Just another note I’ve been devising for some time. I get a lot of emails from you (well, three) and they all ask (well, not really) ‘what’s the food like over there, Tom?’

Well, I’m glad you asked.

Clamato Juice

Clam. Tomato. This obvious combination has gone relatively unexploited in Australia, but is sensibly brought to the fore in this sensible country. Mmm mmm. Andy and I bought some extra spicy juice. It was yummy. Actually, I think half of it remains in our fridge door. The creation of Clamato juice has obviously led to the ‘Bloody Caesar’, the cousin of the ‘Bloody Mary’.

Poutine

A Quebecian (Quebecish? Quebecic? Je ne sais pas) delicacy, poutine consists of french fries — don’t you be calling them chips, now — covered in gravy and cheese curds. Mmm mmm. Jackson wasn’t a fan. I rather enjoyed them. Joe’s Diner — centre of fine dining as it is — substitutes grated cheese for curds, because they can’t be bothered buying curds. They make up for this however by offering the ‘Mexi-Poutine’ — with Chili instead of gravy. This is DELICIOUS.

Rootbeer

OK, so we’ve got this at home too. But people seem to like it here. Ew.

Cheese

‘Tom,’ you exclaim, ‘we’ve got cheese too!’. Do you ever, you lucky bastards. You should see the cheese here. Bright orange, usually, and about twice the price it should be, coming in rather small packages. An Australian is hard pressed to discern between grated cheese and carrots.

Pop

Soft Drink. Soda. Whatever. Also, don’t come to Canada, ask for lemonade, and expect Sprite or 7-Up or similar drinks. Lemonade is proper lemonade here. Aussies are known for causing such confusion. When asked what we call their lemonade, ‘proper lemonade’ is all I could come up with. Anyone got a better idea? Their system does cause minor irritation, as when ordering our kind of lemonade, you have to guess what kind they’ve got — Sprite or 7-Up. If you get it wrong, you get asked if, say, Sprite is OK instead of 7-Up.

So it’s not really a big deal. But it seemed odd at first.

Pizza

Domino’s only offer two toppings on their meal deal pizzas. Shame, Domino’s, Lack of Pizza Topping Shame. Frozen pizza is also insanely expensive.

375

This entry was posted by the illustrious Tom Charman on Thursday, April 15th, 2004. It concerns such pressing issues as . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.