When all the grand kids are over on the farm with traditional pancake eating as part of school holiday, we discovered Golden Syrup is not what it used to be. It started with the brutalisation of vegemite. I am no fan of vegemite. Anyone who can look deep inside a jar of vegemite and then still able to spread it on bread has my respect, even admiration. My mother opened up a jar back on a sunny Saturday afternoon in 1958 on the advice of a Polish refugee. She of course immediately recognized endless possibilities of savings to be made when she read ‘spread sparingly’.
Vegemite is under attack and I will, as a good and proud Australian always defend to the death the right for anyone to eat it with staunch impartiality no matter what the colour of anyone’s political persuasion or for their preferred food.
According to the vegemite lovers, it is now marketed mixed with cheese and called ‘vege-mate’ and another mixture named a phoney patriotic ‘Our Mate’ and another iSnack 2.0 the latest named by popular vote. Of course, any product now has to have both numbers and letters in higher and lower case in order to confuse and make for easier selling to the harassed and comatose consumer. Sausages will soon be sold as SAus 69 Griz.
The Golden syrup has always been the world’s favourite pan-cake spread. Ok, at least in the world of Brayton on the Wollondilly, (with the hordes of defending wombabats manning the ramparts against the evil weed inspectors). Anyway, the grandkids arrived and during pandemonium and general chaos put in the order for the morning pancakes before collapsing in a random and haphazard way to their matrasses. Helvi often tells me to let the mothers do the pancakes but that is also always, as a matter of tradition now, met by protesting grandkids, as ‘Opa can only make the pancakes just right’. ‘He makes them with the golden crusty edges and thin as well ‘, Jak says smoothly. With grandkids’ growing appetites the heap of pancakes are in tandem and this now calls for 2 cast iron fry pans. One is a surviving wedding present, made in Finland and superb for pancakes. The other is a Taiwanese cast iron alloy job with black colouring, as proof of its dodgy quality, appearing on the dish cloth.
The milk and water is added to the plain flour with a couple of eggs and pinch of salt. The mixture is thin and pure salted butter is added to the very hot pans. The whole procedure for perhaps 30 pancakes takes no more than 30 minutes with the eating perhaps no more than 7 minutes.
The Golden Syrup is not anymore what is used to be. Does anyone remember the yellow metal tins with black lettering and with a lid that used to be prised open with a knife? The colour was dark and the bouquet brooding with a mystery and hint of an almost Oriental nature. I think Raffles used to serve it up to Somerset Maugham in Singapore for breakfast, while I believe, he was writing ‘Razor’s Edge’.
Perhaps it contained treacle or molasses but it was just right for the crispy, golden edged pancakes. Now all that glory and joy has changed and gone. It was decided that it had to become’ committed’ more wasteful and turned over faster, make more and better money, and what better than to make it thinner and sell in squeeze plastic bottles that would malfunction after a couple of tries. It is a shadow and fake Golden Syrup now but makes a fortune for the Emporiums of the money merchants. It will soon be called GLod Mr3 S and Golden Syrup ‘flavoured’ in small lettering to hide deception and join Maple syrup ‘flavoured’ and Vanilla ‘flavoured’ ,but nothing real anymore.. A bummer.
Window Dresser's Arms, Pig & Whistle 
testing, testing
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“Bwahn tsuooo, bwahn tsuooo!”
Now with extra effect:
“Bwa wa wa tsuo soo soo”
A little pre delay:
“b’bwahn t’tsuoo”
Tons of plate and we’re ready.
Knock knock!
Who’s there?
Wurlitzer!
Wurlitzer who?
“Wurlitzer, one for the money
two for the show
three to get ready
now go cat go
but don’t you step on my blue suede shoes.
You can do anythin’ but lay offa my blue suede shoes
Blue blue blue suede shoes ah-ha blue blue blue suede shoes ah-ha
(Repeat through fade)
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Your identity revealed; you are Bob Hawke!
