- 1 year ago
The Food Truck NZ - S01E06 - Mexican
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TVTranscript
00:00The New Zealand fast-food industry is worth over 1.3 billion dollars a year,
00:06but there's a huge social cost.
00:08Two out of every five deaths have some link to diet-related factors.
00:12Without putting you off your dinner,
00:14us Kiwis need to change what we eat.
00:19Michael van der Elzen is the owner and head chef
00:22at the award-winning molten restaurant and liquid molten bar
00:25in Mount Eden, Auckland.
00:27Let's get a show on the road.
00:29He set up a mobile kitchen on a mission to make fast food healthy food.
00:33Alright, I'm for business.
00:35Yummy.
00:36Yeah, it's good.
00:37It's tasteless.
00:38Fast food can be exciting, it can be healthy,
00:41it can be food that we serve in our restaurant.
00:43The bit I'm worried about is, are Kiwis willing to go for it?
00:47Last week, Michael took on 60 food carts at a Chinese New Year celebration,
00:52but couldn't find many takers for his Chinese takeaways.
00:55I think we've cooked the best food up to date,
00:58and I think it's been a complete failure.
01:01Tonight, can Michael create fresh, healthy Mexican
01:04with the price, speed and taste that people want with fast food?
01:08Find out in the food truck.
01:15There are less than 100 Mexican restaurants in New Zealand,
01:18but only a handful offer quick takeaway options.
01:21That's a wasted opportunity,
01:23because Mexican can be quick, delicious and good for you.
01:27I love Mexican food.
01:28It's fresh, it's fast, it's full of flavour,
01:30but you can't seem to find it much here.
01:32You know, it's more of a restaurant food than a fast food,
01:35and that's a shame.
01:37Kiwis love the old El Paso taco kits,
01:40and they love their corn chips,
01:42so I'm hoping they're going to love my Mexican food from the food truck.
01:45There's a lot that's healthy about Mexican food.
01:48Rice, beans, corn and salsa are all good for us.
01:51It's the extra cheese, sour cream and fried corn chips that do the damage.
01:56Like so many other cuisines, what we have here in New Zealand
01:59is more of an American-style Mexican, or Tex-Mex,
02:02which has just been loaded with far too much cheese
02:05and far too much sour cream.
02:07It's just lost some of those fresh, healthy qualities
02:10that authentic Mexican food has.
02:13So I'm hoping I can bring some of those traditional flavours back
02:16and show people how fresh and healthy Mexican food can be.
02:22In less than a week, Michael will try and sell his own version of Mexican
02:25to a lively crowd at the Solarosa concert
02:27as part of the Auckland Zoo Music Festival.
02:34Burrito, taco, enchilada, tostada, quesadilla.
02:38All Michael needs to decide is what to serve.
02:41I'm heading to Mexicali Fresh.
02:43This is the closest thing we have to a Mexican fast food franchise.
02:46They call themselves a healthy Mexican kitchen,
02:49so I'm hoping to get some healthy, fast Mexican food at a cheap price.
02:54It's like the Mexican at Subway, isn't it?
02:56Yeah.
02:57Except you can buy beer.
02:59I love that.
03:01Two tacos, two minutes, $8.
03:03Hard to beat, but easy to eat.
03:06Very tasty.
03:07Good kick, good chilli.
03:09I just nailed that in four bites, though.
03:11Next up, Michael's trying the beef nachos
03:13from Mission Bay's Dos Amigos Cantina.
03:16An average serve of beef nachos has around 700 calories,
03:19the equivalent to one and a half mince pies.
03:22Nachos are not even Mexican.
03:24They're Tex-Mex, they're Americanised Mexican food.
03:28But it's what us Kiwis love.
03:30A bowl of nachos, a couple of beers, fantastic.
03:33It's going to be a real challenge for me
03:35to replicate nachos in a healthy fashion.
03:38Last stop on the feast list is a chicken burrito from Taqueria,
03:42up the hill in fashionable Ponsonby.
03:44$12.90, super fast, took me a minute to make it.
03:47See what it's like.
03:49It's pretty hard to get a lot of flavour
03:51into a burrito with so much rice in it.
03:53I've had burritos in Mexico and they're nothing like this.
03:56For a bang for your buck, yes, it's probably value for money
03:59in the sense where it's going to fill you up,
04:01but it's not going to give you a meal
04:03that you are excited about going back and having again.
04:07Underwhelmed but very full, Michael says adios to the city outlets
04:11and takes the food truck to Ellerslie for a more authentic Mexican feed.
04:15I'm heading to a place called Mexican Specialties.
04:18This place is legendary.
