It’s the ABC, the original home of the saying ‘All sizzle, no sausage’, so it’s always possible we’re all going to be spectacularly disappointed. But its new series Eat The Invaders looks to be the tastiest morsel the nation’s broadcaster has brought us all in a very long time.
Starring likeable future mega-star and ‘Aboriginal man about town’ Tony Armstrong, and “with the help of scientists, land carers, an artist and a chef” the series will “attempt to turn our unwanted ecological trash into desirable culinary gold, in a provocative attempt to Eat The Invaders”.
Or in Armstrong’s plainer and more accessible English, “[We’re trying] to see if we can turn Australia’s most destructive invaders into high cuisine”.
On the menu, apparently, are feral deer, rabbit, camel, carp, cane toad and even cat. Or so the teaser strongly infers.
A personal prediction… the ABC is as conservative as most mainstream news outlets, even more so in some regards. If Aunty is actually brave enough to document an attempt to cook and serve cat, then I’ll volunteer to eat it.
But if the trailer is anything to go by, that’s what’s happening, and it (the trailer) at least, is delicious.
The series, at least on the surface, ticks a LOT of boxes. The name of the show alone – Eat the Invaders – is a nod to the more ‘radical’ elements of Black Australia… ‘radical’ in this case referring to the vast majority of Blackfellas, who still to this day hold crazy notions of things like ‘Treaty’ and ‘Sovereignty’ and ‘fairness and equity’… and in this case, eating invaders.
My early tip is they mostly can’t (although deer and rabbit taste okay, and you could do worse than camel… although you need to put a bit of effort in). But it’s ultimately irrelevant – the series is very obviously primarily interested in shedding light on the environmental damage we’ve wrought on this country, and the way it’s doing it (from an Indigenous perspective), is very, very clever.
Without having even watched the series – all I’ve seen is the same trailer you’ve now all seen – I give it 4.5 stars out of 5. It’ll likely get the 5 once I’ve watched it. On that front, we won’t get to see it until 2025… I’m hoping they launch it on January 26 (Invasion Day), which’ll really set the ‘cat amongst the pigeons’, so to speak. Although another tip… they’re way too gutless for that.
Either way, credit where it’s due, Eat The Invaders is a genuinely brilliant concept. We all wait with ‘baited’ breath.
Donate To New Matilda
New Matilda is a small, independent media outlet. We survive through reader contributions, and never losing a lawsuit. If you got something from this article, giving something back helps us to continue speaking truth to power. Every little bit counts.
