Dr Chris Bourke grew up in country Victoria where his parents were both keen gardeners. He was the first indigenous dental graduate in Australia and came to Canberra in 1993. Chris is well known as a former member of the ACT Legislative Assembly. He completed an MBA at the University of Canberra in 2017 and now works with the Australian Healthcare and Hospitals Association where his policy work is focussed on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health, rural health and oral health. He says advocating for systemic change in Australia's healthcare system can be stressful at times.
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Since marrying textile designer Julie Ryder 20 years ago, Bourke has watched her growing food but he tended to be a bit "economically rationalist" in his thinking about the effort and expenditure required to produce food that we were so lucky to have in cheap abundance in Australia. Bourke says he is sure he was missing the point.
When Ryder built her studio at the back of their suburban block in Weetangera, there was a patch of land between the studio and back fence, an easement, that was a good place for a vegie garden.
Soil had to be brought in to raise the ground slope and to give easier access for harvesting.
Bourke has become a kitchen gardener, with his hands in the soil, for the first time. He finds choosing, planting and caring for vegetables in which he is interested has helped provide more balance in his daily life.
Vegetable seed and seedlings are bought from Bunnings in Belconnen which, Bourke says, has a great range for weekend impulse buying. He wanted to grow vegies that he liked cooking and eating and were either a bit harder to get really fresh or had a higher cost at the supermarket or Belco markets. This led him to choose okra, Lebanese eggplants, assorted capsicums, peas and sweet corn.
Meanwhile, in another part of the home garden, Ryder is growing lettuce, tomatoes, kale sand cucumbers. The kale has been so prolific she has been chucking it over the fence to the three chooks who absolutely love it.
Bourke is a keen cook and Ryder likes his dishes a lot. They have developed a pattern where he cooks on weekends and Friday because the demands of work and meetings often mean he is late home during the week.
Okra (Abelmoschus esculentus), in the mallow family, is also known as gumbo or lady's fingers. It is a favourite with Bourke because of its texture and its ability to take on flavours of the ingredients with which it is cooked. There are many ways to cook okra because it is a popular food in four continents, each with their own ways of preparation. His favourites are in a curry or with a tomato salsa and he says good fresh okra is hard to get in Canberra and it is usually around $10 a kilo.
All was growing with abundance until the hail storm which devastated the vegie garden. Plants were shredded and capsicums punctured. He wonders, hopefully, whether they will grow back.
Before the storm, okra was harvested and Bourke made the following curry recipe on the weekend of January 19.
Chicken and okra curry
Ingredients
4 chicken thigh fillets
500g okra
1 onion
1 clove garlic
1 hot chilli
a grind of black pepper
1 tbsp coconut oil
2 tsp ground turmeric
2 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground cumin
Method
Bourke's best curry making pot is a 5 litre stainless steel Jamie Oliver casserole with a heavy base, which he has had for years.
Warm the oil in the pot and chop the onion. Saute onion until lightly coloured and then add chopped chilli and finely chopped garlic. Give it a minute or two and then add the spices. Lower the heat, put the lid on the pot, and simmer for five minutes. Cut the chicken into bite-size pieces. Turn the heat up and add the chicken. Saute the chicken in the spice mix for five minutes, it's amazing how the oil reappears. Add 100ml water, turn down to low heat and cook for 30 minutes. Check occasionally and add more water as needed to prevent dryness. Trim the okra stalk ends carefully without opening up the okra pod. Add the okra to the pot and continue cooking on low heat for 15 minutes, then serve.
Serves 4.
