Food writer Lauraine Jacobs’ new book explores Matakana and the surrounding districts’ local artisans, food businesses, wineries, breweries, restaurants, cafés and boutique accommodation.
One of the many food producers featured in It takes a village is horticulturalist Hamish Alexander’s business, Southern Paprika.
She's also included Matakana-inspired recipes, like one for making fritters out of Mahurangi oysters
Jacobs tells Kathryn Ryan her book follows the stories of 25 "local heroes" who show the depth and growth of the area.
"Over the 20 years that I have been at Ōmaha, I've seen an enormous explosion of artisanal food producers, artists, people who want a wonderful lifestyle, don't want to go too far away from the city, it's only an hour from Auckland."
For almost 40 years, horticulturalist Hamish Alexander has been growing capsicums in at Ōmaha Flats and now employs more than 150 people.
He started out at Ōmaha growing crops like melons and squash for the market, but five years after doing it under a glasshouse, they expanded so much they had to operate out of Warkworth, he says.
"The way that place is developing, it's definitely becoming more of a lifestyle, artisan type of area. So the commercial side of our operation which is out here at Warkworth, 26 hectares under glass, doesn't quite fit out there.
"It's just the limitations, water and various other things, conflicts of commercial area."
The original glasshouse still is in operation, growing seedlings for the bigger the Warkworth arm.
He says they are also growing Pitt Island and Chatham Island palms just out of the original glasshouse, which get sold to landscaping places.
"It's sort of a passive use of the land that doesn't upset neighbours generally."
Matakana is well known for its Saturday morning market with a wide array of producers - from buffalo cheese, to citrus, Mahurangi oysters, kombucha, chocolate, and coffee roasters, Jacobs says, which has made it popular even with Aucklanders.
"Not too far away, there's a farm doing experimental aqua culture with kingfish and whitebait and so you can get whitebait fritters there on Saturday morning and you can oysters, there's lots of wonderful ways you can taste the region as well."
It all started when Christine and Richard Didsbury bought a site and developed it into what is now a carefully curated offering of shops that's "unequalled" in New Zealand, she says.
"What he did first of all was to build a farmers' market that actually had a dedicated kitchen where people could go and create their products, because the laws become a little hazy when you produce something to sell.
"The other thing that did too is it gave the people the opportunity for people to get known as a brand and to grow themselves.
"For example, the original Ōmaha Organic Blueberries who are now OOB, and have now actually gone worldwide with their organic vegetable farming."
In her book, Jacobs has 12 Matakana inspired recipes, including one using Southern Paprika's capsicums.
