Maesri is our choice in Thai curry paste

Why are we fans of Maesri red and green curry pastes?

Great taste

An ingredient list that looks interesting and authentic and isn't loaded with filler ingredients like water or sugar or oil

Competitive price

Available in small tins that are the ideal size for a family curry, so there's no three-quarter used jars moulding away in the back of the fridge

Small tins make it easy to store a range of curry pastes in the pantry

Tins aren't as breakable as glass jars

http://www.maesribrand.com/

100% pure cocoa stocked again in Woolworths supermarkets

It has been out of stock for quite a while now but its back in stock again, at a special price. I have been unable to find any other unadulterated cooking cocoa powder for sale at a reasonable price in any chain of supermarkets since this product went out of stock. Woolworths Homebrand 100% Pure Cocoa Powder is made in Germany from imported ingredients. Unlike the popular Australian brand of cocoa, Bournville Cocoa, this product only lists one ingredient in the "Ingredients" listing on the packet: "Pure Cocoa Powder". The Bournville brand product differs from the German Homebrand product in many respects. It apparently contains flavourings, it is lighter in colour, less intense in flavour and it has roughly twice the sugar content as the Homebrand cocoa, which makes me wonder how much of the flavouring in the Bournville brand is just plain old sugar. I certainly don't regard the Bournville product as a pure or honest product, and I refuse to buy it. I also refuse to buy any of the many premium imported cooking cocoa products on the market that come in tiny cans and have huge prices. If Woolies can offer a pure and good product at a very reasonable price, why can't other supermarket retailers offer similar products?

Frozen egg whites seem to whip up just fine

I've recently used five frozen egg whites which were left over from making a cake to make a pavlova. Maybe the egg whites were a little bit less light and fluffy than fresh egg whites would have been, but I can't say I saw any definite problem with using thawed frozen egg whites in a recipe that requires them to be whipped up to soft peaks. So don't chuck excess egg whites, freeze them for later!

Lemon mudcake anyone?

Black and Gold brand, as sold in IGA supermarkets in Australia, have been, maybe still are, selling "self-raising flour" that apparently has no raising agent in it. This is a big problem, because if you bake with this stuff you will not only have wasted money buying a sub-standard product, you will also have wasted money spent on all the other cake ingredients, and wasted time baking the cake, and wasted the opportunity to have the cake that you planned. I recently invented the lemon mudcake. I never intended to invent the lemon mudcake!

Plum Crumble recipe a winner!

Thank you David Herbert at the Weekend Australian for this winning recipe, which is a great way to make use of the cheap plums that are currently in season in the temperate part of Australia where I live. It's a quick and easy recipe which works, and there is none of that pre-cooking of the fruit which one finds in many other fruit crumble recipes.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/features/comfort-and-joy/story-e6frg8h6-1226293447421

Very simple but effective recipes - raspberry or blackcurrant juice jelly

I find that Cascade cordial syrups for use in this recipe are easiest to find at Coles and Woolies supermarkets, and Bickfords are widely available but often sold out.

Raspberry jelly can be used as an element of a raspberry trifle, with raspberry jam on the sponge and fresh or frozen berries to top the trifle.

Ingredients

1 packet Aeroplane Create-a-jelly (black packet)

raspberry juice cordial syrup or blackcurrant juice cordial syrup (Cascade and Bickfords are good brands)

boiling water

cold water

Method

Follow the instructions on the jelly packet, using the cordial at around half dilution, or to taste.

Very simple but effective recipes - French onion dip

If you are shopping at Woolies at the moment and you hope to buy a packet of French onion soup to make the classic home-made party dip, you may find you are out of luck. Wollies and Coles are huge corporations which aim to sell groceries that they want the public to buy, but not necessarily stuff that the public wants to buy, so items such as French onion soup and plain tinned baked beans which tend to sell well at Christmas time, (the beans for breakfast gatherings presumably), are often out of stock at outlets of Australia's supermarket duopoly. Woolies do have your foul-tasting vegetable needs in mind with prominent displays of parsnips and Brussel sprouts (pleh, blargh), but if you wish to try some more edible foods in the festive season, your suburban corner store supermarket might be a better bet.

Ingredients

1 standard-sized packet of cream cheese (Philly is the best-known brand)

1 standard-sized packet of French onion soup (dehydrated powder)

as much milk as required

Method

Mix it all up with a potato masher in a bowl, adding milk gradually till you have a soft consistency suitable for a dip. With a scraper transfer the dip into a suitable container for serving.