Have a merry season

Today, I made my last Christmas gift packs for 2013. It filled with me joy as that is another step in the right direction that we have made in our wee spice business. People have been really complimentary which never ceases to amaze us. See Zoe's write up on: Christmas Present Guide

Last night we got an email saying they needed to find Deema's spices to tide them through the festive period. I think on that absoultely brilliant note - we wish everyone a merry season as we close for 2013.

See you in 2014.

Delicious Deema's Spices Christmas Gift Bag

You'll be glad to know that our authentic delicious blend of Deema's Sri Lankan Curry Spices is now available as a special Christmas gift bag.

 

For just £8 each, our Christmas gift bags include 2 packets of Deema's Sri Lankan Curry Spices in a lovely re-useable jute bag and a special recipe card for making curry with turkey leftovers and the price includes postage but not the holly! And if you pre-order 2 gift bags, the price is £15. Order today!

For Christmas gifts sorted easily, we can send to a friend or relative. Just email us their name and address along with your details to deemaspice@gmail.com we will add a note in to say that it is from you.

In the meantime, have a merry season.

Flying by the seat of our pants.

Damn. We didn't find any funding.

It did put us down and there wasn't much enthusiasm. But hey we'll just use the trusted but limited VISA and fly by the seat of our pants.

So no more radio silence, doom and gloom and cursing banks - well, bank cursing will continue.

We are back.


And we have been busy. There is a new Christmas giftpack. Hopefully unveiled this weekend. So watch out Deema's back in town!

There’s healthy eating. And there’s deep fried curried chicken.

On Saturday afternoons, my husband used to get us yummy but expensive bags fried chicken from various chicken places on the way down Leith Walk.

However, he’s now come up with a new option that’s even tastier and a load cheaper. But this no health-food option either.  It’s just delicious, while being easy dish to manage for the average male member of the species while he juggles his usual hectic Saturday afternoon schedule of sport-watching, pint drinking and avoiding DIY commitments: 

Deema’s Spice Deep fried chicken, the ingredients:

Any fresh chicken will do

Deema’s Spice one packet

An extra hot chillie, or two

Mixed herbs

Rice-wine

Garlic

Salt and Pepper

Soy-sauce

Chicken oxo-cube

That’s right he grabbed everything we usually have to hand and just rubbed it into the chicken, then he left it for a few hours. When he came back, he plonked it into the fryer, and twenty minutes later, voila. We had a gorgeous and deliciously unhealthy treat for around £7.50, instead of twenty-odd quid.

For even tastier Deema's Spice - do nothing but wait.

Although we like to say our curries are quick to make, we've noticed one big reason why you shouldn't rush too much. If you let them stand, they taste even better. The mix of flavours blends even more perfectly over time. An overnight stay in the fridge, for example turned our potato and bean curry into a deeply scrumptious cold addition to our Sunday summer lunch and it became the highlight of the meal. 

Incidentally, this means if you have any leftovers from one of our curries, they won't be left for long 

For spice go international, but visit a local grocer for really outstanding veg

Lots of people have different views about supermarkets. At Deema's Sri Lankan Spices, we choose not to have or share any of them. If it all goes to plan, you see, we want to feature in their shelf space.

Yet it's a simple fact that even the most taste-conscious supermarket can't compete for tastiness with local fruit and vegetables that are allowed to ripen naturally, for longer - attached to a plant in the soil, rather than being kept fresh in any super/instant freezing/refrigeration process. Why do we know this? When we cook up samples with veg from Tattie Shaws, people comment on the veg, as well as the spices. Natural freshness makes a big difference. But if we don't support this difference, it may be lost forever to more convenient processes.

Supermarkets can do something about this and promote 'slow food', i.e. food that costs less in carbon. (Here's a line for them: 'Less carbon, but much more taste'.) We can do something too. Yes supermarkets are convenient, but lets get our Sunday or any special meal veg from a local grocer with connections to local farmers.

Good quality naturally fresh local food doesn't have to be expensive either. In Edinburgh we have a great charity called Edinburgh Community Food who carry out training, cooking lessons and make great tasting locally grown vegetables available to people who find it difficult to  have a healthy diet. So some of our most vulnerable citizens get the best at a low cost. They also make this available from the website for us to order, here.

Now that's a positive way to promote good health.

As seen in Bite Magazine

We got just a quick mention in Bite, but all I did was call. Why didn't I send them a sample! All the same, thank you Bite! We're honoured to be included.

Hampers Food and Wine: beautiful food, beautiful place, lovely people

Announcing a new stockists for Deema's Sri Lankan Curry Spices - Hampers Food and Wine. This time, far away from Edinburgh, in beautiful Woodstock, Oxfordshire. UNESCO heritage site and gorgeous gateway to the Cotswolds.


