What have we here?

When I returned home [at the end of 2015] after seven years in New York, I was unsure what I wanted to do next. I was 28 years old and had accomplished so much, but I was burnt out from the hard mahi (work) that comes with working in one of the most competitive cities in the culinary world. I also missed my family, and I wanted to see the next generation of my whānau grow.

Our natural resources descend from the atua [god]; there’s an interconnected relationship between all things. The land, sea, rivers, plants and animals all have a mauri, a wairua —