04:19They used to be only open on Saturdays for lunch.
04:21Now they're open 3 days a week.
04:23The chef is nuts.
04:24He does over 100 people a day, all of them for lunch,
04:27all of them by himself.
04:29It's beautiful, authentic and delicious Mexican food,
04:32the way it should be.
04:34Could I please have a chicken tostada, soft prawn
04:38and an enchilada, maybe a veggie enchilada.
04:44Look at that.
04:49That, my friend, is flavour.
04:51It's just prawns fired with some chilli paste.
04:58It's good.
05:00Tostada, basically it's a corn tortilla, a flat one.
05:04It's got some refried beans, some chicken,
05:06it looks like chilli powder.
05:08The taste and the flavours are just so different
05:11than what we're used to.
05:13Us Kiwis, we're used to Tex-Mex, we're used to nachos.
05:17This is authentic as you get and it's damn tasty.
05:20I've just got to try and get in the kitchen with him
05:22and see how he does it.
05:24How are you?
05:25Very good, how are you?
05:26Great.
05:27Busy lunch, eh?
05:28Very busy.
05:29What are the key ingredients in Mexican food?
05:31Corn, then we have our beans and our chilli.
05:34Those are the three things that make Mexican cuisine what it is.
05:38Avocado?
05:39Avocado is endemic to Mexico, so yes, avocado,
05:42which means the testicle of a man.
05:44Does it?
05:45Yeah, that's what it means.
05:46Is that what it translates into?
05:47Yes, it translates.
05:48I've never looked at one that way before.
05:51It's a well-used pan.
05:53Yes, that's where the flavour is.
05:55Do you clean those at the end of the night?
05:56No.
05:57No, that's it, just keep going, keep going.
05:58Burn it.
05:59I think I'm going to have to get some of these
06:00in the food truck, I think.
06:02I'll get in there.
06:04That's good, that's good.
06:07Guacamole.
06:08Coriander.
06:09Yeah.
06:11Lemon.
06:12People love lemon, that's it.
06:14That is simple.
06:16The food that I had today was all really good.
06:18None of that seemed very fatty at all.
06:21No.
06:22Why has Mexico got the highest rate of obesity in the world?
06:26The American culture has influenced us in such a way
06:29that we have, you know, now we eat things that I didn't eat
06:32when I was little.
06:33The food I create here is food that I had at home.
06:37Very healthy, not a lot of cheese, you know,
06:39nothing pre-cooked, you know, just do it on the spot.
06:42The portion's not huge, just medium, you know, medium size.
06:46Thank you, Jose.
06:47I really enjoyed it.
06:49Don't tell anybody everything is here.
06:51Don't worry, don't worry.
06:53Inspired by Jose's uncluttered vision,
06:56Michael goes shopping at the adjoining store.
06:58Mexican food is simple.
07:00It's spice and it's avocados and it's wraps.
07:03Even the way that it's eaten is very simple.
07:06More chili, less chili, less chili.
07:09You know, I can take a lot from what I learned today
07:12and apply that into the food truck.
07:16Okay, I think that should be,
07:17that should keep me out of trouble for a little while.
07:19He'll never do authentic Mexican,
07:21but the beauty is that he can mix his knowledge of cooking
07:25with whatever he understands of Mexican food
07:28and create a new, a very nice Mexican dish, you know.
07:31He might prepare better dishes than the authentic Mexicans.
07:37In just a few days,
07:38Chef Michael van der Elzen will be selling healthy Mexican food
07:41at a concert at the Auckland Zoo.
07:43Not to the animals, but hungry humans.
07:46Today, his menu experiments begin.
07:48I want to do the classic of all Mexican cuisine, corn chips.
07:52There's only three ingredients, corn, lime, flaxseed.
07:57When you toast the flaxseed in the corn chips,
07:59you know, you get that real rich, nutty flavour coming through.
08:02Plus, flaxseeds themselves are actually really nutritionally good.
08:05You want it to be reasonably thin,
08:07so that when the corn mix actually dries,
08:09it dries into a nice, thin corn chip.
08:12Michael's all-natural, home-style corn chip mixture
08:15goes into the oven for three hours on each side.
08:17I want to bake them in the oven, and I've added no salt,
08:20so they're going to be healthy.
08:22Armed with the most authentic corn chip possible,
08:24it's feeding time.
08:27Today, I just want to try out some of my Mexican food on people
08:31and see what they think.
08:33Today's tasters are the zookeepers,
08:35who know the value of a good diet.
08:37I like spicy food,
08:39so Mexican, you tend to think of spices,
08:43and most of it's fairly simple, suits me fine.
