Food Films

It was a cloudy morning, August the 23rd 2007. The sun rose above the glorious Pacific Ocean and the birds woke, chirping, at the crack of dawn. Moments later, the human race began to wake and continue, typically, in their usual habitat unaware of the significant events that were about to unfold. August the 23rd, 2007 was the day the hashtag made its first appearance online and changed the world forever.

In this episode, we follow the journey of the hashtag and its migration to its final home; social media. Join us in discovering how the hashtag has collaborated with other online creatures, such as ‘the influencer’, in order to shape the interests, values and trends that are prevalent amongst the human species. The hashtag continues to shock research professionals in its ability to create online communities among those who share similar interests and hobbies, and its role in perpetuating the growth of businesses and individuals, at a rapid pace. The emergence of the hashtag within social media over the last 11 years has evoked dramatic response from the human race and has changed the online world forever.

Melbourne prides itself as being one of the world’s most multicultural cities, and at the heart of that is our ever-expanding food culture. In fact, food and cuisine is so integral to the city that Melbourne is renowned as Australia’s Culinary Capital. But hidden behind the abundance of European, Asian and Modern cuisine that plagues Melbourne, there is a food culture that has sustained and been nurtured by members of the Kulin Nation for centuries. The question is - where do you find it?

‘Searching for Bush tucker’ is a short film by Beth Glasby and Georgia Holland that follows our journey, as pre-service teachers, in discovering native Australian food in Melbourne. We attempt to explore the factors surrounding the lack of exposure and accessibility of this cuisine in Melbourne. We share our personal insights as to what made us so passionate on this issue, including our monumental educative visits to both Melbourne Museum and Charcoal Lange. The First Peoples of Australia have been surviving off the bounty of this earth for centuries, yet only now are people taking notice. However, the issue remains, how can this cuisine become visible and appreciated whilst ensuring it is appropriated? We welcome you to join us on our journey as we attempt to uncover this issue and go ‘Searching for Bush tucker’.

Australia has always been a multicultural society, having grown its population through immigration for centuries. This has led to a wonderful variety of foods on offer through our restaurants and grocers. Nevertheless, we have fairly rigid notions of what makes ‘Australian’ foods; pies and sauce, fairy bread, Vegemite, lamingtons and the like. We explore what everyday Australians think of this and the kinds of foods they eat on a regular basis. How often do they really eat the iconic dishes aforementioned? Do they know their true origins, which are often more complex than we realise? ‘Culinae australis incognita’ means southern cuisine unknown or hidden—here in terra australis incognito, now known as Australia—there is more than meets the eye behind both our everyday meals and our beloved national foods.

Australian Guide to Healthy Eating (AGHE) is a food selection guide, and a primary educational and promotional tool in the Eat for Health Program of Australia. This short film explores how AGHE is inevitably present in young people’s everyday life and to what extent do young people with diverse backgrounds realise the nutritional requirements for optimal health and wellbeing is associated with their daily food practices. However, does AGHE considers the food intakes and diet-associated health risks of all Australians population as a whole? Anecdotal evidence proves that there is a cultural and socio-political neglect in the current dietary guideline. As AGHE is used by health professionals, policy makers, educators, food manufactures, food retailers, researchers and all those interested in health and nutrition, multicultural and complex social perspectives should be incorporated in the development of a more sophisticated AGHE.

Kangaroo! If you must eat red meat, choose kangaroo, not beef or lamb, for health and environmental benefits.

Indigenous people have hunted, cooked and eaten kangaroo for thousands of years in Australia, as it provided them with a good source of protein. The early British colonists would not have survived the first years of early settlement without the aid of Indigenous people, who shared kangaroo meat with them when they first arrived. It was valued by those early settlers, with kangaroo meat recipes appearing in pioneering cookbooks. Ironically, many of the descendants of those British colonial settlers do not like to eat kangaroo. They have an emotional connection to kangaroos, viewing them as an iconic Australian national emblem, and think that to eat kangaroo meat is uncivilised.

Instead, Australians eat a lot of red meat sourced from cattle and sheep, more familiar to the British palate. These introduced species require more water and food than kangaroos. Cattle and sheep with their hard hooves, are more harmful to the delicate Australian soils, than kangaroos are with their soft paws. There are other environmental benefits too: kangaroos produce far less greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions per kilogram of meat; compared to beef or lamb, which have very high GHG emissions. Lowering GHG emissions is vital to stabilising Earth’s climate and reducing the impact of climate change.

Only recently has kangaroo been available for human consumption on Australian supermarket shelves. Scientists have promoted the consumption of kangaroo meat for decades, as a good source of low fat, low cholesterol red meat, yet it is still not widely eaten by the general population. If Australians are going to continue to eat red meat, they should choose kangaroo over beef or lamb, because of the health and environmental benefits. With education and promotion, Australians can change their eating habits for the benefit of all.

The short semi-autobiographical film Arancini: Food Memory and Beyond provides an insight to the origin of the Italian dish called “Arancini” through a personal, historical and educative lense. The audience of the film is anyone interested in food, where it comes from, and food sustainability.

Starting with a very personal story about this dish where Stephanie discusses her childhood memory of preparing and eating food in her Grandma’s garage, the film goes on to reveal where Arancini were first historically recorded, what ingredients were in the original Arancini, and where these ingredients originated. Doing research about this made us think about food sustainability. We wanted to know more about the facts and figures regarding food wastage. As it is a problem within our society, we tried to find a small solution to this issue by turning the dish Arancini into a sustainable strategy to deal with food waste. As we both want to be primary school teachers, we consider that this dish can be used educationally as a task in class, whereby children can cook the dish and can not only learn procedural skills such as food preparation skills, but so that they can also acquire declarative skills in terms of sustainability and economics.

Furthermore, the film seeks to encourage the audience to think about how they can contribute to food sustainability and how they can use their food leftovers to create meals.