Traditions relating to food are increasingly being celebrated in Australia’s cultural melting pot, providing many exciting opportunities to experience tastes and flavours, both exotic and accessible.
Food has a central role in many community activities and special events and is an essential component of hospitality. Where green tea was the entry point for communication in my time in VietNam, in India my recent experience was that chai was the equivalent entry point. It was a demonstration of individual and regional difference in what may appear a simple recipe for spiced tea. A far cry from the powdered chai latte prevalent here. The nuances and special touches in recipes were prized and respected. Similarly here, a unique flavour to foods and recipes is one way to celebrate diversity. Without a diverse range of foods available not only are we nutritionally worse off, but culturally as well. In many communities around the world even when the makings of meals prove light on quantities, great importance is placed on the artistry, love, generosity and pride expressed in bringing food to the table, particularly for visitors.
In Victoria Cultural Diversity Week March 16 – 24th includes National Harmony Day on March 21st and the exciting concept of a Taste of Harmony – where in workplaces around Victoria people can come together to share food and stories from different cultural backgrounds.
Despite food rituals and traditions in Australia growing in popularity there is still scope for greater festivity around food, especially when that includes a wide and varied range of foods and celebrations. It doesn’t have to be a huge organised festival, but a smaller local celebration of the produce and associated activities unique to one region or community. Seasonal bounties and the associated harvest festivals often provide the conduit for this type of community interaction overseas. In a previous blog I have shown how in Mexico radishes are celebrated in novel ways. Perhaps more citrus festivals would be beneficial to the farmers in northern Victoria who forsake their orange crops due to lack of markets.
There are some who criticise this level of interest in food as an obsession. Indeed, it was the theme for a debate at this year’s Melbourne Food and Wine Festival. Perhaps the proposition should be how we create a healthy interest in sustainable and just food systems, something being addressed by the Australian Food Sovereignty Alliance’s People’s Food Plan Working Paper just released. In the process of creating food policy relevant to communities of the future it is possible to invest in the revival of lost food-related knowledge and skills and the production and celebration of diverse varieties of seasonal produce in a manner that is accessible to everyone.
