Bush Tucker

Friday 18th May

Wishing to get into the spirit of things, we booked ourselves onto the resort's "bush-tucker" talk at 5.30pm. It was held in the gourmet "Seabelle" restaurant, where they have a fish-bowl kitchen, whatever that means. So there they all are, all these resort guests, who've had an hour or so to get changed into something more fragrant than a Marks and Spencer cotton tee-shirt, all sitting in a semi-circle with their long gin and tonics, awaiting their education.

And then we rock up with Ella in her pushchair, which we have to bunny-hop down all the polished wooden stairs in the restaurant. And it's tea-time, so we've figured the only way to keep her quiet while we get educated in the ways of native Australian cooking is to pack her a picnic, preferably something that'll keep her quiet for a whole hour. Preferably something like a treat.

So Ella sits in her pushchair with a tupperware plate of cheese and tomato sandwiches, carefully removing the tomatoes and passing them to me "there you go, Mummy". We start on the bush tucker; macadamia pesto, bunya nuts, bush tomatoes, aniseed myrtle. Ella starts loudly on a bag of cheesy nik-naks, offering me one every so often and getting upset if I refuse. She lines them up on her tray, counting them out before stuffing them into her mouth, her face now covered in orange stuff.

It's a treat for the palate alright. Illawarra plum, cheesy nik-nak, lemon aspen, cheesy nik-nak, Red Quandong, cheesy nik-nak.

And then she demolishes a Cadbury Freddo Frog and announces "finished" just as we wind up. It was a close call. The Aussies are hoping that bush tucker will become their signature dish, their speciality. For my part, I'll never be able to think "bush tucker" without thinking "cheesy nik-nak". I'm not sure it'll catch on.