Kiwifruit star waning

Press, 11 August 1982, Page 20

Kiwifruit star waning

NZPA staff correspondent

Washington

The trend which made kiwifruit the exotic star of "nouvelle cuisine” in the United States may be passing on.

Many "nouvelle cuisine” chefs who made “kiwis” their trade mark have moved on to other exotics, the “Wall Street Journal” reports. At New York's elite Raphael, the Raphael Edergy, declares kiwifruit “passe.” David Liederman, of the chic Manhattan Market, who was once a student at the restaurant of France’s threestar kiwiphile Troisgros Brothers, says that although the market uses them all the time, he "hates the stuff.”

“They are beautiful but tasteless."

Other authorities differ. The cookery book author. Susan Colchie, says, “Some taste like melon, some like plums, some like strawberries.”

Madelaine Lee, the executive director of a philanthropic foundation in New York, savs that “if you concentrate hard on its taste you will discover a banana.” Although Californian plantings are increasing — 5000 or 6000 tonnes of fruit will be produced this' year — a producer spokesman, George Tanimoto, concedes that the American fruit is not up to the standard of the New Zealand fruit.

Eighty per cent of the Californian kiwifruit in fact goes to Japan and West Germany, one of the reasons that each one costs up to SNZi.2O in the United States.

The Americans are introducing voluntary grading

standards in an effort to improve quality, and these will come into effect this (northern) autumn. New plantings in France, Spain, Italy, Japan, South Africa, and Chile will also challenge New Zealand exports from 1984. Also although some chefs may be giving up kiwifruit, it still lives in one place that matters — the White House. President Reagan loves kiwifruit, and the White House pastry chef, Roland Mesnier, is planning kiwi sherbet swans in papaya shells.

The “Wall Street Journal” attributes the kiwifruit bonanza to the change of name from Chinese gooseberries in the 19505, together with the improved stock developed by a New Zealander, Hayward Wright. The kiwifruit’s best friend in the United States was

Frieda Caplan, president of Frieda’s Finest Produce-Spe-cialities in Los Angeles. She says she laboured eight years without taking a cent of profit from the kiwifruit, giving away 10 free trays to any supermarket that would order 100, pouring all the profit back into promotion, and passing out fruit and recipes at conventions.

This year, the New Zealand Embassy says, kiwifruit exports to the United States are expected to total some 400,000 travs.

Mrs Caplan paid a bitter price for her part in the kiwifruit’s success: she ate so many over the years that she developed what amounts to an allergy to them. Now, she says, even hearing about them makes her tongue tingle. '