The Barber’s Queue

 

"Four more burgers please!" Luna Park in Melbourne

Summer has arrived in earnest this week in Australia, with a mini-heatwave sweeping across the country from Perth to Adelaide to Brisbane. In Melbourne today it’s 37 degrees which, even with a following wind, is uncomfortably hot. You only have to step out into the street for two minutes to feel your skin start to singe and crisp under the full force of the sun. So today, in true Australian fashion, I’ve decided to do little more than sit in the shade and drink cold beer.

 

It’s in this kind of weather that the great Aussie barbecue really comes into its own. Since arriving on these shores in November, Rosie and I have had ample opportunity to sample the delights of this uniquely antipodean institution, both in the homes of the Victorian families we stayed with in December and in our own backyard. Here, then, is my five-point guide to the true blue Aussie barbecue and how to recreate one in the comfort of your own home:

 

1. Size. The first thing to say about barbecues in Australia is that they’re huge. Now to my mind, half the fun of having a barbecue is in building and lighting the thing from scratch, with charcoal and, more often than not, a couple of pints of lighter fuel. That’s all well and good in the UK, where the barbecue season lasts for maybe a couple of months, but in Australia where you can cook outside pretty much all year ’round, a more high-tech approach is preferred.

 

The Aussie barbies that we’ve come across so far have been imposing, gas-powered monsters, with a hood, a temperature gauge and a perplexing array of utensils. Cooking on one is essentially like using an oversize outdoor grill; what you lose in terms of charcoal flavour you gain in the speed with which you can start cremating your bangers

 

2. What to eat. You can’t spell ‘BBQ’ without ‘m-e-a-t’. OK, well technically you can, but don’t tell an Australian that. Barbecues on this side of the world are very much sausage-and-steak affairs, almost to the exclusion of everything else, except for maybe a bit of side salad. Chicken doesn’t get much of a look-in and even the famous barbecued prawn seems strangely absent from the repertoire. In fact, I’ve yet to see any seafood at all on a Melbourne-area barbie. Maybe it’s more of a New South Wales thing…

 

3. What to drink. The great Aussie barbecue is as much about drinking as it is about eating, with the Esky (ice box) as much of a hub of activity as the grill itself. Your Esky will ideally be filled to the brim with ice (available from any garage or convenience store) and an ample supply of stubbies – 375 ml bottles of beer. That may seem small, but it’s the perfect-sized drink when you’re standing around in the mid-afternoon heat trying not to get too dehydrated or drunk. On the other hand, a worrying number of Aussies seem to believe that if you match each drink with a glass of water “you’ll be OK to drive”. Hmmm.

 

4. When to barbecue. If you’ve read The Iliad, you’ll know that Agamemnon and co. didn’t need much of an excuse to have a barbie on the beach. Good day’s battling? “This calls for a drink!”; Siege not going so well? “Let’s roast a couple of oxen and work on it in the morning.” Well, in Australia, things are very much the same, possibly as a result of Greek immigration (or possibly not). Wander around any residential area on a summer’s evening and you’ll soon come across the smell of flame-grilled meat and the sound of people gathering for some backyard bacchanalia. In fact, one of the ladies we stayed with in December told us that her elderly cattle rancher father cooks only on a barbecue, roasting his way through a small part of his herd every evening. And why not?, as Barry Norman might say. Oh, the carcinogens. Right.

 

5. Where to barbecue. Sick of burning food in your own back garden? Well why not burn it on a beach, in a park or by the side of a road instead? As incredible as it may seem to the British traveller, accustomed to all-out bans on al fresco cooking back home, there’s an extensive network of free public barbecues in green spaces across Australia. You just rock up with your burgers and, if you’re wise, some heavy-duty disinfectant, and help yourself to the facilities. Given the preponderance of bush fires this is maybe unwise, but testament in a way to the free-and-easy outdoor life that most Aussies enjoy.

 

 

Back at the ranch, the evening is drawing in and it’s getting cool enough to go outside. Birds that I don’t know the name of are singing their strange, savage lullabies in the gum trees nearby. The rabbits in the garden are emerging from the shade, and soon an inverted moon will hang low and lazy in the sky, as if exhausted by the heat of the day. More importantly there’s a steak with my name on it in the ‘fridge, awaiting some flame-grilled attention. So if you’ll excuse me, I’ll attend to this important matter and bid you goodnight. Goodnight.