Lifting lid on how to use our bush tucker

“We have our own (Australian) cuisine, we just don’t use it,” he said.

Olive says Indigenous Australians have been eating a huge variety of native herbs, spices, fruits, seeds, insects and wildlife for tens of thousands of years, but these flavours are still largely a mystery to the rest of us.

Now he’s intent on showing how these ancient flavours can be integrated into modern cuisine instead of being discarded or shipped overseas – such as antioxidant-rich warrigal greens being sent to Asia as pie-fillers (Captain Cook’s men ate it to fight scurvy).

Olive particularly mourns the tonnes of low-fat high-protein kangaroo meat sent overseas or used as pet food simply because Australians baulk at putting “Skippy” on their dinner plates.

He believes we should see bush tucker as our national cuisine and is spearheading Ayers Rock Resort’s Bush Tucker Journeys, a comprehensive program of native flavour experiences and tastings of Indigenous food and culture.

The program cements the resort’s place as the bush tucker capital of Australia, with a free daily Bush Food Experience where guests can learn to use native ingredients in modern cooking.

Each of the resort’s 10 restaurants now feature bush ingredients in their menus, from the humble “croc-dog” to indigenous herb-crusted steak. Bush flavours such as dukkah seared kangaroo loin on quandong cous cous with native mint yoghurt take centre stage at the range of under the night sky dining experiences.

Guests can also learn about native food gathering on one of the resort’s daily garden walks and buy ingredients to take home.

Uluru Feastival, a quarterly weekend culinary event celebrating native flavours with open air fine dining and traditional bush tucker tastings and master classes, will be held at the resort on August 18-20 and November 3-5.

* Sue Preston was a guest of Ayers Rock Resort.