Australian 'Superfoods' Reach US
High Antioxidant 'Bush Tucker' Products Launched in America
Australian native foods are so high in antioxidants they are considered ‘superfoods’, but they are not yet widely eaten in Australia, or freely available in other countries. However, this is about to change with the entry into the US market of an Australian food producer’s native food products.
‘Bush tucker’, as native foods are known colloquially, supported the indigenous people for thousands of years, and these delicious and highly effective fruits, vegetables and spices are beginning to be recognized by chefs and enthusiastic cooks worldwide, despite their apparent scarcity.
Sydney scientist and native food aficionado Vic Cherikoff has signed a deal to provide almost $1 million worth of his Vic Cherikoff Down Under condiments per month to one of the biggest American specialty food chains,Whole Foods.
From January, shoppers in 260 Whole Foods Market stores will be able to try a bottle of Cherikoff’s Kakadu Wildfire Pepper Sauce or Coolangatta Chili Splash, or eight other creations containing native ingredients including desert tomatoes, Kakadu and Illawarra plums, native limes, blue gum, macadamia nuts and paperbark oils.
He has also signed a cooking show deal with the internet television channel Joost, and plans to introduce the lilly pilly, lemon myrtle and Kakadu plum to restaurants in the casinos of Las Vegas.
Five Times the Antioxdants of Blueberries
In mid-2007, Food Science Australia researcher, Dr Izabela Konczak and colleagues showed that many native Australian fruits rated as high or higher in antioxidants than the North American blueberry, renowned for its high antioxidant count.
The 12 fruits: Kakadu plum, Illawarra plum, Burdekin plum, Davidson’s plum, riberry, red and yellow finger limes, Tasmanian pepper, brush cherry, Cedar Bay cherry, muntries and Molucca raspberry; were compared with blueberries.
Two of these ‘superfruits’ – the Kakadu and Burdekin plums -- had approximately five times blueberry’s antioxidant power.
Dr Konczak’s paper, Native Australian Fruits — a Novel Source of Antioxidants for Food, was published in the journal Innovative Food Science & Emerging Technologies
However, finding ‘bush tucker’ superfruits in the supermarket – even in Australia – isn’t that easy. Cherikoff is one of a handful of producers marketing sauces and chutneys made from the fruits, and there are dried spice mixes available, using native herbs and spices such as lemon myrtle, Tasmanian pepperberry and native mint. But fresh native fruit and herbs are not yet commonly available in Australia or elsewhere.
Fresh Produce Incorrectly Classified
One reason for the current lack of Australian ‘superfruits’ in North America and Europe has been their classification as ‘novel foods’ alongside genetically modified crops and food engineered by nanotechnology.
This is set to change with an industry group, Australian Native Food Industry Limited, focusing on getting a dozen of the most commonly available native foods registered with the EU - a list that includes lemon myrtle, Tasmanian pepperberry, Kakadu and Illawarra plums, quandongs, bush tomato, wattle seed and the desert lime. They point out that foods which have sustained populations for thousands of years can hardly be considered novel!
Exciting 'Bush Tucker' Cuisine
Australian chefs such as Maggie Beer are leading the way with inventive recipes that replace European fruits with quandongs, native raspberries, Kakadu and Illawarra plums, desert limes and wattleseed, and team them with emu or crocodile steaks, as well as fish, chicken or beef. Soon, adventurous gourmets across the world will be able to enjoy the tastes of Australian ‘bush tucker’ in their own kitchens.
