The Aussies like to call dinner as "tea". Why? I dunno.....Maybe an aussie or someone more familiar with the aussie culture can help me explain that. I din't feel like cooking tonight and having had a big salad lunch, I decided to put my sandwich maker into good use and whipped up some toasted sandwiches. I made up 3 varieties. All using different spreads. One with pesto, another with vegemite and the last with just a light spread of butter. Strangely enough, I actually really like the one with vegemite the most.
I can still remember how disgusting the taste of vegemite was when I first tasted it. Over the years, it was always Josh chucking in the bottle of glucky black goog into our shopping trolley ('cos i did not want to hold responsible for finishing that stuff).And to my surprise, each 400g bottle was emptied out faithfully within the span of a couple of months without fail. I have no idea how he did that but it seems like he was and still is consuming a fair bit per week.
It was only recently I decided to give this goog a fair go again just curious to find out again why is this "jam" so popular and to reaffirm to myself that I definitely am not wrong for turning my nose at it. It turned out that I was proven wrong. It's weird taste is starting to appeal to me so much so I actually sometimes feel like a vegemite toast. How strange is that?! Friends who had studied in aussie or being here for a period of time, have u ever felt this way before about vegemite?
8 comments:
Interestingly, in our household, it is the opposite! Tim, the Aussie, does not like Vegemite. I, the Singaporean, love it and make sure each time I go back to Aus that we bring a bottle back (either that or Promite). So in our fridge, this Aussie essential is always available (ironically, not essential to the Aussie in my house).
I love it, maybe because it reminds me of Bovril, the similar one we used to eat with rice porridge when we were young.
Hmmmm.....so does he like Promite instead? I do rembr we use to eat that Bovril thing. but never have been a big fan of it. So does K like vegemite at all?
eh i thot its called Marmite..the one we used to eat as kids haha
i think there's 2 different ones....jsut like promite and vegemite...wonder whats the difference between the SG brands? I do rembr Marmite too.
hmm could it be cos you're expecting and taste buds have changed? ;) haha
K isn't a big fan of vegemite either, but I don't really let her choose. hahaha!!
There's another version in SG called Marmite as well. It used to be that the Bovril one is made from beef and Marmite is the veg version. But after mad cow disease, Bovril came up with a veg version too. I'm not sure what's on the shelves these days though.
An explanation about "dinner" being called "tea" in Aus:
The English used to drink tea (as in real tea drink) in the afternoons. When immigrants came to Australia, especially when they were working on the land and a campfire was the only way to heat water for tea, tea-drinking in the afternoon changed to the night time because the only time there was time to set camp and make a fire was at night after work was done. This tea was then drunk with the evening meal and so they came to call the entire meal, drink included, "tea". This is continued until today even if tea is not included with the meal. ~ Tim B.
I've tried vegemite twice and both times I made a face and cringed. :S I use to like Bovril as a kid but I'm not sure if that is related to my meat-loving appetite.. :P
Thank you to your friend Tim for finally unraveling the mystery behind the use of 'tea' for dinner! I've been wondering about that for the last three years! :P I will never forget the day my housemate asked me if I'm going to get some tea and I said no but I'm going to cooking my dinner. :P (or something along those lines that resulted in her looking at me rather oddly)... :P
thanks tim for the explanation. But i think ur good fren Josh reckons that you made that explanation up.
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