I have been very fortunate in my time that I have had an extremely cosmopolitan career, having had co-workers from all over the globe. I can declaim with some gravity that I have never met an Australian I didn’t like, and having lived in a country that’s full of them when I was in Canberra, it’s no mean feat not to have found one unfavourable example. Of course, Canberra isn’t like the rest of Australia as it is an unreal environment built for government requirements, but still.
From 2000 and beyond, I found myself largely in the company of South Africans, some of whom were exiting the homeland as circumstances deteriorated both economically and socially. Plenty had played their trump card of British passport qualification through immigrant grandparents or other circumstances of ancestry. But also some were Afrikaners and black Africans who do not have that convenient way to get out but still decided to take their abilities for greater rewards elsewhere.
To a man and woman I have found them, contrary to the famous “Spitting Image” song, delightful, good natured and great fun to be with. Also to a man and woman, they remain convinced that it was South Africans that came up with the idea of cooking outdoors. The braaivleis (Afrikaans meaning roasted meat) is a cultural institution on a par with rugby and diamonds.
In the old days, people would drive out into the veld, hunt down antelope such as gazelle, gemsbok or Wildebeest for the larger party. They’d shoot it, skin and butcher it, dig a pit and build a fire and roast the creature, usually whole. They cannot do that very easily anymore as the wildlife is rather better protected and hunting is strictly licensed, but the habit of the braai remains as an important social event which no summer party of any size is complete without.
Australians are also convinced that they invented the idea through the barbeque. Although the hunting element is normally missing, and made difficulty by not being as varied as in the South African tradition. Kangaroos are very tasty but extremely difficult and time consuming to get the meat right (it has to hang for at least 2 weeks which then loses the element of spontaneity) and most other targets are too small (possums), cute (koalas, wombats), inedible (dingoes, platypus) or too lethal (practically all other wildlife on the continent) to consider, the Australians take huge pride in the outdoor tradition.
Here, we don’t have wildlife hunting and eating but we can still make the most of the barbeque, and in recent years the equipment available has improved out of all proportion. For example we have manufacturers such as Weber bbq who build Weber gas grills which help remove the randomness of building an old fashioned fire and replace it with reliability and the facility to use the equipment in all places should the need arise.
Some of the Weber gas grills now come with total portability which means that you can take them with you on a trip out to the beach or picnic which further gets rid of the annoyance of used coals being left behind on the site which is a regular hazard of the disposable barbecue or lightweight charcoal burners.
Of course the colonials can spit their dummies and have their beliefs over the history of the invention, but in the reign of the Mongol empire, as Genghis Khan ran amok throughout the known world of antiquity, his soldiers did not have a Weber bbq so instead they used to cook on upturned shields over an open fire and cook their meat on there, and so probably have the better claim overall.