Dumplings & ANZACs. The Golden Syrup story in Australia.
8 April 2025

April 2025 Just the other day a school friend of mine living in England sent me an article from the Spectator about ‘Golden Syrup Dumplings’ which the article said are ‘a …

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Small Mulch


Bitter Bread and Sour
6 April 2025

A paper for 'Cooking and Eating in Adversity' New Zealand Symposium of Gastronomy and Food History. November 2020 For dole bread is bitter bread Bitter bread and sour There’s grief in the taste …

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Damper, Wild Duck and A Cup of Tea. Bush cooking while droving.
5 April 2025

April 2025 Most days breakfast is damper and a cup of tea. The cook has been awake well before the drovers to prepare these. Every cook has his own recipe for …

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Larder  Basics 2025
1 April 2025

March 2025 I asked: What are the bare essentials in your larder? The top five were Olive oil Tinned tomatoes Pasta (specified non gluten for one of you) Garlic Onions There’s clearly a lot of spag bol being …

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Carping on. A brief history of eating carp in Australia
31 March 2025

March 2025 In January 2025 The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC from hereon) showed the series ‘Eat The Invaders’. Host Tony Armstrong  - with the help of scientists, land carers, an artist …

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A 2000 year old curry ? A culinary journey from South Asia to South East Asia
31 March 2025

March 2025 In July 2023 a team of archaeolgists announced that they had found evidence at Oc Eo, an archaeological site in South Vietnam dating back 2000 years, of the use …

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Caramel, Potatoes,  and Liver and Bacon. Victoria Department of Public Instruction Cookery Instruction Cards 1930
29 March 2025

March 2025 Sometime between 1887 – 1906  the Victorian Department of Public Instruction published a set of 30 Cookery Instruction Cards. A set cost 1 shilling and individual cards could be …

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Meat and a skewer. One hundred years of the kebab at the multi culinary Australian Table
29 March 2025

March 2025 I have wanted for some time to write about elements of South Asian cuisines other than curry. For instance, the tandoor, the thali, sweet confections like gulab jamun, and …

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Parmesan Cheese, the early years 1830 – 1880. A vignette
23 March 2025

March 2025 As I was dusting Parmesan cheese onto my spaghetti Bolognaise the other night I fell to wondering what the backstory of Parmesan in Australia was. When was it first …

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Billycan in my hand. Australian folk songs about food
22 March 2025

2025 The unofficial Australian national song, ‘Waltzing Matilda’ is about a swagman (an itinerant) stealing a sheep that has come to drink from the billabong at which the swaggie has set …

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Pineapples, Pineapples, Pineapples. The Golden Circle Tropical Recipe Book
20 March 2025

20 March 2025 It’s the most vibrantly coloured cookery book in my collection – the Golden Circle Tropical Recipe Book. Across its 96 pages it gives recipes for using pineapple in …

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Carmen curlers, extra marital lovers, and some damn good food. The quartet of Bernard King’s 1977 seasonal cookbooks as camp texts.
12 March 2025

March 2025 Through the course of 1977 Celebrity Chef Bernard King released a quartet of cookbooks, one for each season beginning with Autumn. King was an openly camp gay man on …

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Diggings 10 March 2045
10 March 2025

Pies to pavlovas. The culinary landscape of the Australian Hostess Cookbook (1969) In I969 the Australian Hostess Cookbook was published, edited by Hanna Pan. The Cookbook is in the form of …

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