Jean-Paul Bruneteau is a French-born Australian chef with a passion for Australian native foods.  He has made it his specialty to feature the unique flavours of bush foods in his cooking, often developing new methods of working with these unique ingredients.  In 1996 he published Tukka, Real Australian Food to share his passion with a wider audience.

Jean-Paul has owned and run restaurants in Sydney and Paris.  You can sample his extraordinary food at the Slow Food Botanic Bush Tucker Picnic at The Royal Botanic Gardens on Sunday October 18.

I became passionate about Australian native foods by… discovering how beautiful these flavours were.  I found it impossible to understand why modern day Australians could have passed up such ingredients in the quest to create a genuine Australian cuisine. By unlocking all the secrets these wonderful indigenous foods offered, I also gained a better understanding of Aboriginal Australia.

The food I prepare is different from that of other chefs because… back in the eighties when I started to experiment with a lot of these native foods, I soon learned that these were not ‘European vegetables’.  Their cooking and handling were startlingly different.  This is why I became so besotted with their preparation, to make them more acceptable to gastronomy.

Some of the flavours were so strong; I also understood straight away that people would mishandle a lot of these plants unless I set out to explain how to best handle these wonderful flavours.  That’s why I felt I needed to write my book, TUKKA, Real Australian Food.

I’d recommend anyone in Sydney to grow and eat… the Riberry - Syzygium luehmannii, or a Brown Pine Plum tree, also known as a Podocarpus - Podocarpus elatus, or a Lemon Myrtle - Bakhousia citrodora. These three trees are good ornamentals and will provide an abundance of fruits and flavours for a lifetime; they don’t even need to be watered, or very little.

There’s a whole lot of stuff that’s easy to grow, and that quite naturally doesn’t need much maintenance and especially no pesticide as a general rule.

Tetragon spinach is another one that is easily propagated - sometimes called Warrigal Greens, Botany Bay spinach or New Zealand Spinach, Kokihi in Maori language, its Botanical name is Tetragonia tetragonioides. The seeds are often available in seed shops.

The most satisfying thing about working with Australian native foods is… to have the ability to create whole menus around them and be able to match them with wine and other ingredients like cheese for example. The other as we were just saying is to grow them, even just in pots.  It’s worth it.

Native foods have been good to me as they have taken me around the planet a few times. Discovering, or should I say, having been introduced to their existence by the Aboriginal people, I guess I was fortunate to be able to popularize them to a wider audience.

My biggest frustration in working with Australian native foods is… the charlatans who have been getting on the band wagon for a fast buck, or the ones who have mishandled their culinary use, and as a result, put off quite a few Australians and others who, had they been properly instructed, would have fallen in love like I did.

Greed has been a factor in the emerging industry. Misunderstanding and misconception of Kangaroo and Emu is also an on-going frustration of mine.

The best meal I’ve eaten this year was… almost certainly at Bodega restaurant in Commonwealth Street, Surry Hills. I just love the Tapas Ben Milgate and Elvis Abrahanowicz put out.  Lots of brilliant flavours and lots of garlic! And wonderful Spanish reds which I love so much. I really can’t think of just one dish that has blown my mind - there are several I have liked.  I’m also a regular at Thai Nesia in Darlinghurst for Billy’s ‘Holy Basil Crispy Salmon’. It’s amazing, like the rest of his dishes.

In the top end of things, this year nothing! If I see another foam, spit, frog froth or call it what you like on my plate, I am going to scream!  And no… you do not turn crayfish or other expensive items into custard and charge a hundred bucks for it and call it Modern Australian Cuisine!  Or serve a square inch of pork belly for the price of a whole pig - that’s obscene.

Australian menus are all out of whack, trying too hard to be something they’re not.  Stick to basic wholesome food and there you will have it. It doesn’t take molecular energy to create a good meal.

My most treasured food memory is… a lemon sole I had in Zeebrudge in Belgium many moons ago.  It was by far the nicest piece of fish I have ever eaten.  It really did change my life.

Another was a Coquille St Jacques (Scallops) Feuilleté where when my fork hit the six centimeter stack of the best puff pastry I have ever eaten, the whole pile fell like a house of cards.  I have never worked out how they got it onto my plate, to me, out of the oven without the thing flying off, it was absolutely amazing!  This was in The French Basque country in the town of Saint Jean De Pied-de-Port at ‘Hotel des Pyrenees’.

Slow Foodies should check out… early issues of Slow Food, a prized treasure on my bookshelves, alongside another collection called “Convivium: The Journal of Good Eating”.  ‘A Continuous Picnic’ is another good read.

The most important thing about the sustainable food movement is… to educate Gen-Y on the importance of eating healthy, unadulterated foods and on how to prepare these foods so we at least can keep a tradition which otherwise will fast slip out of our fingers.

Slow Foodies can make food in Sydney better, cleaner and fairer by… identifying organic food as ‘clean food’ and move into certifying it as ‘Slow Food’ approved. It would be nice to see a tag or a label to identify products like native food products as ‘Slow Food’ family friendly, to make it easier for people to choose well.