Billycan
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A billycan, more commonly known simply as a billy or occasionally as a billy can, is the traditional Australian utensil for boiling water, making tea and cooking anything liquid on a campfire.
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[edit] What is a 'billy'?
A billy is cylindrical, with its height about one and a half to two times its diameter. It comes with a wire handle, to allow any handy stick to be used to move the hot billy off the fire or to its edge to keep it hot, and normally a close-fitting lid with its own wire handle is also provided. Traditionally there is no spout or pouring lip of any kind. Originally made of thin tin-plated steel, billies are now more commonly made of aluminium, and stainless steel billies are also available. Billies come in many sizes, from about two cups capacity to a gallon or more. Modern Australians often boil a billy on a portable stove rather than on a campfire.
A quite adequate billy, but without a lid, can be made from one of the larger sizes of tin can (so long as the lining is metal and not plastic!) and a piece of fencing-wire for the handle, and this was possibly how the first billies were made. A number 10 can makes a medium large billy, and has just the right proportions.
[edit] Using a billy
Billy tea is made by boiling the water in a billy, adding the tea immediately after removing the billy from the fire, and allowing the tea to draw for a time. Then often one of several methods is employed to make the tea-leaves settle to the bottom of the billy before pouring, preferably into mugs known as pannikins.
[edit] "Billy Tea"
"Billy Tea" is also the registered brand name of a popular brand of tea long sold in Australian grocers and supermarkets, but this Billy Tea makes equally good tea in a teapot, and conversely any good black tea will make well in a billy.
To boil the billy most often means to make tea, but coffee is also made occasionally, either instead of or as well as.
[edit] Etymology
There are many theories on the origin of 'billy':
- It was derived from the local indigenous language billa, meaning creek.
- It was derived from North of England slang 'billy', meaning mate.
- A corruption of 'bally': Scots language meaning milk-pail.
- Large 'bully beef' cans may have been cleaned out to become the first billys. This became 'bullycans' then 'billycans'.
[edit] Methods of settling the leaves
There are two common methods for settling the leaves; one more spectacular than the other.
The first method is simply to tap the side of the billy with a stick until the leaves settle.
The second, more dramatic method, is to stand away from any overhead obstructions and swing the billy in a vertical circle.
[edit] The billy in Australian literature
[edit] Henry Lawson
A billy features in many of Henry Lawson's stories and poems. Some examples:
The swagman tramping ’cross the plain; Good Lord, there’s nothing sadder, Except the dog that slopes behind His master like a shadder; The turkey-tail to scare the flies, The water-bag and billy; The nose-bag getting cruel light, The traveller getting silly.
"'I’m going to knock off work and try to make some money,' said Mitchell, as he jerked the tea-leaves out of his pannikin and reached for the billy." - Mitchell’s Jobs.
"The hatter warmed up the tea-billy again, got out some currant buns, which he had baked himself in the camp-oven,..." - The House that was Never Built
"Then he made a fire in the kitchen, and hung the kettle and a big billy of water over it." - A Child in the Dark, and a Foreign Father
"I started early, and Mary caught up to me at Ryan’s Crossing on Sandy Creek, where we boiled the billy and had some dinner." - ‘Water Them Geraniums’.I. A Lonely Track.
"Mitchell and I turned off the track at the rabbit-proof fence and made for the tank in the mulga. We boiled the billy and had some salt mutton and damper." - The Lost Souls’ Hotel
"Brewing his tea in a billy-can under the bough of a shady tree." - The Swagman by Elaine Bannister.
"Then he went to the camp-fire to try some potatoes which were boiling in their jackets in a billy, and to see about frying some chops for dinner." - The Loaded Dog.
I mind the days we played at camp With billy-can and swag,...
"Then he lifted his swag quietly from the end of the floor, shouldered it, took up his water-bag and billy, and sneaked over the road, away from the place, like a thief." - An Incident at Stiffner’s
[edit] Banjo Paterson
Banjo Paterson's most famous of many references to the billy is surely in the first verse and chorus of Waltzing Matilda:
"And he sang as he watched and waited 'til his billy boiled..."
[edit] References
- Emerson, Ken (w), "The Warrumbunglers" The Warrumbunglers Bushed! 1983 The Dominion Press - Hedges and Bell (23-24).
[edit] External Links
- [|brislib] (2003-01-22), 'Swinging the Billycan' - Making Tea in the Australian Bush [link accessed 2007-02-16]