He is the only other man with blue suede shoes, besides Elvis. Bob was wearing them with white polyester pantaloon and a checked American style jacket; all that and wavy grey hair…
Maybe the shoes were Blanche’s choice; I hope she did not step on them… if she did, I would have asked her to spit on the hankie and clean them.
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There’s nothin’ a little hanky and spit can’t polish.
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I had some friends here for a holiday, we decided to go to Port Douglas for “Breakfast with the birds”, and a look around the sanctuary. Up early and made our way north. There were a lot of people there for the same purpose as us, we chose our breakfast, cereal, toast and vegemite in those plastic packets. There was a tour group of Americans sitting at tables in front of us. One bloke had 4 packets of vegemite which he spread on his one slice of toast. “yuck” he yelled,”how can they eat this stuff, this is disgusting”. We giggled for a while, after they left their table, even the birds – who act as scavengers, would not touch this blackened mess left behind.
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I have not seen such a beautiful Golden Syrup tin , like the one in the picture. I remember something more yellow and red…
The green and gold one must be English; has anyone seen a tin like that?
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Nor have I seen such a florid tin, H.
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Emmjay, I like old florid tins, I could easily become a collector.
The friends who stopped here on their way to Yass, picked up a box of books on their way back to Sydney, and Max6 went home with Grimm’s Fairy Sories, a very old copy with nice pictures.
No more of collecting of anything for me; it’s not going to be easy.
Oh no, I have turned into a gez again, talk about Grimm’s grim stories.
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Are you saying your nose is getting longer and pointing to the left as well? ( A reference to an ice-skating accident in 1953) You’d be surprised what I find around many left corners.
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The ultimate of a very nice kind of sweet is a substance that is chewed out of wood and called Glycyrrhiza glabra.
As a very young school boy back in Holland one would sell friends’ mothers in order to get it. A small stick would last all day and was therefore a most economical treat.
Here it is from Wikipedia, albeit in Dutch. I have never heard of its use here.
Zoethout is in de handel de aanduiding voor korte stukjes van de wortelstok van Glycyrrhiza glabra. Deze bevat een zoetstof die zo’n 30 tot 50 keer zo sterk is als suiker, maar niet schadelijk is voor de tanden[bron?]. Er moet flink op gekauwd en gezogen worden om de zoetstof te proeven. Toch werd zoethout — vooral door kinderen — gewaardeerd voordat de snoepindustrie deze markt overnam met veel makkelijker te consumeren producten.
Aan zoethout worden geneeskrachtige eigenschappen toegeschreven, en de wortel wordt gebruikt voor de bereiding van kruidenthee. Die is goed voor de werking van de maag en de spijsvertering. Het sap uit de wortel wordt gebruikt als grondstof voor drop, eventueel samen met het zout salmiak.
Er zijn drie soorten: Glycyrrhiza glabra L., de Glycyrrhiza echinata L. en de Glycyrrhiza uralensis. Deze planten worden allen gebruikt als sierplant in de tuin. Glycyrrhiza glabra wordt in Zuidoost-Europa voor het zoethout geteeld. In Zuid-Europa en het Midden-Oosten groeit Glycyrrhiza echinata en in China wordt Glycyrrhiza uralensis geteeld.
De zoetstof in zoethout heet glycyrrhizinezuur, dit is een stof die de bloeddruk verhoogt. Zowel van drop als van zoethout is dit effect beschreven en dit kan tot klinisch belangrijke hypertensie leiden.
De Engelse naam voor zoethout is liquorice, wat in die taal hetzelfde woord is voor drop. In Vlaanderen noemt men het ook wel kalissenhout, kalissiehout of gewoon kalisse.
De industriële verwerking van de zoethoutwortel werd mogelijk toen de Italiaan Giorgio Amarelli er in 1731 in slaagde om het sap uit de wortel tot drop, of Glycyrrhiza glabra, de Latijnse apothekersnaam, te verwerken[1].
