Month: November 2011

Speaking of Bespoke

The Internet promises to disrupt many industries, but it’s finally getting around to disrupting the garment industry. There are now many sites devoted to providing exclusive-brand quality at mass-market-brand prices. They use approaches like out-sourcing design to their customers, taking a smaller profit margin than typical designer or bespoke operators, generating a larger volume of sales through global exposure via the Internet, and providing generous terms for dealing with wrong sizes.

Threadless and Cafe Press are the grand-daddies of the market, but there are now some Australian outfits getting in on the act, such as Shoes of Prey who are getting a profile for their high-end women’s footwear.

However, I want to do a shout-out for Carbon Copy Shirts who I’ve bought a few business shirts from. They have a great deal at the moment of 3 shirts for $99 that I’ve taken advantage of. Now the shirts have been through the wash a couple of times, I can say that they are good quality and they are in the regular wear cycle.

Stonehenge Slice Recipe

This is another easy and tasty slice from the Country Women’s Association slice cook-book. The first time I made this, I followed the recipe and used dried apricot, but this time I used crystalised ginger and it worked a treat.

Consider it to be something like Adult Chocolate Crackles. I guess it’s called Stonehenge Slice because you could cut it into thin slices and assemble your very own Stonehenge, if you really wanted. Or even get more creative.

Ingredients

  • 185 g dark chocolate (I prefer 55%)
  • 125 g butter
  • 125 g caster sugar
  • 125 g pieces of crystalised ginger
  • 3 1/2 cups rice bubbles (probably something like 125 g, too)

Method

  1. Chop ginger into small pieces.
  2. Grease a 18cm x 28cm slice tin.
  3. Break chocolate into pieces and put chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave on HIGH for 60 seconds.
  4. Chop butter into pieces and add to bowl. Microwave on HIGH for 30 seconds then stir. Keep going like that until just melted.
  5. Place rice bubbles in a large bowl and combine with the ginger and sugar.
  6. Pour in the melted chocolate and mix together gently.
  7. Press into the slice tin, cover and refrigerate for a couple of hours.
  8. Cut into slices in the tin before serving. (Keep unused slice in the fridge.)