'The spaces you make create the cities you want to live in'

On community, cocktails and the first lesbian club.

Nau mai, haere mai. Welcome to The Boil Up, The Spinoff’s weekly food newsletter, presented in partnership with Eat It! - K Road's restaurant month.

Let me paint a picture. It’s a Thursday evening, the air is sparkling with cold and I’m exhausted from the week thus far, but I’ve pulled myself together, bundled up in a warm coat and am walking briskly along Karangahape Road as the frigid blue sky softens to lilac.

I reach Open Late while it’s still early; the clock’s just gone 5pm but the doors are open, the disco ball lazily spinning, throwing red house-party lights around the walls. I enter to the metallic sound of cocktail shakers hard at work, a smiling bartender calls out a kia ora! over the din, and then a fragrant waft of citrus as the liquid is released, poured over ice in tall glasses. It’s the drink I’ve come here for, the KG Club cocktail, although this first round is for a group who’ve arrived even earlier than me – the team from the Charlotte Museum, a space that preserves and provides access to the lesbian and Sapphic herstories of Aotearoa, located just a short trot from Open Late. Soon, owner Christy Tennent tells me, ThreeNews will be here to interview museum director Sarah Buxton about Aotearoa’s first lesbian club – KG Club, aka Karangahape Road Girls' Club or Kamp Girls' Club.

KG Club was a lesbian club because it couldn’t be a lesbian bar. Under NZ law at the time, women were prohibited from obtaining liquor licenses, and so KG Club was formed as a kind of workaround, a social club that sold tickets which members could then exchange for alcohol… except that this was still considered illegal, and so the Club was constantly changing premises after each raid and subsequent closure. When I ask Christy why she chose to pay homage to the Club for Open’s Eat It event, she describes how KG Club popped up in various spaces along K Road, including a spot just around the corner from Open Late, above the space that was occupied by Joy Bong Thai Restaurant until very recently (it’s now relocated to Mount Eden). “We like to acknowledge the history of K Road and its communities, we’ve done it before. During lockdown we started serving boil up for the community and I learned that Tāme Iti used to have a boil up shop on this block.”

As Christy and I chat about Open Late, she keeps circling back to this word, community. It’s a word people love to bandy about, as though any time folks gather in proximity, a community is born. And yet this is not that. As we talk, the community shows up. Almost every person who enters is greeted like an old friend and Christy introduces me to Nay behind the bar like she’s introducing her sister, rather than her employee. A couple of 20-somethings show up, casually set up their decks and start playing music. When I comment that it feels like the start of a house party, Christy says that’s exactly the vibe she was going for. “The spaces you make create the cities you want to live in,” she tells me, and I quickly jot this down in my Notes app with the addendum: so true.

Because all the spaces that I most love in Tāmaki are owner-operated joints, spaces created with intention and creativity. On K Road alone, I think of Bestie, how I befriended one of my best mates when I was a regular there (never not getting the Towpath cheese toastie with quince jam) and he was waiting tables, and he now runs one of my newer favourite spaces, Roses Dining Room, a business born as an answer to the question of how to be a chef while also being a new dad (part of the answer is also having a partner who will do the damn thing with you). I could list my favourite spots forever (future newsletter?), but really I’m just reiterating what Christy said, something Sam Low and Jean Teng also touched on in the last episode of Ate Ate Ate podcast, albeit from a different angle: what makes a city exciting is when people build the spaces they wish existed, opening their dream restaurants rather than playing it safe and attempting to cater to the broadest possible audience.

I’m worried about what this cost of living crisis is doing to our hospo scene, what we’ll be left with in six months, two years. But I’m also hopeful because of the dynamism we’re seeing from small businesses like Open Café/Open Late – who don’t only serve community and damn good cocktails, but also have chef Carlo Bernado aka @the.strawberrypig in the kitchen making the best hoki burger I’ve ever had.

EAT IT, Karangahape Road restaurant month, is all about over the top pleasure. Head down this week for black truffle cacio e pepe at Pici, parmesan custard at Bar Magda, bang bang chicken at Satya, raw raw (not a typo) fish ceviche at Madame George and more. Send your receipts in to win K Road vouchers! Check out the T&Cs and full EAT IT schedule, here.

Weekly bites

More evidence that our hospo scene is in peril: Korean toastie shop Swings – home of my favourite burger (the prawn burger!), one of Paul Lee’s excellent establishments, alongside Ockhee and Nami Record Bar – quietly appeared up for sale last week. Far less quiet was the announcement that Ponsonby institution SPQR had been placed in liquidation, news that swiftly spawned a slew of heartfelt tributes and editorials, reminders of the restaurant’s storied past, especially its early days as one of the only establishments in the city that firmly and loudly supported the gay community.  

I came across this story via a charming Instagram reel shared by a friend promising to use it as a teaching aid in his new job as an English language teaching assistant in Barcelona. What better way to explain your country of origin than to share a news story which not only reveals the existence of a competition entitled the Decked Out Doughnut Championship, but also showcases the highly specific, gentle yet deeply earnest enthusiasm of a small town bakery owner whose establishment has just taken out the top prize.

Given my grocery list this week literally includes fish, flour and feta (for curry, sourdough and savoury scones), Shanti Mathias’ article unpacking what’s at stake as temperatures rise and the South Island’s glaciers melt faster and faster, without being replenished. It is not a cheerful read, but it is an informative one, clearly illustrating the links between snowmelt and irrigation, irrigation to crops and livestock, farming to the kai lining – or not – our supermarket shelves.

Visa Wellington On a Plate kicks off

Cuba Street will be buzzing on August 1st, the first day of Visa Wellington On a Plate. Head to Loretta to meet ex-Noma chef Rosio Sanchez and sample her world-famous tacos. Pop by Garage Project for the Japanese-inspired Matsuri Madness party. Finish with affogatos in cookie cups at Kāpiti Ice Cream x Good Fortune Coffee. Hungry for more? Get all the details here.

…but what about the cocktail? A Review of the KG Club Cocktail at Open Late

The KG Club cocktail was a one-night only special, a spin on the classic Long Island Iced Tea with pink grapefruit soda instead of the usual cola. In my opinion, this KG version is better than the original – although my favourite cocktail of all time is a simple Paloma, so we know I’m a sucker for that grapefruit tang. But this drink was not only a little tangy, it was also sweet, aromatic and vaguely medicinal, likely due to the presence of five different spirits in there – vodka, tequila, rum, gin and triple sec – although as the Open Late team explained, this is part of why they chose it: all those spirits cater to all kinds of tastes, speaking to the fluidity of queerness on Karangahape.

Mā te wā, 

Lucinda