Where I Ate Last with Tony Astle: Tempero

This week Tony Astle last ate at Tempero, a Latin Restaurant and Bar on Auckland’s K Road.  

They offer a blend of the rich heritage of Latin cuisine with modern innovation, resulting in a “symphony of flavours that will delight your palate.” 

Tony sampled the pickled mussels, the lamb tacos, the braised spare ribs, among other things, with his favourite being the Feijoada. Overall, he gives Tempero four ticks. 

LISTEN ABOVE 

 

Recipe of the Week: Spiced Pork Belly Confit with Grilled Scallops 

Ingredients:  

 

Pork belly confit: 

1 side pork belly  

1 tbsp chopped thyme 

4 star anise, crushed  

10 coriander seeds, crushed 

6 cloves, crushed  

2 medium sized onions, chopped 

1 head garlic, chopped  

30 ml oil 

1.5 litres duck or pork fat  

1.5 litres beef or chicken stock 

 

Oriental dressing: 

100 ml sesame oil  

100 ml olive or peanut oil 

50 ml soy sauce  

50 ml mirin 

20 ml lemon juice  

1 clove garlic, crushed 

½ tsp chilli paste  

1 tsp grated ginger 

 

Roast Tomato: 

4 vine ripe tomato  

Malden salt 

2 tsp oil 

 

 

Method: Pork belly 

1. In a frenzied attack, stab the pork skin with a fork or skewer. 

2. Rub in the herbs and spices all over the pork. 

3. Place on a non-corrosive tray, cover and refrigerate for 24 hours. 

4. Heat oven to 160 degrees celcius. 

5. Saute onions and garlic in oil until brown. Do not burn. 

6. Place the pork in a roasting dish, skin side up. Smear with the onion garlic mix. 

7. Melt the fat in a saucepan and then add stock. Whisk together, then pour over pork. 

8. Cover pork with baking paper, then seal the roasting dish with foil. 

9. Bake for 3 hours. Remove from the oven, cool, cover, and refrigerate. 

10. The fat/stock can be kept for future use. It can be frozen. 

 

Method: Oriental dressing 

Place all ingredients into a bottle and shake well. 

 

Method: Roast tomato 

1. Heat oven to 160 deg C.  

2. Drizzle the tomato with oil, sprinkle it with salt. 

3. Roast in the oven 15-20 min. 

4. Remove from the oven, cool the tomato. 

 

Ingredients to Assemble: 

8 slices cold pork belly  

oil for greasing 

16 scallops  

75 g mixed greens 

1 carrot, peeled, julienned  

1 courgette, julienned 

16 snow peas, julienned  

roasted tomato  

oriental dressing 

 

Final Assembly: 

1. Preheat oven to 160 deg C. 

2. Slice cold pork belly into 5 mm slices. 

3. Oil four metal egg rings (85mm), and line with two slices of pork belly. 

4. Place on greased tray, and heat in oven until pork is hot. 

5. As the pork heats, saute the scall

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Finding the hidden gyms at the hospitality scene where I
ate last with Tony Astell on Kerry WOODAM Mornings and
time now to catch up with legendary chef Tony as
Still from the iconic Antwin's Restaurant and Powdered now recently
published author the book is out Tony very good morning to.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
You, and good morning to you. I've missed you for
the last two weeks.

Speaker 1 (00:25):
I know, I do apologize. I went to Fiji with
the food was excellent.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
Oh that's good.

Speaker 3 (00:31):
I'm glad you. I'm glad you've gone away. I've just
taken off as well.

Speaker 1 (00:34):
I know I saw that. I saw just I think
you're in Paris, aren't.

Speaker 2 (00:38):
You arrive in Paris? And it's one o'clock in the morning.

Speaker 3 (00:41):
Here I'm listening to your hot program all evening just
in case I missed you, and I just happened to
be looking at looking from where I am at the
Notre Dame, which is actually it's so and the weather's beautiful.
So I've had I had a beautiful steak, tartar and
chips as I have to do as soon as I.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Arrived in Paris and had my past. So now I'm
all ready for you.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
Oh, how fantastic, do you know what? Speaking of speaking
of alcohol as he did with pastis, I saw before
you left you posted a magnificent photo, as you will
want to do from time to time, of gems from
your wine cellar, and I saw an old bottle of Ammah,
and I thought, oh, the night year old Rod had
on the Amma, My god.

Speaker 2 (01:21):
What thing they were.

Speaker 3 (01:22):
They were all bad times with some Roger Barry. We
had some bad times with that bad boy, but he
was amazing. And that wine it's actually I think it's
nineteen eighty something that worked one that day, was just
put on there and he's written all over it.

Speaker 2 (01:36):
So it's was a little bit of money. But I
think maybe you better get.

Speaker 3 (01:40):
Back to drinking. I'll get him and you and me
and we'll just have a partner.

Speaker 1 (01:45):
Be almost worth it to taste that, my god. The
last decent bottle of amara I found, because it was
very hard to find for a while, was an in
Vcago at a fabulous restaurant with handpainted Italian wallpaper, and
it was a beautiful restaurant and in Vericago, and that
was where I found my last bottle of them.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
Are well, it's worth going down to in Vercago. Let's
go straight away.

Speaker 1 (02:09):
Well before you left for Paris, and I presume we'll
hear some gorgeous spots in Paris. Where did you eat last.

Speaker 3 (02:17):
Well, actually, my last one was Temporo in k Road
in Auckland, and it's run by Fabio Bernardini and his
partner Tiffany Low and they're quite new on the scene
and it's Latino but doing a modern take on Latino
food but into a bistro style situation. And he's quite famous.

