The borderline desert climate of South Australia's Riverland is a far cry from the native climate of turmeric in the forests of tropical south-east Asia. But farmers Peter and Ann Brooke have found success in growing turmeric in their dry region. They say the crops can be grown anywhere in Australia.
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00:00 Well, we've had it forever. My grandfather had it 100 years ago, so he was been here
00:07 a long time. We were away for quite a few years, but we came back 12 years ago. We've
00:13 got a vineyard mainly here. And then the grapes have been really bad,
00:18 as you know. So before that, though, we thought, "Oh, we'll start growing vegetables." So
00:25 we got into sweet potatoes first, and then we were selling them at the Adelaide Showgrounds
00:31 Farmers' Markets. And everyone was saying, "Well, you've got the hot climate. Can you
00:36 grow turmeric and ginger?" So we bought $500 worth of each, and the ginger failed, but
00:46 the turmeric really took off. So...
00:48 Yeah. So explain for us how then it's grown over the last six years.
00:54 Well, we only did a little bit at the start. We had no idea what we were doing, but no
01:01 one else grows it in South Australia. But everyone can grow it. You only take a piece
01:05 of turmeric, and it'll grow. Any piece off there will just grow put in the ground anywhere
01:11 in Australia. It's like garlic. If you can grow garlic, you can grow turmeric. So a picture
01:17 of our sweet potatoes and our puppy dog. The sweet potatoes are our main business. "Oh,
01:21 there's turmeric." And there's the ginger that failed in the foreground there.
01:26 The turmeric flowers are beautiful too. You can eat the whole plant actually. You can
01:30 eat the leaves, you can eat the plant, the flowers. Our niece actually had the flowers
01:37 in her wedding bouquet. These have died off a little bit now, but she's a vegan, and I'm
01:42 sure she ate the bouquet after the wedding.
01:45 Nothing goes to waste. I'm surprised at how large the plant is.
01:55 Yeah, it's like a canna lily. It grows a good metre high. They grow really well. They don't
02:03 die. I plant a thousand and everyone grows. So they're a pretty tough plant.
02:06 And was there much trial and error in it, or did it just basically took really well?
02:15 Yeah, we just put it in the ground and away it went.
02:17 All the ginger died though. It just happens to grow nicely here. I don't think anywhere
02:25 around Australia grows nicely. Everyone should have it for medicinal purposes. It's fantastic
02:32 stuff.
02:33 Yeah, you don't want to let the secret out too much and have everyone growing it and
02:36 you'll lose your business.
02:40 Now, so where do you sell it to and has it been pretty popular?
02:45 Ah, yes, we sell out most weeks. Well, we sell it at the Adelaide Showground Farmer's
02:52 Market in Adelaide. We go down every weekend with our sweet potatoes mainly, but always
02:58 have a few garlic and turmeric. What else do we sell?
03:01 Garlic, turmeric, rhubarb. Rhubarb's really good with calcium. We try and sell products
03:08 that are health-orientated. We've got asparagus growing too, but we don't sell that.
03:13 Yeah, we're all organic.
03:14 Yeah, so no poisons or anything.
03:17 The farmer's markets are fantastic to grow and sell for. I think there's a lot of stuff
03:22 about the supermarkets lately, but we tried the supermarkets, but they weren't very good
03:26 to us.
03:26 No.
03:26 Right. And so how do people use the turmeric?
03:33 We have a formula for a tonic, and we have a teaspoon of that every day. And what it
03:39 is, we sell our turmeric at 100-gram punnets. So that whole lot of turmeric, it's a bit
03:46 more than-
03:46 About like that.
03:47 Yeah, about like that with a little bit more. So all that you throw in a blender, you put
03:51 in a teaspoon of black pepper and two tablespoons of honey and the juice of a lemon and blitz
03:59 it and then put it in a jar, then in the fridge. And that size actually lasts, Pete and myself,
04:05 a week when we have a teaspoon each every morning. It doesn't taste nice.
04:10 Mate, you swear by it.
04:14 Yeah, I know. But I prepare myself. I still think, "Right, I've got to have my medicine."
04:19 So I just take a teaspoon of the turmeric and then get my orange juice ready and swig
04:25 it down quickly. Whereas you mix it in your orange juice, don't you? So yeah, but we're
04:32 fighting, Pete's nearly 70 and I'm not far behind him. So yeah, we work every day out
04:41 in the block and everything and our bones are good and everything. So yeah, we swear
04:47 by it.
04:48 And yeah, you reckon people should get to know it a bit better and use it for different
04:52 things?
04:52 I think everyone takes the tablets and the powder. Everyone knows turmeric these days.
04:56 But when you have it fresh, it just makes so much difference. It's just beautiful stuff.
05:01 You both seem to be really in your element and you obviously love the farming life.
05:06 Yeah, farming is the way to go. Small farm, we're not a big scale, but
05:13 no, it's fantastic. Pete's working for a living.
05:16 The young girl that was in the photo before, Jenna, she's been corporate and she came to
05:23 us just for, she said, "I just need a job." She's looking for work in Barmara in corporate.
05:29 So she started working for us and she said, "Oh my God, I am never going back to corporate.
05:35 I love this life. Come to work, bring my dog." And she said, "Don't you dig without me."
05:43 There she is.
05:44 Yeah, that's Jenna there. She said, "Don't you dig without me?"
05:46 Because she loves digging with sweet potatoes, love getting in the soil.
05:50 It's beautiful weather up here in the Riverland too. So we're very lucky. Even in wintertime,
05:56 there's a lot of rain usually in Adelaide, but it's not raining up here, which is probably why
06:02 the turmeric grows so well as well as the sweet potatoes. We're a lot hotter than the southern
06:07 area of Adelaide. So yeah, it's really good.
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