Aussie Farmers Direct

Herself has signed us up. First delivery is yet to arrive. Someone knocked at the door - and it seems like a great way to support our farmers. You see in Australia our grocery retailing is in the hands of a duopoly - Woolworths and Coles. There are independents - an Australia wide one IGA and locally there is Maxi. Here at The Trad Pad, Maxi is our preferred grocery retailer but we do shop at Woolworths when it suits - for very good specials or a particular product. You see we don't want to give most of our grocery dollar to supporting the market dominance of Woolworths - not only in groceries but in hotels, liquor retailing, and poker machines. What do you think, dear Reader, when you see the Roll Back poster in Woolworths proudly boasting that they are rolling back prices? Miss Eagle thinks there are two possibilities:

1. This is untrue - and prices are not rolling back i.e. when are they rolling back to? - are they rolling back on every item or only some items?
2. This is true - but how is the rolling back being done and at whose expense? Stories persist of farmers being squeezed; of farmers being flooded with paperwork as Woolworths imposes their auditing procedures upon them. And what about employees - are their wages and working hours and intensity of work being squeezed too? Are suppliers being forced to cut and cut their prices to get shelf space to put their products up front?

Miss Eagle suspects that the answer to each question is in the affirmative. Woolworths are progressively introducing their trendy looking house brand, Select. Some stories are around that Select is gradually taking shelf space away from other wholesalers. In other words, Woolworths are not giving existing suppliers a fair deal. Dear Reader, if you are not already taking time to check the labels on all the products that go into your shopping basket - please do so from now on. To whom are you transferring the power of your grocery dollar vote? Towards Australian business and employment or to foreign businesses who do not pay their employees well, who do not meet appropriate environmental standards? If you think this is exaggerated, Woolworths had to answer questions recently about Select brand toilet paper which had its source in unsustainable forest harvesting.

As a consumer, dear Reader, are you prepared to be relieved of what power you might have and give the decision-making to large corporations to make decisions in their own interests which, in the end, may not be in your best interests?

So, here at The Trad Pad, we are willing to give Aussie Farmers Direct a go.

A heart for French Provincial

Let me put it on the record. Here at The Trad Pad we love things French Provincial. This means that Herself and Miss Eagle take a regular fix by visiting Provincial Home Living at Nunawading on a regular basis. Now, what I would really love to purchase there is their large bookcase, the one with the ladder. Ho, hum. Not on the financial or space agenda here at The Trad Pad. But, I usually walk away with a tidbit or two. Herself had to have a bird cage (only ornamental birds at The Trad Pad) and a pair of golden mesh food covers. Miss Eagle came away with a set of three heart-shaped biscuit cutters in their own metal case, some new tea-towels, and three little white hens with which something interesting needs to be done. As you can see below, as if I needed another biscuit cutter. So, I had to bake something that would justify a graduate set of hearts. Using the small and large cutters, I made biscuit pairs with pink icing in the middle and on top and multi-coloured cachous. Won't make them too often because the icing makes them s-o-o sweet. You virtually have to eat them like cakes by slicing them up into smaller pieces! But the biscuit pastry is lovely and the recipe is below. Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups of butter or margarine
• 1 cup of granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tablespoons of milk
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla
• 1/2 teaspoon of almond extract
• 4 cups of plain/all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon of baking powder

Method

• Preheat oven to 200 degrees Celsius or 400 degrees Fahrenheit
• Thoroughly cream butter and sugar
• Add egg, milk, vanilla and almond extract
• Beat well
• Stir together flour and baking powder
• Gradually add the creamed mixture, mixing to make a smooth dough.
• Roll out
• Cut into shapes
• Bake for 6 to 8 minutes
• Cool on rack
• Ice

Paradise, Cinnamon, Crunch and Apple Crumble

I'm here, back, arrived. Rumours of my demise have been greatly exaggerated - in spite of my illness, Herself's illness, and general busy-ness and Spring fever which can be seen over at The Trad Pad. Just popped in to tell you about something I did differently for dessert recently. Instead of the usual topping on the Apple Crumble, this packet of Made and Owned in Australia (and isn't that Paradise), Paradise Cinnamon Crunch got crumbled up, sprinkled over the apples, and dotted with butter. Miss Eagle thought it was absolutely scrumptious and highly commends it. Herself said is was "all right" but preferred the traditional topping.

Muriel

Muriel Robertson, Robert Borlund's mother, is hereby declared by Miss Eagle as Mother of the Year. Greater love has no mother than that she fly half-way across the world to her son's bed of pain with a packet of Tim Tams. Television reports show a distinguished elderly woman from Perth with an English accent and say that she has turned up in Thailand with Tim Tams.

A step up to a start-up: social enterprise catering

Clockwise from top left:

1 & 2: AfriTas Restaurant, Hobart; 3 La Cocina, San Francisco; 4 Smart Cuisine, Clayton; 5 & 6 Sorghum Sisters, Carlton

Reading about La Cocina in San Francisco has stimulated this post. How many women and men who are interested in food and who are good cooks have not dreamed about a restaurant or a coffee shop? Somewhere between few and none is Miss Eagle's guess. For immigrant women for whom English is not their first language, who have limited or no resources, and risk social isolation, one of their exits could be the communal commercial kitchen.

Refugee organisations have assisted in this regard in Australia. African immigrants and refugees put their energies into AfriTas in Hobart in a very systematic operation which has had great success.

In Melbourne, there are two fine examples in SMART Cuisine and The Sorghum Sisters.

But Miss Eagle would like to know more. Where are there other social enterprises such as these operating in communal commercial kitchens? Are there business incubator enterprises such as La Cocina operating in Australia for women who are not immigrants or refugees who may want to consider starting up a food enterprise? How easy and how cheap is it to rent a commercial kitchen - say in Melbourne or Sydney - for a short period (say one day per week)?

In a world that appears dominated by celebrity chefs, can we explore together, dear Reader, the world of the start-up?

Conversion tables - Fahrenheit/Celsius

MISS SCHAUER'S CONVERSION TABLES

[To open a larger picture in a new tab, right click on picture]

Jam Drops - from thumbprints or fingerprints

Woof Nanny recently posted on what she referred to as an American Classic - the thumbprint cookie. I knew immediately what she meant and the photograph confirmed it. Because, after all, it is an Australian Classic - the Jam Drop. And the recipe I am about to give is from that other Aussie Classic, Amy Schauer, in my family's cooking bible: The Schauer Australian Cookery Book.

APRICOT OR RASPBERRY DROPS

Cream 4oz butter and 4oz sugar to a cream, add 2 well-beaten eggs, beat well in. Add 6oz sieved flour and 6oz cornflour, 1 level teaspoon of cream tartar, 1/2 teaspoon crush bi-carb. soda. Mix well through, roll into small balls with the fingers, and make a smal well in the centre of each with the finger-tips; in this put 1/2 teaspoon of raspberry or apricot jam, and place on cold floured tray. Bake in quick oven 10 to 15 minutes until a golden brown.

Miss Eagle's Notes

• I prefer a little less cornflour and use 8 oz plain flour and 4 oz cornflour
• I place the biscuits on a greased and floured tray
• A quick oven is a hot oven - so about 200 or 220 degrees Celsius - and keep any eye on them

A must for the biscuit barrel or cookie jar