The most common question we get (from friends at home and from visiting yachties) is about food. How many re-supplies do you get? (None). How did you know how much to bring? (I calculated it). The second most common question is usually in the form of some commentary on the presence of agapanthus. (Nope ā theyāre not native, yes, they block the view and yes, they must be heritage-listed since no oneās removed them!).
It took a lot of planning to get to Deal Island, the biggest challenge of which was food (because thatās the number one priority in my life!). What to eat, where to get it (because of quarantine requirements), and how to store it. Thankfully we had a long lead time to think about all this. And thank heavens for spreadsheets!
Apanie and I caught up (almost a year ago) when I was visiting Victoria and pulled together a āfinger in the airā list of what we typically consume. We quickly estimated 350 kg as a minimum, so decided to work through things in finer detail, and thus began the mother of all spreadsheets. We wanted a meal plan that:
Had enough variety and flexibility to keep us from getting bored
Was filled with vegetables we could easily store long-term term (weāre not fans of processed food or things with additives and preservatives)
Allowed for easy substitution with fish when we caught it (without relying on it)
Didnāt require us to discard any excess on our return because of quarantine requirements.
We opted for 30 dinner recipes (all vegetarian, ācos thatās mostly how we eat anyway) for rotation, a variety of lunch foods (we were less draconian about our planning here) and some staple breakfasts (with an allowance for pancakes at least once a week, of course!). We made sure to have plenty of excess ingredients for baking treats when we felt like it, and comforts like chocolate and cheese. Once we had our master list, a little sanity check on the total caloric energy of the staples confirmed we were going to be well-fed. I confess, we also did a bit of āpanic buyingā in Launceston, additional to this list (mostly cream and cheese and condiments).
By weight, our top 10 items were:
Flour (20 kg)
Bananas (15 kg)
Cheese (15 kg)
Oats (10 kg)
Coffee (9 kg)
Eggs (10 dozen)
Beer (1 case)
Tinned tomato (8 kg)
Milk powder (7 kg)
Carrots (7 kg)
We bought most provisions on the mainland, with the plan to buy the fridge & freezer items, along with fresh fruit and veg in Launceston on the way. This was another logistical challenge ā ensuring we were able to keep things cold/frozen over our 3-day transit window. I had a little fright about whether or not it was possible to fit 3 monthsā worth of food and gear in a carā¦ but we made it work. The answer was a van. Thankfully Apanie has one.
The caretakers cottage is much better equipped than we had anticipated. We planned around uncertainties (e.g. learning multiple methods for yoghurt making so we could work with what was available) and allowed for contingencies (e.g. back-up yeast, in case the sourdough starter didnāt like the water here). While we didnāt put any reliance on the vegetable garden, weāve been delighted with how productive it is.
Despite having so many contingencies, we didnāt plan for everything. We certainly hadnāt anticipated our refrigerated goods (in storage on Flinders Island for a week) to get accidentally frozen. It was a concerning discovery on the morning of our flight to Deal Island. With no option to re-stock we had to just roll with it ā and I can now comfortably report that it wasnāt an issue!Ā Our 12 dozen eggs didnāt fare very well though. A defrosted whole egg comes out with a bit of a cooked yolk which makes it fairly unusable (though still edible). We made a lot of pavlova with the whites until we were sick of it.
Now at the other end (the end end ā¹) of our trip, weāre packing up our excess food, and itās interesting to reflect on what we consumed. We still donāt know how much food two people need for three months! We only ran out of one item (rice wine vinegar) but made do with alternatives. Ā We barely touched our frozen veg (the garden is just that good). Thereās plenty of excess staples, but weād planned for that in case we got really hungry, or we had 10 people stuck on the island for a week due to an unopened weather window (which did happen to previous caretakers).
Weāve been buoyed along our three months here with care packages from passing yachts, excess goods (including wine!) from the Erith mob on their departure, bags of homegrown apricots from the visiting fire-crew, and essential top-ups from visiting friends (the soda stream really upped our Friday evening drinks).
Weāve had moderate success with fishing ā one day we caught two big lobsters, one of which was a whopping 2.7 kg. We havenāt caught any since, but weāve seen a couple down at Pegleg recently that appear to be deliberately taunting us. Weāll have another go before we leave. Thereās been a few fish served up for the novelty.
After finding a very large and healthy patch of samphire on our adventure to Pulpit rock, we had Ottolenghiās āsamphire and anchovyā spaghetti for a meal. Weāve also sampled the abundant salt-bush as a little beer snack.
By far the most novel food adventure weāve had here has been barbequed mutton bird. Ranger Dan gave us a couple of frozen ones on Flinders Island, which we (thankfully) saved to share with our friends who visited early in the new year. Of the ten of us, two were unable to stomach it, two were really into it (until the flavour revisited them in burps throughout the night) and the rest of us were impressed by the novelty and thankful for the experience, but happy to leave it there. I had previously heard the taste described as chicken cooked in fish oil (or with anchovies). Iād say thatās pretty accurate, and the taste was not so bad. Itās the amount of fat and oil that was most surprising (and overwhelming). I feel so lucky to have tried it (and even luckier to have been able to share it instead of having a whole bird to myself!).
There is nothing that Iām craving or feel like Iām missing here. I have no desires for my āfirst mealā back on the mainland and could happily continue eating like this for another 3 months. With a view as good as we have from our table, Iād be happy eating anything.
You can catch up on my previous posts here: