What we eat on the road in Australia

While driving along Australia's east coast and Tasmania, we hardly ate out. Instead, we embraced the nomadic lifestyle and our Coleman cooker and prepared our meals ourselves.

Coffee, the most important thing to start (Tom's) day, is made on Tom's soda can cooker, using methylated spirit for ease and speed to get the day going. Towards the end of our time in AUS we even buy a handgrinder, Australia's fondness of good quality coffee will accompany us along the way, it seems.

Breakfast then depends on the climate of the day: on a hot day we eat cereal with milk or the soy/coconut version, on a cold day we have porridge with different toppings, such as raisins, dried apricots, almonds, walnuts, maple syrup, honey and cinnamon. If we're fancy and its locally available we'll have fresh fruit such as apple, banana, passionfruit etc. as well.

As free electric BBQs are very common in many places in Australia, we also eat toasted bread with peanut butter and jam sometimes. Or fried egg and avocado.
In order to do so, Tom needs to find the possibility to bake bread first, though. We're simply not the biggest fans of the white toast that can be bought everywhere. Tom is still experimenting with baking in a Dutch oven on a campfire, however, the results are always super tasty and so much better than anything that can be bought. Only downfall are the local firebans... no fire, no bread.

When we started our roadtrip, I had been convinced that a pressure cooker would be a good idea, allowing us to cook legumes, potatoes and soup etc. much faster. Well, I was wrong. Unfortunately, the Coleman doesn't produce enough heat for large quantities and after three attempts to cook potatoes or soup, we give up. It worked, but took forever and hence wasn't economical anymore.
It now has a new home with Ange and Mathew, giving us a bit more space and them great meals. Or so I hope!

We still cook soups and vegetable curries quite often in a common pot. Especially in Tasmania's cold they keep us warm and our bellies full.
Another staple is stir fried veggies with pasta or rice. Anything using fresh and local products really.

And we're still trying to avoid plastic as much as we can. That means shopping at farmers' markets and bulk shops whenever possible - even if it results in our pantry box taking up a huge amount of space in the car.
Avoiding plastic also means that we don't want to buy cookies wrapped in it. Being quite big fans of sweet snacks on the road, I had to find a solution: energy balls! I fought for space for our mixer in the car, mostly to be able to make them. And now, I can turn whatever dried fruits we've got, oats, shredded coconut and other nuts into tiny little treats that satisfy our cravings and are environmentally friendly. Win win.

Talking about sweets: we also tried our hands on "cobbler" once. Basically cake made in the Dutch oven over a campfire. We still need to get the temperature right, but the result did taste like pineapple cake and was super delicious. Quite a treat after a day long hike.

And last but not least, I am still a big fan of foraging. Now probably more than ever. In Tasmania we found an abundance of blackberries (great addition to our porridge) and rosehips (got turned into jam, made on a campfire when the fireban was lifted) and back in Melbourne, I foraged prickly pears (be aware of the thorns. They aren't called "prickly" for nothing). They made an awesome smoothie paired with coconut milk!

All in all, our diet hasn't changed much. It's still about what is available locally, lots of veggies, a few carbs (mainly to prevent Tom from losing weight) and fruit (to prevent me from being grumpy). And the occasional serve of chips and craft beer from a local pub. Gotta support the locals!Read more