Dingo’s Breakfast

There is something life giving about rolling out of the swag at daylight in the bush, with cockatoos and parrots flicking through the trees, their voices harsh like the climate. The smell of eucalypt smoke and the first sounds of the fire starting to crackle as it is rekindled from last nights coals. The sight of fellow campers stirring not quite yet awake, peering over the tops of their swags first worried, then relieved to see that someone else is up stoking the fire and putting the billy on.

In the swagmans days, often there was little or no tucker in the tucker bags and this is probably where the “Dingo’s Breakfast” originated from.

Basically a Dingo’s Breakfast is to get up at day light, “have a piss and a good look around”, before setting off on your way again.

What you need

• Full bladder
• Empty tucker bags

What you do

Gaze about the bush whilst emptying the bladder.

Tricks & Tips

Whistling is optional.

Rating

Not very nutritious

Billy Tea

Making Billy Tea is one of those legendary pastimes where every bushy has his own method and style and fiercely disputes the quality of any tea made by any other bushy. The main thing with billy tea is to remember that it doesn’t matter what it tastes like, you have to look real good making it. So with this being the accepted rules of billy tea making, it is no wonder we have a whole craft made up of forked sticks, jam pots tied with wire, gum leaves and bearded bushies swirling boiling water round their heads. It has become acceptable behaviour to threaten the safety of anyone foolish enough to be still standing that close to the campsite after the antics started.

What you need

• Tea, Australian grown of course
• Sugar as needed
• Milk as needed
• Water
• “Billy Can”, make your own or buy one
• Forked stick
• Fire

What you do

Drag some coals out of the fire and put the billy on. When boiling, throw in a single fistful of tea for each person and then throw one in for the pot. Leave on heat for another minute then pull away from coals using the forked stick on the handle to lift.

This is where the rot sets in.

Grab billy handle with hat or other suitable insulator and swing quickly around in a full circle three times bringing it back up past your knee then back over your shoulder and so completing a full circle each time. The reason for doing this is to sink the tea leaves to the bottom of the pot so you can pour a drink without filling the cup with tea leaves.

However if you just let it sit for a minute or two and then pour carefully you still get a good cuppa without risking life and limb.

Tricks & Tips

Some people apparently use tea strainers.

Rating

Nothing like a good tin mug of billy tea to start the day, and for smoko drink with a slab of damper in the other hand.

Damper

We could have produced an entire book with different recipes, and different schools of thought on damper. We offer you one alternative, but the traditional thing to do is practice making it until you’re comfortable with it and then tell everyone else that your recipe is the one true damper. Bragging is necessary when it comes to Damper cooking, a bit like fishing and Billy Tea making.

What you need

• 1kg bag of self raising flour
• Water
• Salt
• Tablespoon of milk powder (optional)
• Tablespoon of icing sugar (optional)
• Raisins or sultanas (optional)

What you do

Put the flour in a bowl large enough to mix in. Mix in half a teaspoon of salt and any or all of the optional ingredients. When dry ingredients are well mixed, add water while cutting mixture with a butter knife. Keep cutting until mixture is evenly wet and resembles dough. With well floured hands, pick up and drop into your already pre heated camp oven, and shovel some coals on to the lid. Check in twenty minutes, should take about thirty minutes give or take a few. Use a piece of fencing wire to spear the damper, if no dough sticks to it when you pull it out then it is cooked.

Tricks & Tips

The milk powder and the icing sugar make the difference between it being a good damper and a bloody legend of a damper. Also try basting the top of the damper with a bit of milk and sprinkle the surface with sesame seeds, hmm yummy.

Rating

Everyone’s favourite.

Jonny Cakes

What would a bush recipe book be without an aboriginal standard. In the tradition of damper and bush bread, “Johnny Cakes” are a staple in any aboriginal camp. A close friend of ours, Browny, swore us to secrecy on this recipe. So don’t tell anyone where you got it.