08:46When I think of Mexican food,
08:47I don't necessarily think of it healthy or unhealthy.
08:50I choose it because it tastes good.
08:53But before he can meet the zookeepers,
08:55Michael needs to finish prepping the corn chips
08:57and the sassy salsa to go with it.
08:59I'm just going to break them up, little bits, big bits.
09:02So that'll be enough for my tasting,
09:03so we'll just put those in.
09:05After just five minutes,
09:06Michael's scrumptious jumbo-sized oven-baked corn chips are done.
09:12It tastes like a corn chip.
09:13That's just corn.
09:14To go with his chips, Michael's making three salsas.
09:17First, a tasty salsa rosso,
09:19using whole tomatoes and chilies char-grilled over an open flame.
09:23Char-grilling just gives you that beautiful, smoky flavour.
09:27They're going to go straight into the blender.
09:29So one onion, two cloves of garlic.
09:31OK, let's blitz.
09:38Pretty hot.
09:40But not blow your head off.
09:42Just a little sweaty brow, that's all.
09:44Next is the salsa verde, using green tomatillos.
09:48Tomatillos are very similar to a green tomato.
09:50You can think of it as a sour tomato.
09:52If you can't get green tomatillos, just use green peppers.
09:55No need for a mixing bowl.
09:56Everything goes right into the chopper.
09:58Straight in.
10:02I just want the root of the coriander,
10:04and then the squeeze of one lime.
10:07When you're making a salsa, keep it quite chunky.
10:09You want to identify the individual flavours
10:11as opposed to one pureed mass.
10:14OK, so there we go.
10:15One salsa rosso or red salsa,
10:18one salsa verde or green salsa.
10:20For his final salsa,
10:22Michael simply combines the two he's made with fresh avocado,
10:25making a classic Mexican sauce, especial.
10:29That's going to be fantastic just as a dip.
10:32It's very similar to guacamole.
10:34It just has a lot more punch and a lot more flavour.
10:37With the salsa deal sealed,
10:39it's time to find out what the zookeepers think
10:41of Michael's healthy take on chips and dip.
10:44Do you want to be a little dummy for a second?
10:46I can be a big dummy.
10:47So I've basically made corn chips from fresh corn.
10:49OK.
10:50I'll try those first.
10:52And then I'll mix flaxseed through it.
10:54I'm interested.
10:55I'm playing with type 2 diabetes.
10:57There you go.
10:58There is no sugar and there's very little salt in all of that.
11:01That's yummy so far.
11:03And there's no cheese in there.
11:05Well, the avocado's the good fat.
11:08Exactly.
11:09If I gave you a good stack of those corn chips,
11:11how much do you think I could charge you for that?
11:14Maybe $7, $7.80, somewhere around there.
11:19I'd be happy with $7.
11:20I really like these homemade corn chips.
11:23Better than the soggy ones that you often buy.
11:27The zookeepers love their animals,
11:29but that doesn't mean they're strictly vegetarian.
11:31So Michael's next dish for them to try is a beef tostada
11:35topped with a tangy mixture of cold, slow-cooked beef
11:38with corn, coriander and lime juice.
11:42The finishing touch is a classic Mexican staple, black beans.
11:46Those colours are just awesome.
11:49Would you like to try some of my beautiful Mexican?
11:51I love Mexican, but I need to know first how I'm all free.
11:55Yes, it is.
11:56Cool.
11:57It's also sugar-free, fat-free, almost salt-free.
12:00We're on.
12:02He's assured me that there's no palm oil in there,
12:04which is important to us here at the zoo,
12:06given the devastation palm oil causes wildlife.
12:09I'll do a red salsa, which is basically charred tomatoes,
12:13and then I'm going to add...
12:14Charred, does that mean you burnt them?
12:16A little bit.
12:17Charring flavour.
12:19Michael's using the same corn chip mixture for his tostada base.
12:23OK, try those.
12:26That's beautiful.
12:27I love the charcoal as well.
12:29I'm going to keep going.
12:32For you, is health a big thing when you eat particularly fast food?
12:35I think it's important to know what you're eating
12:38so you can actually balance the good and the bad.
12:40I'm bringing the truck back to the zoo music.
12:42Do you think this sort of food would work at that event?
12:46If you can get it quickly and eat it with your hands, that's brilliant,
12:49and we can push the message that everything on site is good for you.
12:53I got some really good response from people today.
12:55They really enjoyed the corn chips,
12:57and the fact that they had no cheese and they had no fat
13:00and they weren't deep fried and they were baked in the oven,
13:02and they were good corn chips.
