Home Cooking and native bush food teaching and Indigenous Countries
Good evening 
Last week and this week was all about food and we even went along to the Melton Botanical Gardens which hosts an Indigenous food garden to teach lil miss about native bush foods. We'd heard from a friend to head down as it was a great location for educational purposes.
Lil Miss loves cooking and we started off with crepes instead of pancakes, personally I really enjoy crepes more than pancakes they're alot thinner and easier to eat and don't leave you as bloated.
Lil miss is an absolute wizz in the kitchen and I just sat back handing her the ingredients as she wished it all together. I don't feel confident handing her the fry pan as yet especially with crepes as you need to pick up the fry pan and roll it so the batter thins out.
Lil Miss agrees they were far better than pancakes, we topped them up with some yummie Ice Cream, vanilla of course! We didn't make enough as Lil miss are 3 mumma bear ate 3 and dad ate one :( ah well I'm sure they're saving me from the additional calories. Lil Miss' excuse for eating so many was that she cooked them so she gets first dibs.
For dinner we made some pork spare ribs where lately I've been trying to teach her about different flavours. Please correct me if I'm wrong and if you have any other herb and spice blends let me know.
By standard practice Rosemary and Garlic goes with all meats but Oregano with steak, thyme with lamb and pork has a few different options.
This specific blend is paprika, garlic powder, salt, pepper, cummin, onion powder, olive oil and then rubbed all over to cover. Lil Miss loved getting her hands dirty.
I cook these a little different in a tray with a rack and 2 cups of water which brings the water line just below the rack and doesn't touch the meat. Cooking for about 3 hrs turning at the 1.5hr mark produces a beautifully soft pull apart pork but with lovely pork fat. You can also use the left over juices spilled into the water to make a lovely BBQ sauce flavoured gravy/condiment.
We then headed off to the Melton Botanical Gardens to explore traditional bush foods from bush tomatoes, yams (type of Aussie potato that's really thin and is a root of a flowering plant) push watermelons (not in season though) bush cabbage and the various different native plants. It was a great garden with a few different Australian native areas from across the country.
My favourite part was the giant Australian mural which had all the different indigenous mobs (tribes) lands listed on it. My wife and I are half Indigenous hailing from the Wiradjuri mob in Central NSW and part of Victoria.
Our country is this big bit of land mass and one of the largest mobs or family groups. My wife is a little more upper class than me. She hails from traditional owners and lore men and women. Her blood line is similar to royalty which means really nothing these days as it was all taken.
But in short, yes. Technically Lil Miss is an actual princess and in line to inherit her own parcel of land had the same lores been applied and continued. I don't think she understood or knows what that means but I do often tell her that she is a princess. She thinks I am joking when she comes out in her Elsa from frozen dress asking me Dad do I look like a princess I always respond, why are you dressing up as a pretend princess when you are a real princess?
In time she will understand but alot more learning will occur in this field, a hard one but it is good to know you're history and heritage even if it isn't currently valid.
I hope you enjoyed this week's learning, I know I did!