NEWSLETTER: Summer 1999/2000
- Fair trade
- Giving you curry
- Egged on
- Spice up your love life
- Puree heaven
- BBQ King
- Native gone
- Lee Way
Fair trade
Our trading hours over Christmas will be our normal hours every day except public holidays and New Year’s Eve — that is:
Friday 24th December Christmas Eve 10:00am to 5:00pm
Wednesday 29th December 10:00am to 6:00pm
Thursday 30th December 10:00am to 6:00pm
Friday 31st December 10:00am to 2:00pm
Re-opening Tuesday 4th January 10:00am to 6:00pm for another year of pleasing our customers!
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Giving you curry
We’ve been asked many times how to make a basic curry paste. Well, it’s easy — in a small bowl mix together the following: 2 tablespoons of any Herbie’s curry powder, 1 tablespoon oil, 1 tablespoon tomato paste and _tablespoon water. Presto, it’s a curry paste! For a slightly more splendid version, brown the curry powder for a minute or two in a small pan, stirring so it doesn’t burn. Add the oil, then a tablespoon of finely chopped onion, a crushed clove of garlic, a few curry leaves, and cook another minute or two. Keep stirring frequently. Then add the tomato paste and enough water to bring it to the paste consistency you want. You can store this in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.
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Egged on
Egged on by many of our customers, we’ve had a Herbie's Spices apron made. A tasteful non-crush fabric the colour of the background of our label bears the Herbie’s logo and a beautiful stitched star anise about the size of a saucer. Under the star, the stitching declares (what else??) "COOKING STAR". We’re delighted with the result, and the retail price is a reasonable $25.95, which is the same price as our cheerful chilli apron. (Postage $5.00 extra.)
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Spice up your love life
We love to get inspiration from our customers, and a chance remark about a need for an engagement gift brought about our new Aphrodisiac Kit! We had great fun putting the recipes for this one together...everyone knows that virtually all spices are aphrodisiacs, and they’ve been teamed with other sensual and sexy foods such as oysters, figs and artichokes for the ultimate in seductive sensations.
Departing from the cheerful corrugated cardboard boxes used for the other kits, this one is in a slinky, black-satin-smooth box tied with a gold, heart-studded ribbon. Simply too good to save for Valentine’s Day, it’s perfect for hen’s nights, anniversaries, and any special occasion. For a bit of a preview, here’s one of the recipes from the kit...
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Puree heaven
BRUSCHETTA WITH PUREE OF ARTICHOKES
1 x 420g can artichoke hearts, drained
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
6 black olives, pitted and chopped
1 small tomato
teaspoon jalapeno chilli powder
2 teaspoons ground cumin seed
salt and pepper to taste
4 thick slices French bread
extra olive oil
Chop the drained artichoke hearts finely, and peel, seed and finely chop the tomato. Heat the oil in a pan, add the artichokes, olives, tomato, chilli, cumin and salt and pepper. Stir to combine and heat through, adding a little water if necessary to combine the ingredients. When the tomato is softened, blend the mixture to a fairly chunky puree. Brush the slices of bread with olive oil and toast both sides under a grill. Top each slice with artichoke mixture and serve immediately. Serves two. Or use it as a dip or part of a mezze plate.
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BBQ King
There’s been great demand for a Barbecue Kit as well, so naturally we’ve obliged in time for the summer barbie season. It contains a good selection of the Herbie’s blends particularly suitable for barbecues, a South Indian inspired wrapped chicken number, and a fantastic spare ribs recipe with star anise. (Herbie says "barbecue" basically translates to "cooked by male person", therefore we can put ribs cooked in the oven in the barbecue kit!)
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Native gone
Many of you will have been disappointed that our native Australian blends have been out of stock because of a crop failure of bush tomato (akudjura) which is an ingredient in Native BBQ, Native Seasoning, and Bushman’s Pepperpot blends. With most herbs and spices, if there’s a crop failure in one part of the world, you can still find that particular commodity coming from somewhere else. However, by the very nature of Australian native herbs and spices, if they’re not available here in Australia, they’re not available anywhere! Faced with continuing unreliable supply, we have re-formulated the Bushman’s Pepperpot, and we promise you won’t be disappointed in the minor change. Native Seasoning has also been re-invented so that it is a suitable replacement for the original Native Barbecue, which will remain out of stock until akudjura is available again.
All this means that our True Blue Aussie Kit no longer has entirely Australian ingredients, as we have replaced the Native Barbecue with our immensely popular Balmain and Rozelle Spice in the kit. However, it’s still nearly all-Australian, and we hope you won’t mind too much.
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Lee Way
Just a final word on our spice kits...if you’re ordering for Christmas, we might at times find it difficult to fulfil our usual one-day turnaround, so please give us a few days’ leeway on delivery at this busy time.
Our very best wishes for the Festive Season and New Year,
Ian and Elizabeth
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