Outback Families Share 70 Years of Recipes and Remote Learning

When your nearest neighbor lives hours away and the supermarket is 200 kilometers down the road, a shared meal becomes more than dinner. It becomes connection.

Families across Far West New South Wales just released "Dust Off and Dish Up," a cookbook celebrating 70 years of School of the Air. The book captures recipes passed down through generations of station families, along with stories of learning via radio, tape recorders, and now video calls.

Bessie Thomas from Burragan Station helped edit the cookbook while her three children attend classes online. She says food brings together families, station workers, and communities despite the vast distances between them.

"We're getting together for smoko in the paddock or barbecues to celebrate birthdays," Bessie explains. Her children now learn through video calls, forming friendships with classmates before ever meeting in person.

The cookbook is the fifth published by the school, continuing a tradition that began in the 1980s. Each decade brings new recipes and stories tracking how remote education evolved from crackling radio broadcasts to high-speed internet.

Anny O'Connor shared memories of learning via transceiver in the late 1960s from Connulpie Downs Station near Tibooburra. Sometimes lessons got interrupted when the family's foal wandered off or they spent extra days checking water supplies with her dad.

The recipes range from classic sausage rolls and quiche to practical bush cooking. Lachlan Gall from Langawirra Station included instructions for catching and cooking yabbies, complete with advice to cook them outside so "she-who-must-be-obeyed won't be pleased at all" about the smell.

Former student Ainsley Fuster photographed the cookbook cover in the paddock, battling flies and melting cream. "It looks great on the camera, but behind the scenes it was a lot of fanning the cream and swatting off flies," she laughs.

The Ripple Effect

Funds from cookbook sales help cover bus trips, school camps, and supplies for students who can't pop over to weekend sports like other kids. The money bridges the gap created by distance, giving remote learners the same opportunities as their city peers.

The cookbook sold out at Broken Hill stockists and the Parent's and Citizens Association just restocked retailers, hoping to sell more copies at next week's Mundi Mundi Bash.

Seven decades of recipes, stories, and connection prove that distance might separate these families geographically, but it brings them closer in every other way.