Rebecca Barnes knows native bushfoods
Victoria Cosford
It’s my latest obsession; native thyme infused vinegar. Herby, a little sweet – it’s a knockout – a gutsy dimension added to my most-nightly salads. And the strawberry gum, a generous scatter into a recent raspberry muffin mix, added a thrilling new layer. These are merely two of the native bushfoods Rebecca Barnes has been growing, promoting and educating about for over twenty years in her business Playing With Fire; part of what she poetically describes as ‘this huge, ignored, unknown world’.
It certainly was like that when she started out, although the industry has made strides since then. The fact that McDonald’s offer a wattleseed coffee is evidence that native foods have finally entered the mainstream, and cooking shows like Master Chef, which regularly feature them, are furthering the cause. Even so, while we have come a long way from the days when Davidson’s plum and lemon myrtle constituted our sum knowledge of the bounteous pantry of native foods surrounding us, factors like supply and cost of ingredients remain deterrents. Rebecca says that the former remains an issue and that, ‘climate change is starting to impact the availability of some lines.’ She says, ‘we definitely need more growers that are serious about supply into the future.’ The supply issues affect price, she continues, ‘as do the low volumes inhibiting development of machinery and more efficient systems.’ All her products are still made and processed by hand, so, by way of example she says, ‘we just finished doing a food service order of 130kg of Davidson’s plum – all diced by hand!’.
Meanwhile, what a rich store for us to draw on! Wattleseed, peppermint and strawberry gums, bunya nuts, rosellas, karkalla, aniseed myrtle, Dorrigo pepper, warragal greens. We need Rebecca to start her own TV cooking show so we can learn more about incorporating these glorious ingredients into our day-to-day cooking. For now, we’re lucky to have her at the farmers’ markets!
Join us for Welcome to Country, 9am Tuesday 5 July at New Brighton Farmers Market, and 9am Friday 8 July at Mullum Farmers Market.
You will find Playing with Fire every Tuesday at New Brighton Farmers Market from 8–11am and every Friday from 7–11am
