Aboriginal Food Australia

Fish were hunted with spears and nets.

Aboriginal food australia.

You can taste australian aboriginal food in many places in australia. One of the most well known traditional aboriginal foods is the australian witchetty grub which is actually native to central australia where the watarrka region is located. Similarly pascoe argues australians should be consuming more native fauna like kangaroo and wallaby that was also once an aboriginal food instead of hoofed animals such as sheep and cattle which were introduced by settlers. They like collecting acacias lemon aspen seeds herbs fruits and nuts roots of eucalyptus fig trees grass trees apples quandong and lilly pilly.

Wild millet was the principle grain. The yellow fat of the goanna a large australian lizard was considered a delicacy and also smeared on the body to protect the skin from drying and cracking in the harsh sun. The witchetty grub remains a common snack or meal addition in australia and is high in protein and nutrition. Many restaurants have bush tucker on menu.

Traditionally the aboriginal people have been known to turn this nut into a paste to be eaten or cooked on hot coals making bread. But to the aborigines who had thrived in australia for nearly 40 000 years this landscape was a seasonal supermarket providing bush plums and figs desert raisins honey ants edible reptiles and marsupials. Facts about aboriginal food 6. In other parts of australia indigenous people constructed elaborate fish and eel traps in creeks and rivers.

Other insects eaten by aboriginal australians include cicadas and caterpillars. A prominent food for the australian aboriginals is the bunya nut. The food that the aboriginal people gather is from the australian bush. Australian fauna is adapted to the environment puts less pressure on water supplies does not compact the soil and by cultivating genetic diversity which has been greatly reduced in our food system increases resilience.

Similar to a chestnut in both taste and appearance this nut can be eaten raw or cooked. A wide range of plants and animals were eaten by australia s aborigines and insect foods included certain ants grubs moths and beetles while streams provided fish and eels in some regions. Middens along the ocean shorelines show that shellfish and crustaceans were also important aboriginal food sources. And aboriginal people organise bush tucker tours in deserts tropical rainforests and many national parks where they explain what plants were collected how they were prepared and what they were used for.

Birds were eaten including waterfowl scrub fowl the cassowary and the jabiru. Australian and aboriginal cuisine is an amazing combination of the foods prepared and eaten by not only the aborigines the natives who have lived in australia for about 50 000 to 60 000 years but also those of the british colonists and the settlers who stayed behind after english colonization was over as well as a more recent influence of east asian and mediterranean immigrants. Flowers that caught the morning dew even provided water in the desert.