What you need

• 1kg bag of self raising flour
• Water
• Salt
• Chicken wire (or wire grill)

What you do

You will need a flat bed of coals to cook on and no flame. If you don’t have a manufactured flat grill, you will have to fashion one out of chicken wire. Mix a dough the same as you would for damper. Spend some time on it cutting and kneading. This will aerate the dough and give you a lighter bread.

Break off a piece of dough the size of a tennis ball, roll this into a ball shape and then flatten it out to about 1cm thickness. Throw the grill straight on the coals and the Johny cake straight on the grill. The cake will swell and ‘bubble’ when the bottom is cooked, just turn it over and give it about the same time on the other side.

Tricks & Tips

Because the heat will be so direct, the coals don’t need to be that hot. If you have flames on your coals you will definitely burn these.

If you are making your own grill out of wire, use something flat and heavy to get the grill nice and flat.

Rating

It’s a pity you will have to keep this a secret, because everybody would have loved these.

Eskimo Yabbies

For the man who has everything.

What you need

• Hot day
• Nothing better to do
• Comfy portable chair
• Esky full of beer and ice
• Esky full of fresh caught, boiled yabbies on ice
• Shady tree

What you do

Isn’t it bloody obvious?

Tricks & Tips

Sit as close to the two esky’s as possible so as to conserve energy. Get yourself into a hypnotic yabby peeling beer drinking state and if someone speaks to you either ignore them, or just grunt till they go away.

Rating

Sheer bliss. Wives tend to dislike this one.

Yabbie Cocktails

What you need

• Tomato Sauce
• Mayonnaise
• Yabby tails
• Lemon

What you do

Mix tomato sauce and mayonnaise in equal amounts, add to yabby tails in a bowl and sprinkle lemon juice over the whole show.

Tricks & Tips

Good to eat with a crisp cold beer like Crown Lager

Rating

Moorish. That is the yabbies not the Lager

Mexican Yabbie Barbs

Don’t let any Mexicans in on this recipe, or we’ll have to start thinking of something that rhymes with enchilada and hombre. And we don’t want to be the ones who send ‘Akubra’ broke because everybody wants a sombrero all of a sudden.

What you need

• Tomato Sauce
• Chilli Sauce
• Yabby tails
• Lemon

What you do:

Mix tomato sauce and Chilli sauce in equal amounts, add lemon juice and stir. Pour over yabby tails and leave for an hour. Then chuck the lot onto the barby or the camp oven floor and cook till they are a bit crispy.

Tricks & Tips:

Use a toothpick to eat with. King prawns also go well like this. As with any sort of marinade, it can get a bit messy. The marinade often burns before the meat is cooked, so a fairly low heat is preferable.

If you want to hook straight into your yabbies without worrying about the ‘pooh shute’ (you big girl) then pull it out before you cook them. Grab the yabby by either side of the head, just behind the claws. There are five ‘fins’ at the end of the tail, give the middle one a twist each way and the ‘pooh shute’ will come away with it.

Rating:

Top Tucker.

Bardie Grub Au Natural

Aboriginal peoples in this country have eaten Bardi Grubs and the more widely known Witchety Grubs since time began. Our modern day palettes have been educated to be repulsed at the thought of this, however, we can assure you that once the squeamishness is overcome you will find a food source that is not only delicious but extraordinarily high in protein. A relatively small amount can go along way energy wise. 

The Bardie Grub

If you use more energy collecting food than you gain in nutritional value by eating it, then I’m afraid you are going to starve to death. This happened to a few of the earlier explorers.

The best way to find Bardi’s is to find a local who knows what he is talking about. No doubt he will be in the local pub, so you will obviously have to do quite a bit of research in the pub on this matter. Basically catching them, though simple enough, is a bit of a bush art and is best learnt by demonstration.

