Australian Food

Aussies refer to their home as the "Lucky Country," which is apt when it comes to Australia's abundance and variety of food. They are blessed with many exotic fruits, a huge variety of fish, some of the best lamb and beef in the world, and, thanks to the immigration rules that were changed after WWII, almost every sort of cuisine.

Apart from Italian, Greek, and Lebanese food, which is now firmly established in Australia, Asian cuisine is having a major effect. Japanese, Thai and Chinese food is particularly popular. Modern Australian cuisine is a fairly meaningless term, but some of the country's trendier chefs are now producing a hybrid of Asian and European cuisine, with interesting results.

Barbecues are very popular with Australians who like a casual lifestyle and eating outdoors. Most homes would have outdoor barbecue facilities or portable barbecues. Many parks and beaches have designated barbecue areas. You will hear the steady sizzle of meats and seafood over coals around the country on balmy summer evenings and during weekends.

The sheep flock of 170,000 million is the second largest in the world after Russia. Three quarters of sheep are merinos bred initially for wool, then mutton once their wool-growing days are over. The remaining 25 per cent is prime lamb production.

Over the last five years Australia has become a serious coffee-drinking nation. With some obvious exceptions (certain parts of Queensland, for example) you can get an excellent cup of coffee from Dimboola to Darwin. Melbourne is the home of the sidewalk café, but other Australian cities are catching up fast. Most of the better cafés serve fresh, affordable snacks, meals, and Italian ice cream.

Is there such a thing as "Native Australian Cuisine"? You bet there is -- and the current revival of "bush tucker" among chefs is making for some of the most creative dishes anywhere in the world. Using the indigenous plants and herbs, chefs like Andrew Fielke of Adelaide's Red Ochre Grill are finding that bush tomato, sea parsley, riberry and and quandong, a native sweet peach, can make the rich variety of lamb, seafood, pheasant and other meats, fish and fowl into its own unique world-class gourmet cuisine.

For an explanation of some of the more unusual Australian food stuffs, see the Bush Tucker article in this section.

The Epicentre. © 2006. All rights reserved.