42 GOURMET TRAVELLERProduce
ILLUSTRATION DAWN TAN.T
his will be the hardest thing
I’ve written so far. Because I
know I’ll get it wrong, but
to not try is perhaps worse,
so open your mind, please forgive my
missteps, and join this conversation.
I began my career growing Tasmania’s
wild plants, and, having a penchant
for novel ingredients, I was fascinated
by them. Later I worked
with chefs whose
search for new flavours
created demand for my
knowledge, and I was
off – finding wild plants
for dinners on remote
islands, working on
a documentary about
foraging chefs, and selling
Tasmanian edible plants
at my market stall.
Then I started learning about cultural
appropriation. First it was seed savers in
North America, acknowledging custodians
of particular strains of maize, then it was
Toni Burnett-Rands, a heritage chef and
activist working here in Tasmania, fillingmy Facebook feed with articles about
foodways and the gentrification of
traditional dishes such as hot chicken
and barbecue. Finally, it was NAIDOC
Week at my children’s school that
helped me begin to see. And that, says
Trish Hodge, a Palawa woman and the
director of Nita Education, a Tasmanian
Aboriginal education group, is the plan.
Children are
unburdened by the
prejudice that was once
ingrained in education
about Tasmania’s history,
and by the guilt that
many non-Aboriginal
Australians carry about
awkwardly. They happily
join their school
NAIDOC celebration
of living culture, while learning of past
wrongs and sharing the path forward.
I’ve been watching the growing
relationship between Trish and her
colleague Craig Everett, and Asher
Gilding and Franca Zingler of the
Port Cygnet Catering Company.Trish talks of her joy
of working with
chefs who want
to learn, and who
acknowledge the
story of where the
food comes from.The first I saw of their collaboration
was a picture on the Port Cygnet Catering
Company’s Instagram of bower spinach,
Tetragonia implexicoma, that they were
tasting together while harvesting on
Aboriginal land for a Slow Food dinner.
They described the scent and flavour
of the flowers as being like leatherwood
honey, and acknowledged Trish as having
shared the plant with them. It was a
respectful and generous exchange of
learning that I’ve rarely seen. This led
to further dinners at Asher and Franca’s
Cygnet kitchen – interactive events where
people came not only to eat the food,
but to learn from Trish about culture –
and then to Palawa Fire Pit, an event
held over six nights as part of the Dark
Mofo festival. Asher describes many
native-food experiences in Australia
as fine dining, but this event, with
barbecues, and flatbreads stuffed with
wallaby seasoned with native herbs,
was accessible for everyone.
Trish and Craig take schoolchildren
with them when they harvest, sharing the
value of finding food on country and
the philosophy of taking only what you
need, a vital part of traditional practice,
to ensure future harvests and to pass
knowledge on to younger generations.
Trish says that children and international
tourists are particularly receptive. Franca,
for example, is relatively new to Tasmania,
having trained as a pastry chef in
Germany, and brings an open mind;
perhaps this is part of what makes the
collaboration work so well. She loves
the intensity of many indigenous herbs,
and uses small amounts as flavouring and
seasoning: shedescribes pepperberry
meringues, alpine-mint jelly and cumbungi
with oyster mousse. She finds secret
foraging spots with Trish, often places
where native plants are grown to beautify
public land by councils unaware of their
tasty, traditional utility.
Trish talks of her joy of working
with chefswho are receptive, who want
to learn and acknowledge the story of
where the food comes from. She sees it as
making a difference, and as a pathway to
reconciliation. Her work is generous and
inclusive, and she quotes Craig Everett,
saying “culture is sacred, not secret”.Native plants are about history, culture and responsibility
as much as flavour, writesPAULETTE WHITNEY.
Taste of home