It's the most amazing, proper old fashioned delicatessen, packed to the brim with everything tasty you could ever imagine. We're really proud to be included. It was great to see Wayne's face light up as he tasted my sample and said "Yeah I'll take what you have".  Lovely people.  Wish I'd brought more.

Free Chianti. May not return...

Of course we will come back.

How else can we continue to help our fine foodie friends experience authentic, sophisticated and extremely tasty Sri Lankan curries?

We will be back on the 12th of July, all the keener, obviously.

Here we are again....

Love it. Hundreds of years old Sri Lankan curry blend, now 'new on the block' at
Foodepedia.  Thank you guys for your support, interest and enthusiasm.

With lashings of ginger beer...

Hardy friends and customers have been out in the field, literally, with bags of Deema's Sri Lankan curry powder to flavour their food during their summer camping jaunts.

"It was great" said one from the wilds of Devon. "Tasted lovely, and I didn't have to bring loads of other spices." It's just the thing we like to hear. Yet we stand in awe and admiration at some foodies' talents with the camping stove.

Next stop North Pole. Come on campers!

Spice Scribe review

Someone else besides us think our spices are great! Thank you!
http://culinaryadventuresofthespicescribe.wordpress.com/products/

Henderson's Taste Sensation

Thank you everyone at Henderson's Hanover Street Edinburgh and all my happy customers and samplers of Deema's Spice potato curry. What a great couple of hours. Sorry I ran out of samples so soon!

More samples will be available Tuesday lunch.

The best thing next to a barbecue

Summer's here. Time to get outside, do garden barbecues and enjoy all those extra added macho-style risks that come with uncooked meat and soil bacteria. But now you can add an extra tasty side dish of Deema's potato curry as the ideal complementary dish.

I tried this by bringing a quickly cooked-up potato curry to my friend's homewarming barbie, instead of the usual bottle of plonk. Everyone loved it. In fact, they went on about my contribution more than the sausages.

Yes, you heard it here folks - veg curry was more popular than meat at a barbecue. Then people kept thrusting glasses of wine in my hand and the details become a bit hazy. The things we do in the name of the cause.

Potato curry is easy. Just follow the instructions on the packet. Remember, brown the potato in the curry powder first before cooking it in a quality tin of coconut milk. Have a good weekend.

Pistachio Pork & Spinach Curry

Sunday morning was spent in the kitchen cooking. Mainly because I couldn't fit the newly bought groceries into the fridge and freezer. And the sun wasn't out.

Pistachio Pork
250g of pistachios - give it a couple of bashes so you have some small bits
1 tbs of honey
1 tsp of crushed cumin
2tbs of coarse ground black pepper
1 tbs of chillie
Left over white wine and a splash of soya sauce
And pork. I used a 1.2kg leg which I cut up and trimmed the fat,

Mix all the ingredients and rub into pork chops. Marinate for at least an hour - more if you have the time. Then fry when ready. Add the wine and soy sauce and let it simmer. Leave some of the nutty mixture for serving.

Spinach Curry
Spinach, left over choi sim and halved some cherry tomatoes for colour.
3 cloves of garlic chopped
1 x Coconut milk tin
2 tbs Deema's Spices

Fry the garlic, add the leaves and tomatoes, 2 tbs of Deema's Spices and coconut milk.
Let it it boil then simmer till you are happy with the taste.

Pork crackling
Rubbed salt and the cumin (yes crushed too much!) into the skin and roasted it. Delicious. I ate most of it.

As seen in Scotland on Sunday!

We were delighted to see Deema's Sri Lankan Curry Spices in the Scotland on Sunday Lifestyle section. What a great write up. We're honoured and touched. 

Read the scoop yourself here:

http://www.scotsman.com/scotland-on-sunday/scotland/deepthi-de-silva-williams-is-spicing-up-home-cooking-1-2951723

Spicy Tuna dish by 15 year old

Finally made hoppers! Whoop whoop! Thanks to a pan that came all the way from Sri Lanka. Can't make hoppers without this pan as I tried a month ago. Epic fail.

After a few disasters this time mainly due to over enthusiasm hoppers were made. The 15 year old said the sambol that goes with hoppers was too hot for him.

So I said make something and left him to it.

 He gets out a tuna tin - we are not very pc in our house. Chops an onion, 2 cloves of garlic, some spring onions, baby tomates puts them all in a pan with the tuna and adds 2 pinches of Deema's Spice.

Yummy and that is now another dish he can make along with a fried egg.