Among the Māori before European arrival, there is no starter, main course, or dessert. Food (kai) is divided into two worlds: everyday kai, gathered from the forest, river, and shore (roots, fern, eel, shellfish), and the hākari, the great community feast where kūmara, fish, and birds are cooked together, steam-baked in the hāngī (an earth oven heated with stones). Everything is cooked slowly by the steam of the earth, then shared directly on leaves, without individual plates: to eat is to connect with ancestors and the whenua, the nurturing land.

The iconic technique: a pit, a fire of hot stones, baskets of foliage, a splash of water to create steam, then earth heaped on top. The kai cooks for hours, perfumed with fern and damp soil. For Muri-ranga-whenua, the earth-mother who devours, cooking in the ground is giving back to the earth what she lends us.