Rowing World champs

now you may be thinking this has little relevance to food - but I do find the mobile food carts at these events of interest. The World rowing event at Karapiro had to cater for many thousands of people each day and in the whole they did an awesome job. The volunteer workers would have won international awards for being tirelessly cheery and helpful. Everyone I spoke to had words of praise for all the staff they encountered in a uniform.

Here is a selection of the vendors lined up there...

 from coffee to icecream

 to "good sausages..."

 to gourmet wild foods

to a french patisserie next to a coffee cart. Just what the doctor ordered after an hour's drive to get there.

Laura was convinced to eat a donut or two - and the organisers were saved from one sore point when they relaxed the rules about taking food into the grounds. So a nice picnic on Sunday, but we did still spend money at the carts. As my sister pointed out, they seemed to think we might be like a rugby crowd - but we're not! So once they realised we could be trusted not to get drunk and punch people, we were allowed to take food in.

Power to the rowing audience! and congratulations to the vendors who had interesting foods, clean surrounds and prices that were fair.

Love friends like this...

We go for a drink and we end up being served beautiful fresh bread and a platter of fresh seafood.
AND I have the link for everyone - fresh seafood delivered to the door... no need to go out on a rainy weekend now! Solander Gourmet Seafood

Food services

Back on 12th February I was wondering about food services that deliver - with my computer-challenged, cheque-book carrying grandmother in mind. Since then I've ordered a few sample meals from Tomorrow's Meals in Tauranga and during a visit to Rotorua last weekend my Mum and I took them to Nana. Her reaction was, "What on earth do you think I need those for!?" Not surprising at all knowing her - ferociously independent - even at 95. So Mum tucked them away in the freezer while she wasn't looking and I promised Nana that it wasn't that I thought she needed looking after, just a convenience for some evening when she'd rather not think about cooking.
The meals looked pretty good sizes, although being frozen and covered it was a bit tricky to see them and I didn't want to open them.

(I do think they need to keep the type size realistic for their customers who I'm presuming are largely the older age groups)

Anyway there they were in the freezer with the ones Mum bought her 6 months ago... might be on a losing streak there!

A new Food business idea

My grandmother at 95 is beginning to face difficulties with her groceries. Having had a fall last year she can't walk the 2 km to the supermarket as she did, and she's losing faith in her driving ability so that will also not be an option soon. As a fiercely independent person who lives alone, the idea of taking a taxi will not appeal. And her frailty makes it hard to access groceries when the supermarkets are so big. Her other limitation is that she likes to write cheques and doesn't use a card, so she can only shop where the supermarket will approve her cheques.

Surely there's a business opportunity here.., and not just for my Nana but for all those of us who do not wish to personally shop for groceries, who want fresh items, not frozen, and for whom online shopping isn't viable? Nana doesn't use a computer so her online access is non-existent too. And if I suggested Salvation Army meals she'd laugh me out of the house.
I can find a few 'gourmet' ready-made meals and soups at the supermarket and courier them to her (we don't live in the same town)... and if I bake for her I'm pretty sure she'll eat that.
But I can imagine a nice little business that operates in the smaller towns and uses local people to gather orders from a network of customers, shops and delivers same day, carries the groceries to a chilly-bin type of drop-box at the door for the customer and - glory, imagine this! - can even get a meal ready if required.
So kind of "Hire-a-Hubby" but more "Hire-a-Foodie". Any takers?

I did find one business on the net called "Tomorrow's Meals" which offers a reasonably-priced frozen meal delivery service in the Bay of Plenty and Auckland, and has retailers who stock their meals throughout NZ.