Happy Australia Day, Aussies. I hope you’re all watching sport, or BBQing, or drinking, or all of the above!
What am I doing?
I will be baking…
******
Let me, if I may, take you on a flashback…
It was almost the mid-1990s. Swedish pop was again dominating our airwaves. We warbled ‘I saw the sign and it opened up my eyes and I am happy now without you, I’ve left you..you…ooo..o…ohhh’. We dressed according to the grunge craze; our flannelette shirts were – for a while – allowed out of the paddocks and the chilly mornings at home and onto the streets. Boris Yeltsin was still vodka-jigging across Russia and we hadn’t heard yet of Friends.
It was also about the time when this was invented. Or at least, it was when I first became aware of it:
Damper Dip.
Australia’s BBQ snack of Champions. The answer to those of us who are cooking challenged.
Why?
Because all you have to do is buy a cob loaf, or damper, scoop out the middle, mix up some sour cream and some french onion dip, whack it in the oven until the scooped bits crisp up and it warms through and wha-la!
Instant cred.
Since then there have been experiments with the fillings – oh yes, spinach and fetta! I cannot forget you. But the reaction is always the same: NOM NOM NOM. Everyone eats it.
Until you get to that last little slab of bread at the end, the bit at the bottom underneath the dip, that gets soggy, that gets thrown to the dogs, who NOM NOM it up just as eagerly.
Damper Dips.
Bless ’em.
😉
