon.
We are close to the coast and have every outdoor adventure activity you could want right at our doorstep. This region brings plenty of Kiwi travellers and tourists to our town which keeps our restaurant full all year.
What do you love about Taupō produce? Our Taupō region also offers amazing produce that consistently features on our seasonal menus. Right now our locally sourced autumn offering includes chestnuts, Jerusalem artichokes, heritage potatoes, figs, limes and fennel seeds.
Serves 6 entree sized portions. This dish has been on the menu at The Bistro for nearly 10 years now and I have no intentions of ever pulling it off, the calamari continues to be a favourite for our diners and will do so for many years to come.
• in a medium-sized saucepan gently sweat the shallots in the oil until they are opaque then add the garlic, salt and pepper, cook for about 5 minutes until they are tender and shiny • add the champagne and thyme then boil to reduce the liquid to about 50ml • add the fish stock and once again boil to reduce the liquid to about 50ml • add the cream and bring it to the boil then simmer for about 5 minutes until the cream coats the back of a spoon. Now that you have created an intense reduction to flavour your cream, allow it to cool to room temperature then finish the seasoning with the lemon juice and oyster sauce. You can now pass the champagne veloute through a fine sieve and it is ready to use.
Fish Stock (yield 1 litre) 50g butter 100g yellow onion (½ a medium onion diced) 50g celery (½ stalk diced) 1 bay leaf 4 white peppercorns 10g parsley stalks lemon (juice) 600g fish bones (snapper, eyes, fins and tail removed, chop up the bones) 150mL dry white wine (don't use your good stuff) 1½ L cold water • in an appropriately sized sauce pan melt the butter and gently sweat the onion then add the celery, pepper, herbs and lemon • wash the fish bones and add them to the pot then cover it with a tight-fitting lid and gently stew for 5 minutes • add the wine and water, bring the stock to a rolling simmer, skim off the impurities that rise to the surface and simmer for 20 minutes • gently ladle the stock through a fine strainer lined with cheese cloth and you are done, cool quickly over ice if you are storing it or use it right away. This recipe will give you enough stock for three batches of champagne veloute, it can be stored in the fridge for up to week or kept in the freezer.
Calamari cooked sous vide 600g squid tube (6 tubes sliced into thin rings) 100mL olive oil 6g lemon zest 10g flaky sea salt 5g cracked white pepper • mix all of the marinade ingredients with the cleaned and sliced calamari then vacuum pack or seal it in a zip lock bag being sure to squeeze out all of the air • spread the contents so that the bag is flat and cook it in a water bath at 64C for 6 minutes • try timing the cooking of the calamari so that it comes out of the water bath when you are ready to serve and add it straight to the hot veloute The marinating of the calamari can be done in advance, even the day before if you like. If you do not have a thermo regulator (sous vide machine) try using a pot of water or a crock pot set to medium. Make sure you keep an eye on the temperature with a probing thermometer
Lemon Gnocchi 500g agria potatoes (2x medium) 3 egg yolks 20g parmesan cheese 4g lemon zest (2 lemons) 10mL olive oil 8g flaky sea salt (2 pinches) 1g white pepper 100g soft flour 300g rock salt 30g flour (for dusting) 100mL olive oil (for holding gnocchi) • wash the potatoes and stab them with a fork all over, then bake them at 200C on a bed of rock salt until they are tender and the skin is dry and crisp • spoon out the flesh while it is still hot and pass it through a drum sieve into a medium-sized bowl or onto a clean benchtop • using a table fork gently mix in the yolks, zest, cheese, oil and seasoning • add ¾ of the flour and kneed it in by hand to form a soft dough • the dough should be soft but not sticky and should just bounce back a wee bit when you press it with your thumb. use more flour if needed but be careful not to overwork the dough or it will become tough and difficult to work with • cut the dough into 4 even balls and keep them under a damp cloth while you are working • form each ball into small thumbnail-sized cushions by rolling them into long snakes and cutting them with a small spatula • poach them as each ball is formed in boiling salted water until they float • as each batch is cooked coat them in the reserved olive oil and store them in the fridge until they are ready to be used.
Let's put it all together Okay, so now that all the big jobs are done we can focus on the finishing touches. Firstly the crispy fried capers; you can use the ones that come in the brine for this recipe, just drain some off, coat them in rice flour and shallow fry them in medium to hot canola oil until they are golden and have stopped bubbling. Drain them onto a paper towel and they are ready to use.
Next is the gremolata; this is just a combination of garlic, flat-leaf parsley and lemon zest. I chop up a small amount of each and add it to a little olive oil to make a tasty wee drizzle. Finally, I pick the golden heart leaves from the centre of a head of celery, finely slice up some chives and dice up some shallots.
Now you are ready to plate up the dish. Heat up the champagne veloute in a large saucepan, when it begins to simmer add your gnocchi and let it tick away until it is soft then add the calamari, turn up the heat so that the stunning goodness quickly comes to the boil with the occasional stir.
Remove it from the heat, check that the calamari is hot, add the chives and shallots and you are ready to evenly divide your entree between six dinner bowls.
