The Confessions of a BeachcomberBanfield, E. J. (Edmund James)
History
The Confessions of a Beachcomber
Banfield, E. J. (Edmund James)
Dunk Island (Qld.); Natural history -- Australia -- Queensland
The repast might be initiated with a few oysters on the shells (with a
choice of three or four varieties); a selection of many fish would be
succeeded by real turtle ("padg-e-gal") soup (in the original shell),
and made as before described; the joint, a huge piece of dugong
("pal-an-gul") kummaoried, rich and excellent, with ENTREES of turtle
cutlets and baked grubs ("tam-boon"), ivory white with yellow heads, as
neat and pretty a dish as could be seen, and rather rare and novel too.
When the beetles (APPECTROGASTRA FLAVIPILIS) into which these stolid
grubs and fidgetty nymphs develop, are chopped out of decayed wood, they
have the odour of truffles, and emit two distinct squeaky notes from the
throat and the abdominal segments respectively. Each maintains a duet
with itself until the hot embers impose silence and convert them into
dainty nutty morsels. Roast scrub fowl eggs would be no novelty, and
baked crayfish ("too-lac"), bluey-white and leathery--"such stuff as
dreams are made on"--might lend a decorative effect. Raw echinus
("kier-bang"), saline and tonic, would clear the palate for succeeding
delicacies.
The tough sweet yam ("pun-dinoo"), the heart of the Alexandra palm
("koobin-karra"), the hard rhizome of BOWENIA SPECTABILIS ("moo-nah")
after being allowed weeks to decompose, the core of the tree fern
("kalo-joo"), the long root-stock of CURCULIGO ENSIFOLIA ("harpee")
crisp and slightly bitter, the broad beans of the white mangrove
("kum-moo-roo"), would stand as vegetables.
Sweets would be the weakest part of the menu. One pudding might
certainly be included, VERMICELLI (shredded bean-tree
nuts--"tinda-burra") with honey and orange-coloured balsamic custard,
scraped from the outside of the drupes of the PANDANUS ODORATISSIMUS
("pim-nar").
Dessert, on the other hand, might be plentiful and varied. "Bed-yew-rie"
(XIMENIA AMERICANA), thirst-allaying and palate-sharpening; "Top-kie"
(Herbert River cherry, ANTEDISMA DALLACHYANUM), resembling red currants
in flavour; "Pool-boo-nong" (finger cherry, RHODOMYRTUS MACROCARPA),
sweet, soft and appeasing; "Panga-panga," raspberry (RUBUS ROSAEFOLIUS);
"Koo-badg-aroo" (Leichhardt-tree, SARCOCEPHALUS CORDATUS), resembling a
strawberry in shape, but brown, spicy and hot; "Murl-kue-kee"
(snow-white berries of EUGENIA SUBORBICULARIS), vapid, and as insipid as
an immature medlar; "Raroo" (CAREYA AUSTRALIS), mealy and biting.
Various figs, ranging in size from a large red currant to a tennis-ball,
and in colour from white through all the tints from pale yellow and green
to red, purple and black, sweet and generally mawkish. The banana would
be there in the MUSA BANKSIA ("boo-gar-oo"), although "close up all bone";
but the Davidsonian plum, plentiful on the mainland, would be absent.
The scape of the ELETTARIA SCOTTIANA, oozing viscid nectar, might stand
as a sweetmeat.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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