Two decades of delicious

Not many catering companies can say they’ve fed a future King and Queen, supported
New Zealand at three Olympic Games, and still have their roots firmly planted in a small New Zealand town. Gourmet Delicious can. Twenty years on from their modest beginning as a two-person operation, they have built something that quietly defies expectation at every turn.

Where it all began

In 2006, Kim Moodie and her business partner Noeleen Christenson looked around at the catering landscape in Cambridge and spotted a gap. The town needed a caterer who could deliver quality, consistently. So they started one, just the two of them.

“We felt there was a need in Cambridge for a reliable, high-end caterer,” says Kim. It sounds straightforward enough. What followed was anything but.

When Ali Foers joined in those early days, something shifted. “That is when our business started to grow,” says Kim. “Ali thrives on challenges and new opportunities, and still does to this day, 20 years later.” Today, Kim and Ali co-own the business together, and that spirit has carried them from a two-person operation to a company employing 25 regular staff
and up to 60 people for larger events. Along the way, they’ve earned multiple industry awards, including the Supreme Winner of the Waipā Networks Business Awards, recognition that confirmed what Cambridge already knew.

Whatever it takes

The Gourmet Delicious motto is “whatever it takes,” and that’s certainly not just words on a wall. The duo can recount no end of jobs where they’ve had to dig deep, think outside the box and go that extra mile to get the delicious results.

“We have had many jobs testing our ‘whatever it takes’ philosophy,” says Kim. Cooking at a beach wedding with no running water or facilities. Catering in London, Rio and Singapore. Sending equipment months in advance to Biwa, Japan. Feeding guests from a footpath in Devonport, Auckland. “We take everything we need, and try to troubleshoot anything that might play out. We love a challenge.” 

That word, challenge, keeps popping up. Where others might reach for easier jobs, Ali and Kim see opportunities in all corners. And it’s that classic, go-for-it attitude, more than any single event or accolade, that explains how they ended up at three Olympic Games.

Guest lists like no other

The full roll call of what Gourmet Delicious has delivered over twenty years is the kind of thing that stops you mid-sentence.

Olympic athletes at London 2012, Rio 2016 and the New Zealand Rowing Team at Lake Biwa in Japan. The New Zealand Swim Team in Singapore. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, William and Catherine, during their visit to Cambridge. Most of New Zealand’s Prime Ministers. The Kaimai Crash Memorial. Crankworx. Maadi Rowing Cup. Louise Upston’s wedding.

What’s striking about the list is its range. It moves from the grandest international stages to the most intimate local moments without missing a beat. It takes a particular kind of business to be trusted such a range of events. And it takes a particular kind of team to show up for both with the same standard of care.

Even with a billing list like this, Ali says it’s all the locals that have trusted them to cater for their special functions over the last two decades that are among the most special jobs to them. “We’ve been lucky to be part of some incredible events, but it’s the locals who keep coming back to us for their own celebrations that really mean the most,” Ali says.

From kitchen to cafés 

None of the three cafés that Gourmet Delicious now run were planned. Not a single one. “No, it wasn’t the plan to open cafés, it just evolved,” says Kim.

Suburban Kitchen on Robinson Street came first, in 2015, born out of a business course. “Ali and I had to do a business plan for a new venture in 16 weeks,” Kim explains. “We made the plan a reality. We saw it as a great opportunity, and the location was brilliant.” The deadline of an academic exercise became reality as a real-world venue.

Podium Café followed in 2017, when the team was asked to build and open a café at Lake Karāpiro, home to some of New Zealand’s most iconic rowing events. Then came Clementine in 2020, at the Amber Garden Centre on Peake Road. “We were only open three weeks before the first lockdown,” Kim says. The fact that Clementine not only survived but thrives today says a great deal about the resilience baked into this business.

Alongside these they are also incredibly proud of their specialist bakery, Foers & Co. “Everything is made fresh by our wonderful pastry chef Asif and sold through our cafés,” says Kim. The bakery has become a true highlight for our regulars, offering a range of delicious pastries and baked treats that showcase Asif’s talent and passion.

The three cafés are deliberately kept distinct, with different menus, different atmospheres and different clientele. But there is one non-negotiable common thread. “All with the same Vivace coffee, though,” says Kim, with the certainty of someone who has never once considered compromising on that particular point. Alongside the cafés, the team also runs GD Eats, a food truck deployed for events and site catering. Another gap spotted and another opportunity taken.

Reading the room (and the menu)

Twenty years in hospitality gives you an education that no course can fully replicate. Kim and Ali have watched food culture in Cambridge evolve in real time, and what they describe is a customer base that has grown more discerning and more diverse in its needs.

“Customers like fresh, light, tasty meals. They like that we make everything ourselves, baking, chutneys and sauces,” says Ali. “Our house-made ethos has become a genuine point of difference, particularly in an era when so much in the hospitality industry is bought-in and reheated,” she adds.

Dietary requirements have evolved from a minor consideration into a central one. “There is more and more need for special dietary requirements, especially in our catering,” Ali notes. The range of what people need has expanded dramatically and continues to surprise. The latest might indeed surprise people – the carnivore diet and the pollotarian diet. Pollotarians are semi-vegetarians who eat poultry and plant-based food, but avoid red meat, pork and often, fish. Twenty years ago, neither of those terms existed in the average caterer’s vocabulary.

A source of pride

Ask them what they are the most proud of, and neither reach for the name-dropping guest lists or the awards.

“We are proud of our awesome team, many of whom have been with us for a long time. They are amazing,” says Kim. In an industry notorious for high turnover and burnout, the fact that people stay and stay for years is itself a measure of something important about how this business is run.

“We are also proud to have been in business for 20 years, thanks to the support from Cambridge,” Ali adds.

“Cambridge is an amazing place to live. I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else. It’s growing and it’s really neat to be a part of that.” Many clients and customers have become good friends over the years, which is part of the charm of small town business.

What comes next

So what does a business do after twenty years, three cafés, a food truck, and a client list that spans royalty to rowing champions?

“We carry on trying to do our best at all that we do,” says Kim.

It might sound modest, but Gourmet Delicious got to where they are today by showing up consistently, doing the work, caring about the detail, and trusting that if you always do your best, whether on a beach with no running water, in a café that opened three weeks before a national lockdown, or at an Olympic Games on the other side of the world, the rest takes care of itself.

Gourmet Delicious Ltd operates Suburban Kitchen on Robinson Street, Podium Café at
Lake Karapiro, and Clementine at Amber Garden Centre, Peake Road. For catering enquiries visit gourmetdelicious.co.nz