13:04The next day at the Molton kitchen,
13:06Michael has a third dish to round out his menu as a tribute to Jose.
13:10I want to make a prawn taco.
13:11I want to do my take on it.
13:13I want to make it healthier.
13:15And that starts with the tortillas.
13:17So I've managed to get some masa flour from Mexican specialties.
13:20This is the essence of soft tortilla.
13:22It's so simple.
13:24All you need to do is add some water to it,
13:26and then just mix that in.
13:30That took all of 10 seconds.
13:32Next, the filling.
13:33And here I've got some prawns, onions,
13:35and some chipotle paste from Mexican specialties.
13:39So you've got that chilli zing,
13:41but you've got that beautiful smoked flavour coming out of it as well.
13:47I'm not adding any oil to this fry pan at all.
13:51Beans are a huge part of Mexican cuisine.
13:54You've got your purple beans, your pink beans,
13:56your black beans, your pinto beans,
13:58but instead of all of those,
13:59I want to use good old fresh New Zealand green beans.
14:02So I'm going to plunge these into boiling water with a little bit of salt,
14:05and then 10 seconds later, plunge them into ice-cold water.
14:09Stop them from cooking, get that nice crunch on them.
14:11With his beans in the can, Michael can bring it all together.
14:15So I've got my special sauce on the bottom.
14:18Got my charred prawns on.
14:20Put my fresh beans on there.
14:22A little bit of cozz.
14:24A smidge of my coriander.
14:26Finish that off with my little lime dressing.
14:29Look at that.
14:30Yeah, you just want to dive in there.
14:32You just want to eat it.
14:35It's fantastic.
14:36You've got spice coming through.
14:37You've got the crunch of the green beans.
14:39You've got that slightly saltiness of the prawns.
14:42It's all wrapped up in a nice clean tortilla that I made myself.
14:45I've got my menu.
14:46I've got my three great items to take to the zoo for game day.
14:49This one's going to be a ripper.
14:51I think I'm going to set out of this.
14:53I really do.
14:57Chef Michael van der Elzen has spent the last few days
15:00testing, tasting, and learning about real Mexican food.
15:03Today, it's showtime for a healthy version of the Auckland Zoo Music Festival.
15:08As the crowds arrive at the zoo,
15:10Michael is only just leaving the molten kitchen.
15:13I am running so late.
15:17But it's a jungle out there.
15:19It seems half of Auckland's going to the gig.
15:22Come on, people.
15:23Come on, come on, come on.
15:25Damn, I'll go left.
15:28To me, Mexican means fresh,
15:30so I've left as much of the prep as I can to do at the zoo.
15:34I hope I don't regret it.
15:36It's a good excuse, right next to having a flat tyre.
15:45Back at the zoo, the main act, Solarosa,
15:47take to the stage for the Zoo Music Concert.
15:50It's an annual series of events to raise money
15:52for the zoo's conservation effort here and overseas.
15:55With a 2,000-strong audience
15:57and more than 300 animals already lapping up the music,
16:00Michael hopes he's not going to be thrown to the lions.
16:03I've taken out what I think are the worst bits of Mexican food, OK?
16:07I've thrown away the cheese.
16:09I've got rid of that sour cream.
16:11I've gone back to basics.
16:13I just hope that the crowd that I'm going to today,
16:15you know, they want healthy food
16:17and, most of all, are willing to wait for it.
16:20That's if they're still there.
16:22Finally, the traffic thins out
16:24and Michael cranks the food truck up to 30km,
16:27keen to start a Mexican wave.
16:34After touching down at the zoo,
16:36Michael takes the back entrance to avoid becoming the main attraction.
16:40Now the pressure's on to maximise the menu.
16:43As always, when we go into any game day,
16:45my fear is that I don't sell anything or I sell very little.
16:48A lot of thought goes into the food that we serve
16:51and we just want people to come up and enjoy it.
16:54That's it.
16:56The food in Mexico is dirt cheap.
16:58I'm doing corn chips with two salsas, $3.
17:01I'm doing two tostadas, $4.
17:03And then we've got our soft tacos, beautiful flavours, $5.
17:08Why do they have to be any more?
17:18Michael attends to the prep,
17:20but the food truck has caught the attention of the hungry music fans.
17:24OK, it's 6 o'clock. I'm not ready.
17:26We're under the gun here. We've got people queuing up,
17:29sitting around waiting for us.
17:31So I've got to get this food out.
17:33And I'm going to get bombarded.
17:35Over an hour behind schedule, Michael finally finishes his prep.
17:39There's nothing like opening for service when you've never done it before.