(02:40):
He's worked for me, of course at some time in
his career. Everybody and Michael Meredith he's so but he's
now opened his own restaurant and he's you know, it's
tough times at the moment. But we went along and
it was really busy and it's actually what I was
excited to see was so many young people that were
just a doffered. A couple of old geriatrics like me there,

(03:03):
but most of it were young people having the best time,
and the atmosphere was quite vibrant. It's not a quiet restaurant,
but it's so if you're going there just to talk
to each other. It's not a good idea, but to
go and have fun and food that you probably don't
see very much around the place as well worth going to.
I mean, there's a couple of things that I found.

(03:24):
It's Latino soup.

Speaker 2 (03:25):
There's a lot of beans involved, and I find that
a little bit.

Speaker 3 (03:27):
Too, you know, the olflatulance might set and later when
you get to our age or my age.

Speaker 2 (03:32):
But some of it was too heavy.

Speaker 3 (03:35):
But there were some amazing dishes there, like I mean,
like as Selsa's and things, and they were just so fresh.

Speaker 1 (03:42):
But there was one chicken hearts.

Speaker 3 (03:45):
Oh look, I haven't had chicken hearts for so long,
and that's one of my favorites. Was you know, as
everyone knows now, my feet can't keep going. I can't
stop if I could find all these sort of things
around the place, and these chicken hearts were.

Speaker 2 (03:56):
Just just cooked.

Speaker 3 (03:58):
So for the faint heart, they're probably not that great
because they're quite rare, but oh my god, I was
in heaven when I swallowed those little things down. He
did this a special I think, but I'm sure if
you pre ordered you could get them, but you have
to be into that sort of thing, of course. Awful,
I am, but and I found one dish that I
had to give five little ticks to which is quite amazing,

(04:21):
And that was the it was a pork dish, and
it was it's called si joda and it's black beans,
but it's got and it's a pork stew, and it's
got air nose tail trotter, bacon and cured sausage. Look,
I'm just getting so excited, salivating thinking about it. But
of course everyone knows I love those sort of things.

(04:42):
But that it was a brave dish to put on
a menu, and it was so well executed.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
Tell you that he should be very proud of himself.

Speaker 1 (04:50):
So the pork stew, they it was basically nose to
tail using the peg.

Speaker 2 (04:55):
The whole thing.

Speaker 3 (04:56):
And of course that's you know, we don't know enough
of that, but it was, you know, and look I
used to I did that famous dish for this dish
with you know, with the pigs's and the brains and
the tongue and the eyes and everything, many years ago.

Speaker 2 (05:08):
But this here was a beautiful, beautiful dish. But I mean,
you have to like awful, but you didn't know you
were eating all these things. It was just such a
beautiful dish.

Speaker 1 (05:18):
And what is the pico de gallo? Is that? Did
they actually use the rooster beak in the dish?

Speaker 2 (05:25):
You know that? No?

Speaker 3 (05:25):
No, that you know they called that that's the rooster
of beak, which and no one has any idea while
it's called.

Speaker 1 (05:31):
Oh, I said, that's just the name of it, Okay.

Speaker 3 (05:34):
Then of course it's a it's it's it's very fresh,
of course, and it's and pico means to chop, so
I may I think the old roosters beak was doing
a bit of pecking there. But it's also called it's
called salsa bandera in selsa cruder. Yeah, it's just very

(05:55):
very fresh, beautiful, but it went with so many different
things and the toasted yes, well, I've just been looking
at my notes there, and in fact Tiffany had written
on a couple of things on the thing.

Speaker 2 (06:09):
But the cassava.

Speaker 3 (06:10):
Route was really perfect to go with a little pig dish.
I actually dip my I dip the pekana into it,
which is the cap of the beef from which was
cooked absolutely perfectly for me because I liked biting me first.
But it was just a beautiful crunchy. It was like
almost like a powder, but it was just well worth trying.

Speaker 1 (06:31):
And they look, it sounds exactly what you'd hope to
find on k Road, something adventurous, something fun, nothing too pretentious,
but just good food, brave food done well and young
people willing to try that.

Speaker 2 (06:46):
Well, at least I can go to k Road now
for different reasons. Huh.

Speaker 1 (06:49):
Never for those reasons.

Speaker 2 (06:52):
I didn't say what reasons they were. You've got a.

Speaker 1 (06:55):
Mind sorts of things happen on k Road. I'm sure
Beth would have kept you well out of them. Now,
this week's recipe of the week warmed spice cornfee of
pork belly grilled scallops with an oriental dressing. But this
sounds like one you'd need some time to prepare.

Speaker 3 (07:14):
And look, it's quite complicated, but look, it's very well written.
The recipe has been very very well written, and you should.
It's just worth doing this whole dish for something very
very special, and the scallops are so important.

Speaker 2 (07:27):
Yes, it takes I mean.

Speaker 3 (07:29):
There's people must go online to read this. Please don't
ask me for the recipe. I'm not going to stand
there again. But it's all online there and it's well
worth the trouble. But look, if you really don't want
to do the pork belly itself, look there's so many
good pork bellies about you can go on buy and
then do the second part of the dish with it.

Speaker 1 (07:48):
Fantastic. It looks absolutely what. My son and law just
love this. I'm absolutely certain. Thank you for staying up
for us, Tony. At least that keep trouble from prowling
the streets of Paris looking for troubles. So we will
talk to you from Paris next week.