Food

The food here is amazing! It’s not fancy, it’s relatively familiar, and boy is it good! There are 5 eating times (not quite meals) every day, making the kitchen an important hub of activity. It is a small building consisting mainly of a cooking area and an eating area, separated by a counter of sorts. There are other rooms, but I don’t know what they’re for, so they clearly don’t matter. The building is almost always hot and always smells incredible. It is presided over a 60-something woman named Kay, whose husband is the mechanic and whose son works cattle. Although she is nominally temporary until they get someone permanent, she works magic in that place.

Breakfast is at 6:00. While this seems unreasonably early, predawn is the only time of day when it’s not oppressively hot and humid, so early morning is actually the most productive time around here. Until we get a full time cook, breakfast is being handled by one of the Station hands, a large, strong man, aptly called Bull. The meal is a condensed version of the English fry, meaning fried eggs, grilled tomatoes, Canadian-ish bacon, and toast. Every once in a while spaghetti-on-toast makes an appearance. (It’s basically spaghetti-O’s on toast. Yuck.) There are other strange Australian breakfast habits, like baked beans on toast, or pancakes with ice cream and syrup. (I had this particular delicacy at the HiWay Inn. What a GREAT idea!) All of this is accompanied by hot tea, coffee or milo (“energy food drink” something like tasteless hot chocolate, if you can bear to drink anything hot.

The next meal of the day is called “Smoko,” which I believe is a derivative of the smoking break. It is every morning at 9:30 and is recognized as being every bit as legitimate a meal as any other. It usually involves a cup of tea or coffee and whatever baked good Kay came up with the day before. America, I think there is something to be learned here.

Lunch is from 12:30-1:30; a difficult adjustment when you expect it at noon on the dot. Kay puts out sandwich fixings, salad (no dressing, only mayo – very Belg), leftovers from last night, and something new each day.

Work generally wraps up around 5 (thus far) and then at 6:00 the Recreational Club opens. The Rec Club is a little concrete structure with a pool table, a flat screen, a bar and a back patio. Drinks can only be bought from 6-7 and no alcohol leaves the building. There are 2 well-stocked fridges full of sodas (which all seem to be referred to as “Cokes”), beer, and canned mixed drinks (which are only available on Fri & Sat). Only 1 brand of beer is carried; XXXX Gold and XXXX Bitter, a Queensland company, both varieties of which are terrible concoctions that the guys swear by. There is also an unusual assortment of chips and candy bars, including “Twisties,” “Freddo Frog Twins,” “Crunchies,” and “Raspberry Gummies.” My favorite aspect of Australian food is that instead of listing “calories” on the nutritional label, it informs you of the “energy” content – a far more positive spin on junk food.

Last but certainly never least, dinner starts at 7:00. Wow. We have had roast chicken, curry beef with rice, roast with squash, onions and potatoes, and best of all, meat pies, to name just a few. Everything is something very familiar, yet somehow executed in a decidedly non-American way. Good food for working hard. Most of the young guys manage to inhale enough food to feed a small village in less than 15 minutes and then split. I have not yet developed this skill.