17:42And reluctantly opens the floodgates.
17:44I'm still going to be chasing my tail a lot,
17:46but hell, bring it on.
17:48OK, people, food truck's open.
17:50Sorry for the delay. It shall be worth it.
17:52I'm pretty keen to try one of each. One of each?
17:55Here we go. Let's make some food.
18:00OK, something to nibble on, sir.
18:02I may as well get another one in, why not?
18:04Two soft tacos, one corn chips.
18:06Got to be fast.
18:07Salsa, green beans, a bit of that, a bit of that. Beautiful.
18:10There's one, there's two.
18:12I'm just waiting on a corn chips.
18:14Oh, and a corn chips? Yeah. And a tostada.
18:16And a tostada? Oh, where'd that tostada go?
18:18I have no idea. Oh, here it is here.
18:20LAUGHTER
18:22It's a somewhat haphazard start, but the line keeps moving,
18:26with Michael's cheap-ass chips a major hit.
18:28Not greasy at all, very, very flavoursome.
18:31Yeah, love it.
18:33Family-sized orders are flying in,
18:36but Michael still isn't in the zone.
18:38One of each. One of each? Two.
18:40OK, I'll let you add that up while I cook it.
18:42I'm going to sell out in, like, ten minutes.
18:44The big orders are giving Michael a headache,
18:47but the upside, low prices mean happy customers.
18:50Oh, wow, look at this.
18:52This is very cheap. This is $28, and we're feeding three people,
18:56so I think that's pretty good.
18:58We've got it bang on today. Bang on for prices, bang on for food.
19:04The animals are used to being the main attraction here at the zoo,
19:07but today it's the food truck, and one dish in particular.
19:11Three soft tacos, please.
19:13Beautiful.
19:15Coming up. Hopefully it carries on like this.
19:17There you go, sir. And I get smashed.
19:20Beautiful and flavoursome and prawns.
19:24The flavour coming off that is just awesome.
19:26I'm going through these tacos like there's no tomorrow.
19:29Come on, little prawny.
19:31Look at that. One, two, three, done.
19:35And all the cooking has one unexpected benefit.
19:38Genuine burnt pan, just like the one Jose had.
19:41Michael will never wash it.
19:43Look at that pan. Oh, yeah.
19:45Get all that char goodness off the bottom.
19:48Mexican specialties, eat your heart out.
19:50Thank you, sir.
19:52Three tostadas, please.
19:54That's beautiful, cos they're my fastest.
19:56Finally, the tide turns to Michael's tostadas,
19:59and once again, people are ordering two or three at a time.
20:02Here's two tostadas.
20:04Three of those puppies.
20:06Tostadas are the hit.
20:08Here's two tostadas.
20:10In just 30 minutes, Michael sells nearly 40 tostadas.
20:12Customer's healthy, Michael wealthy.
20:14Three tostadas.
20:16Yeah, it's beautiful. It's really fresh.
20:18I can taste all the flavours in it.
20:20Absolutely delicious.
20:22I'm gonna have this all on me at the end.
20:24The food truck's Mexican at the zoo has been a roaring success.
20:28Evidence of Michael's popular trays of Mexican goodness are everywhere,
20:32and some people are coming back for seconds.
20:34Two corn chips.
20:36Damn, must be good, huh?
20:38We weren't gonna eat here because we didn't think there'd be enough healthy food.
20:42Often you'd think buying a lot of stuff is not that good,
20:46but we just saw this, it looked different,
20:48but this is, this is standout.
20:50We're in dregs.
20:52Honestly, I'm only, I'm scraping, look at my bowls.
20:58After you two lovely ladies at the end there,
21:00that is us, all done.
21:02I'm doing three lamb tacos,
21:04which are not even on the menu
21:06because I've run out of prawns,
21:08so I'm doing the lamb in the tacos instead of the prawns.
21:10There is one.
21:12There's the other lamb.
21:14And after this, the food truck has sold out.
21:16Shut it down!
21:18Pleasure. Enjoy.
21:24The humans went ape
21:26for Michael's lighter version of Mexican cuisine.
21:28The corn chips,
21:30tostadas and tacos
21:32were all delivered in just minutes
21:34at prices the competition could only dream of.
21:36Amazingly, the food truck sold 150 portions,
21:38and best of all,
21:40nobody missed the sour cream and cheese.
21:42It's been pretty intense.
21:44It's taken two hours of chukka-chukka-chukka,
21:46but we sold everything.
21:48I think the soft tacos
21:50were just the outstanding start
21:52because they were the most expensive
21:54and they outsold everything else.
21:56So, you know, I'm stoked.
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