--- The Cook Up with Adam Liaw S2 airs weeknights on SBS Food at 7.00pm and 10.30pm, or stream it free on SBS On Demand. Catch Costa in the 'simple but sensational', 'blast from the past' and warrigal greens episodes. ---
Dinner has always been a sacred time for Whadjuk-Noongar television journalist, Narelda Jacobs. She has over 20 years of experience in the Channel 10 newsroom, but the dinner table is where it all began.
The daughter of an Irish-Christian mother and an Aboriginal Uniting Church-reverend, Jacobs had a religious upbringing. Every night the family sat down for a meal that started with grace and ended with a bible reading.
Both her parents were involved in the ministry, so it was common to have multiple guests, particularly after church on Sunday.
"Sunday was an extension of that sanctity of the dinner table because it would be Sunday roast time," she explains.
These gatherings were a time for the family to put their "best foot forward and show guests how much they were respected and loved".
Whether they were hosting an Aboriginal affairs minister or celebrating a sibling's birthday, respect was extended to everyone. Jacobs applies this principle in her career as a journalist and treats everyone that "comes to the table" as equal.
Narelda Jacobs loves eating with family. Source: Supplied
The art of conversation is another skill Jacobs picked up from the dinner table. Religious formalities were followed by lots of chatter.
"Sitting around a table is something that I associate with the love of family," she reflects. "It was time for the family to come together and spend innocent pure time together with no external factors or distractions."
Cook like Narelda
Quandong chicken with creamy mash
She wants to encourage families to use dinner as a time to "really ask questions and to share".
"Whether you've lived with someone for five years, 20 years or 40 years, there are never enough questions to ask someone," she says. "Either about their day or about their life or about their thoughts…being around the dinner table is the time to do it because you have their wholehearted attention."
Sitting around a table is something that I associate with the love of family.
Jacobs and her relatives live on opposite sides of the country so she doesn't see them often. This makes the time they spend together even more special. When they do, they cook a nostalgic childhood meal, such as her favourite apricot chicken.
It was an honour for Jacobs to cook an adaption of this dish on SBS Food's The Cook Up with Adam Liaw, where she replaced apricots with quandongs.
Quandong chicken with creamy mash Source: Adam Liaw
"We were brought up but fiercely knowing our Aboriginality and [my dad], wherever possible, would teach us about traditional foods," she says.
She now often tries to cook with native ingredients. "To be sustainable more than anything and to embrace part of who this country is and part of who I am and to reflect that on the plate."
Narelda Jacobs and her family enjoying a barbecue outside. Source: Supplied
THE COOK UP WITH ADAM LIAW
Roast beef with rich port gravy
