Fleur Sullivan looks out the window of her restaurant and sees a fishing boat coming in.
Even after six years, she is still excited about what the fishermen might have caught and what will be on tonight and tomorrow's menu.
Half an hour later, they deliver their catch, chat to her and chef Simon Peacock, then gather round the bar of the almost empty, mid-afternoon restaurant for a beer and a yarn.
"How lucky can I be, to go out there and bring in a tray of fish," Ms Sullivan said.
"Those guys have gutted the fish but the flat fish is still wriggling at the edges. I say, 'it's been gutted and it's still moving' and he said, 'it might be gutless but it's still got a brain'- which makes you look at it in a different light."
After she sold Oliver's, the lodge and restaurant she established in Clyde 20 years earlier, Ms Sullivan had no intention of starting another restaurant.
She might still be in Clyde if she had not been diagnosed with cancer in the late 1990s, she said.
She moved to Moeraki to be nearer her mother and because it was such a beautiful place.
She tried to ignore the fresh fish coming ashore from the boats in the bay below her house but it was impossible.
"I looked down from where I lived one day and there was this little building here and the sun was shining on the roof and I thought, 'you are going to be very sorry if you don't do that, if you keep ignoring it. You'll be very sad one day that you didn't do it'," she said.
"Because as long as I wasn't ill - who knows if you are better, ever. But certainly, I couldn't switch my mind off how beautiful it would be to have a restaurant here and have a sign out at the road saying, 'Fish smokers opening at 2.30 today'.
"People would drive in. I suppose it's like those places in France selling goat's cheese."
The restaurant grew from its early incarnation as a caravan stall simply because there were fishermen, fishing boats and fish, she said.
The fish was unloaded from the boat and brought straight to the kitchen - not an easy thing to arrange with current fish regulations.
Ms Sullivan has her own quota and fishermen who are willing to catch it and do the paperwork.
She has a fish receiver's licence, which means she can buy fish directly for resale.
Other people around the country wanting to buy fish directly often phoned her for advice, she said.
Behind both Oliver's in Clyde and the restaurant in Moeraki was her sense of the history of places and how people lived, what they produced, and the traditions of food and heritage, Ms Sullivan said.
That approach was becoming more common with the development of farmers markets, an interest in regional cuisine and the slow food movement.
It was something that fascinated her on a visit to Europe with friends Michael and Mari-Anne Coughlin, of Bell Pepper Blues restaurant in Dunedin, after she sold Oliver's.
She could stand for hours and absorb the scenery, the decor, the food - wooden floors and furniture hundreds of years old; cotton curtains wafting in the windows.
"I need to soak the whole thing up, always. So for me in everyday life, if I can't spend that time, it's like getting your plate taken off you. I never finish anything because I never have enough time.
"If I didn't, I wouldn't be able to do what I do, hopefully as well as I do. You might have a natural instinct for it all but you have to get it from somewhere."
Fleurs Place, perched on the edge of the wharf, is built from a recycled barn.
The crockery and cutlery are antiques she has collected for years.
After years in the hospitality business, difficult as it is, she still loves what she does and is shocked to be approaching 70.
"I can't avoid thinking about getting to be 70. There's nothing surer I haven't got 40 years to look at, I've only got 10 years or something."
True to her philosophy, her suppliers are local - Roger Belton, of Southern Clams, who harvests from Blueskin Bay; Allison McTavish, who grows potatoes and vegetables for her at Moeraki; Rod Phillips, who grows asparagus near Palmerston; Whitestone and Evansdale cheeses, and many others.
She and her staff also forage for wild foods.
Last autumn was not a good season for mushrooms, but it will soon be time to gather elderflowers and make the year's supply of cordial.
Kelp is gathered and tied to the wharf to keep fresh to make kelp bags for the cooking of cockles "But it's not just fun; it's not just enjoyable; it's not just beautiful cheese and beautiful wine, and beautiful people," she said.
"It's keeping about 17 staff in Moeraki happy and working. It's not a problem of finding work for them, it's a problem of getting them to want to work and work as hard as they have to while they are here.
"It's a hard-working kitchen and we have tubs of fish arriving, and truckloads of soup to make. It's not just a sweet little place."
Among the international kitchen crew that have found their way to Moeraki is head chef Simon Peacock (30), originally from Central Otago, who returned from working in Australia and Europe because he enjoys cooking with local fresh ingredients.
He likes Ms Sullivan coming in with bunches of watercress, or New Zealand spinach, or chervil from her garden and working with whatever comes off the boats.
When Fleurs Place first opened, most of the fish they sold was blue cod, but now people are more adventurous and the kai moana platter offers people a selection of interesting things to try.
Besides blue cod and flat fish, they also occasionally enjoy conger eel, octopus, mackerel, crabs and other fish.
The staff also enjoy the guests, many of whom are like-minded.
"We are probably more fortunate than a lot of restaurants. They purposely come here and we talk to them all and we know where they come from. They like to tell us why they are here and what made them come here, and I think maybe a lot of restaurants don't get as much interaction as us."
The locals, too, have taken her and the restaurant to their heart and there is a strong sense of community.
She has been made to feel at ease in Moeraki, Ms Sullivan says.
Fleurs Place, by Paul Sorrell with photographs by Graham Warman and recipes by Fleur Sullivan and Simon Peacock, will be published by Penguin on September 29 (pbk, $45)
Grilled sole fillet with Whitestone rarebit & nicoise
This dish by Simon Peacock has become more popular than Fleurs Place's famous blue cod wrapped in bacon, according to Fleur Sullivan.
Serves four
Ingredients
16 large sole fillets
butter
Rarebit
250ml Emerson's lager or beer
2 tbsp plain flour
2 tbsp Dijon mustard
300g tasty cheese, grated
2 eggs
2 egg yolks
Nicoise salad
4 eggs, boiled for 6 minutes and cooled
200g green bean batons, blanched and refreshed in cold water
16 anchovy fillets
16 new potatoes, cooked and cooled
100g black Kalamata olives
4 tomatoes, chopped
salad leaves to garnish
Method
In a heavy-bottomed pot, bring the beer to the boil. Reduce heat and whisk in flour, avoiding lumps.
Add mustard and cheese and allow to melt slowly. Move from the heat, allow to cool slightly, then beat in eggs and yolks until smooth. Cool completely.
To assemble, preheat a hot grill. Lay 4 fillets per serve on a greased tray and brush with melted butter.
Grill for 4-5 minutes until three-quarters cooked.
Cover with cooled rarebit and grill until browned and bubbling.
Arrange nicoise ingredients attractively on serving plates for 4 people, and dress with house dressing. Transfer hot sole fillets on to salad and serve immediately.
House dressing
200ml white wine vinegar
2 tbsp wholegrain mustard
2 tbsp local honey
1 tbsp strong Dijon mustard
500ml vegetable oil or light olive oil
seasoning
In a bowl, whisk together the vinegar, mustards and honey. Drizzle in oil while whisking.
Season and keep in a bottle in the fridge.