Once a “Bardi Tree” has been found, chip away at the ground surface below until you find the holes. These could be a meter or more in length and will have a fat grub at the bottom. Thread a bit of wire with a little ball of wool tied to the end down the hole until you feel a bit of resistance at the end. This is the grub, just dangle the wool around his face until he gets cranky and grabs it, then in one smooth motion slip him up his tunnel and over your shoulder in one careful pull. It is really impressive to watch some of the old timers doing this, and you will have respect for the craft yourself after you have ripped the heads of half a dozen perfectly good Bardi’s

What you need

• As many live grubs as you want to eat.
• A clear path to the nearest tree (in case of involuntary rejection)

What you do

Grip by head with your fore finger and thumb, close your eyes and bite, chew, swallow, 
and hope for the best. Ron loves them, but has to admit that they are better cooked 
than eaten live.

Tricks & Tips:

Its not for everyone, in fact, Ron has cleared a few pubs proving to a disbeliever’s that he actually eats them.
They also are used for Murray Cod bait, though Ron’s tend not to make it to the river without already being eaten. He has often been in trouble for eating the bait.

Rating:

An acquired taste

Bush Prawns (Bardi Grubs)

There are two schools of thought about going to the trouble of cooking Bardi Grubs. On one hand, five Bardi grubs makes a delicious appetiser before a meal in the bush. On the other hand it doesn’t take a genius to realise that five Bardi grubs can be converted into two hundred pounds of cod and feed you for a month.

What you need:

• Bardi Grubs
• Olive oil preferably or any other cooking oil
• A nice chilled Australian white wine

What you do:

Cover the floor of the camp oven with just enough oil to cover the surface, heat it until the oil is simmering but not burning hot. Drop in the fat, juicy, live Bardi Grubs and fry gently. Thirty or so seconds on one side then roll them over and over until they are nice and golden in colour and slightly crispy on the outside.
You will see that the grubs will upon cooking stretch themselves right out so that they are thinner and longer than when you started.

Tricks & Tips:

Surprise your mates and serve this up as an entree with some chilled white wine. 
The texture is that of a delicate prawn, while the flavour will remind you of roasted nuts.

They are really delicious.

Rating:

Get on the Bush Telegraph about this one where ever you are, because it is probably the best kept secret in the bush.

Sulky Stew

We have all heard about the so-called “Hairs of the Dog” recipe’s for morning after cures of alcoholic indulgences. How some blokes rave on about raw eggs with Worcestershire sauce and tomato juice and vodka, well this is one that has been perfected over the years by Hully and may come in handy.

What you need:

• Hangover
• Swag
• Dog

What you do:

Wake up well after sunrise, in fact wake up when the sun is high and has been blasting down on your swag for a couple of hours so that when you finally “come to” you have lost a gallon of sweat, and your throat is as dry as the Strezlecki Track. The cockatoo’s will no doubt choose this moment to gather and screech with laughter at your pain, while the wedge tails will be circling you way up high in the sky, sensing another desert dehydration victim is imminent.

Stagger blindly to the nearest leaning post and get a good grip on it with one hand while you empty even more precious liquid from your bladder. Ponder how it could be at all possible to be so dry this morning when you drank so much liquid last night.

Attack the esky in search of any non-alcoholic liquid, barring vinegar, (a lethal mistake once made by Ron, to the amusement of the whole camp), take a long hard swig then head for the nearest dog and give him a kick for good measure.

Then drag your swag back under the nearest shady tree cursing all the while your so called mates, who in your belief are totally responsible for your present state. Swear off all further communication with them for life and then crawl back into the swag where you spend the rest of the day dozing, waking only briefly to sulk a bit more before slipping back into a death like sleep.

Tricks & Tips:

Always work out where the shade is going to be in the morning and plant your swag there before crashing. Also remember to keep an esky with cold water no more than an arms length from your swag. Make sure you kick someone else’s dog.

Rating:

Death could be a serious alternative and should be contemplated

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