Talk to chef Al Brown and a certain four-letter "f" word peppers the conversation.
That word, of course, is fish. Something very dear to his heart and also the subject of his latest book.
The presenter of television series Hunger for the Wild and founder of Wellington's Logan Brown restaurant with good mate Steve Logan, is addicted to fishing and says fly-fishing for trout in Otago and Southland is top of the list of his favourite pastimes.
"You should celebrate what's unique to this area."
He likes nothing more than promoting this country and says he would happily "throw away my passport".
"We're surrounded by oceans, have our own fruit, oil and wine - let's just close the borders down."
Next on the horizon is a new television show called Coasters, which will screen early next year.
Similar in format to Hunger for the Wild, this series features Mr Brown travelling stretches of New Zealand's coast, outlining the history of each area, meeting people, telling stories, cooking and fishing.
When it comes to cooking, flavour should be first on the list of priorities, texture second and presentation third, he says.
"I can't stand when you go out to a restaurant and have a rack of lamb and it arrives with half a shrub of rosemary decorating it and none in when it was cooked.
"What am I supposed to do with it?" he says incredulouslyCooking only fillets of fish is a waste, he says.
"Cook it whole - don't throw a third of it away."
Fish should be eaten fresh, not frozen for later, Mr Brown says .
"Don't catch as many as you can and throw the fillets in the freezer. It'll stay there for a month or more and then you'll clean out the freezer and give it to the cat. I've seen cats take one whiff of it and walk away."
The book
Go Fish: Recipes and stories from the New Zealand coast, by Al Brown, is published by Random House, hbk, $65.
It contains detailed how-to photographs for filleting, scaling, cleaning fish, extracting crab or crayfish meat, shucking scallops and oysters and dealing with squid, as well as numerous recipes for various types of fish.
While Brown's mantra is that he likes food to be simple, simple for a chef can be different from simple for a home cook - check his list of ingredients for a bach pantry, which includes five types of oil, five types of vinegar, three types of rice, as well as 11 Asian ingredients and other things.
A delicious book to give a committed angler/cook for Christmas, or to decorate the beach house coffee table. - Charmian Smith
