Are these 1970s Women’s Weekly favourites the best old school Aussie dinners ever?
From apricot chicken to a classic corned beef, the meals which were once Aussie staples are now largely relics of a simpler time. Here, we’ve compiled some of the best.
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Australia these days is the land of a thousand flavours.
Families have changed, with many more women entering the workforce and cooking becoming
much more of a shared responsibility as parents rush to get kids to and from school and a bevy of after school and weekend activities.
Life is faster. More of us are at work. Often we’re at work longer than we once were, or on days and in hours that would have made us swoon decades ago.
For some families, takeaway and processed food is more the norm than the exception in the
modern world.
And post-war immigration has forever changed our tastes – often for the better.
Many people might regard as boring the classic home-cooked Aussie dishes that once graced our tables each evening.
But there is a genuine comfort in remembering the times when we ate simpler fare from the family.
Here are a few of the best from a 1970s Australian Women’s Weekly recipe card library.
APRICOT CHICKEN
Those who would argue that something is fundamentally wrong with the idea of chicken pieces simmered in apricot nectar until tender and juicy are … well … fundamentally wrong.
The sweetness of the nectar and dried apricots married beautifully with the sauteed onions.
It was perfect served on a bed of rice to soak up the apricot gravy.
CHOW MEIN
This Chinese-inspired, heavily Anglicised gem turned cheap-as-chips cabbage and your favourite inexpensive cut of meat into a cross-cultural experience.
The Australian Women’s Weekly recipe card library version called for called for chicken, pork and prawns with cabbage, celery, spring onions, garlic, soy sauce, oyster sauce, crisp noodles and a splash of brandy, among other bits and pieces.
Who were they impressing? Some of us settled for a concoction known in some households as ka si Min – heavy on the cabbage with onion, lashings of mince and curry powder, all simmered down with curry powder and chicken stock cubes or, even better, Sachets of Continental chicken noodle soup powder for a chicken-y kick. That’s using your noodle.
CURRY
Forget your fancy Asian and subcontinental curries, and your supermarket flavour bases.
Once upon a time, a curry meant meat (or mystery bags), a few spoons of mild Keen’s curry powder and not a hint of vegetable matter, with flour to bind into gravy.
Some household cooks lashed out and added sultanas for a dash of flair.
And we curried everything – lamb, beef, chicken and sausages.
SUNDAY SOUP AND TOASTIES
In the days when a Sunday roast lunch was as common as a chrome-clad Aussie car in the driveway, Sunday nights were more relaxed affairs.
With the kids in pyjamas and dressing gowns, many of us would settle in front of the TV in time for The Wonderful World of Disney or Ask The Leyland Brothers with toasted cheese sandwiches and a ramekin of tinned soup.
No Breville sandwich makers were required. It was pan-fried only, or jaffles fresh from a jaffle iron on the stove top for those that favoured spaghetti or baked beans as a filling. Welsh rarebit with a dash of mustard if you felt adventurous.
Domestic bliss.
CORNED BEEF
Some of us had it with white sauce. Some had it straight up.
But in these days when it’s a little harder to find at the butcher or the supermarket, some of us remember fondly the steamy, juicy, slightly vinegary saltiness of corned beef.
We loved it boiled up with a serve cabbage and mash, both speckled with pepper, and carrots.
SHEPHERD’S PIE
The Australian Women’s Weekly wasn’t all that fussy about the star ingredient for its shepherd’s pie.
It started with 750 grams of cooked meat. Beef? Lamb? Chicken? Pork? A combination of the four?
Whatever was in the fridge would do.
Add mashed spud for the topping, carrots and onion for the filling and peas and beans to accompany it all, and you had a real crowd-pleaser on your hands.
The slight crispiness of the potato masking that tasty, tender meat beneath was a treat.
SPAG BOL
We had never heard of the modern, lighter fusion of pork mince, beef mince and vegies we see in a good bolognese sauce these days.
And al dente might as well have been a panel beater.
Back in the old days, our bolognese sauce was iridescent and came out of a tin.
The nice folks at Leggo’s regularly published magazine advertisements with bolognese recipes that, naturally, included tons of its own tomato paste so that we could experience and allegedly more authentic Italian treat that also stained our gizzards crimson.
For a truly continental touch, we sprinkled Kraft dried parmesan cheese over the top like snow and ate our slightly soggy pasta with gusto.
RISSOLES
We used to make our own rissoles once upon a time – no supermarket shortcuts back I the day.
Again, the Women’s Weekly recipe card calls for unspecified cooked meat, but ventures that minced steak could be substituted.
Those patties, bound with egg and a dusting of breadcrumbs, crisped up beautifully in the pan and were always accompanied by boiled vegies.
The brown onion gravy that often topped the rissoles wasn’t so much a delightful red wine reduction as a few spoons of Gravox, fried onions, pan scrapings and water. Magic.
LAMB
Yes, kids. There was a time when lamb didn’t cost an arm and a leg, and we ate it all the time.
Lamb roasts that melted in the mouth and became lamb sandwiches on doorsteps of white bread the next day, and the day after.
Lamb chops and lamb cutlets for our meat and three veg fix. Lamb’s fry, too.
HAM STEAK WITH PINEAPPLE
It paid not to think how those deliciously salty discs of ham were stitched together down at the factory.
But pan-fried with rings of Golden Circle’s finest pineapple rings, cooked until caramelised on the outside, and with a mountain of peas and mashed potato on the side, and everyone kicked a goal on ham steak night.