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Kylla, kylla, Gerard, mina muistan sen kun asuimme Hollannissa ja lapsemme ostivat noita tikkuja. Kysyin tyttarelta jos han niita muistaa ja han sanoi etta kylla han niita muistaa; Isa on oikeassa, halpoja olivat.
Umlauts, no can do, sorry folks.
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“De Engelse naam voor zoethout is liquorice”. You’ve never had liquorice in Australia? But I do seem to remember from years back that Dutch licorice was quite salty. A shock when you weren’t expecting it.
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‘Zoethoud’ translated ‘sweetwood’ is the root of the plant originally from the Middle East. English liquorice has the extracted juice from that plant in very small quantities. You are right, the Dutch licorice or ‘zoute drop’ has more of that zoethoud taste but also with much more salt.
The high salt and acid contents of zoute drop and licorice is not good for hypertension but the root of the plant is credited with having some beneficial properties.
Anyway, the wooden sticks were most sought after.
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You lucky lucky wheat eater you. Will have to try gluten free pancakes
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Hung, it must be hard to follow a gluten free diet, I feel sorry for you.
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At times its very difficult. When you start fantsising about ham and cheese salad sandwiches you know you have a real problem. Thank God for shiraz 🙂
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What about “ChooChoo Bars” and “Clinkers”, “Cobbers” and “Musk Sticks” and the penny paper bag of mixed sweets; and “Fruit Tingles” aren’t the same either, though at least they still “tingle”. Oh, Oh, oh; what about “White Knights”? That dark chocolate over very chewy peppermint nougat. I loved those.
Scheherezade is still a Vegemite fan and thankfully the jar she’s working her way through at the moment still has the old logo. I gave up Vegemite when I discovered that Promite on toast goes better with sugary black tea. That was sometime in my teens. And I do remember the tins of “Cockies Joy” and prying that lid off, and the smell, no fragrance is better.
I used to like soaking freshly baked bread in the stuff and then leaving it until the bread and golden syrup had begun to crystallise together.
Golden Syrup is another Fairbridge memory too. Many were the nights that the kids “filled up” on bread and golden syrup. I recall it came in large four pound tins which were red (?) with the lettering in a sort of polished light golden colour. My mother used to save the tins because they were good for containing other commodities purchased in bulk from “the health food store” which was where you bought things in bulk, without the packaging so to speak.
I remember that peanut butter, honey, golden syrup and other spreadables could all be purchased this way as well as things that came in powdered form. Dad made mum a little trolley to shop with because once you’d bought your four pounds weight of various stuffs it was all a little heavy to lug around in a string bag.
G, you may be “da man!” when it comes to making the GK’s pancakes but it’s well known in culinary circles that Sche makes the best potato chips. Wordsworth’s mates all love eating fish and chips here because she uses a light tempura batter for the fish and the chips, my goodness the chips! They are to die for.
But I don’t advocate going that far. Burning down the house was cost enough.
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….. and Bullets, Caramel Butters and Milk Bottles, Love Hearts, strap liquorice, Whizz Fizz, Fry’s Cream Bars (I found a current source in North Sydney) Raspberry Frogs.
Not to mention Sunny Boy Ice blocks, Lemonade Icy Poles, Golden Gaytimes (still love them), Streets Hearts (now eclipsed by Magna and other heavy-hitting Belgian choc treats)
I think we have the seed of an article here, Waz. “Loss of Innocence and The Decline of Love Hearts in Western Civilisation”.
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What about Western’s Wagon Wheels? Yummie
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Wagon Wheels and Cherry Ripes were the standard bribe in our family. Both cheap at 6d.
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There was a tiny ice cream cone with sherbet topped with marshmallow and hundreds and thousands, penetrated with a hollow liquorice straw.
I’m surprised that I have any teeth left at all.
The miracle of Mr Mackenzie’s “keep your parents poor” painless dentistry.
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Black cats.
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Yes! Chewy little treat those Black Cats. I was all for anything that changed the colour of your tongue. And those bags of sherbet with a licorice straw and those rolls of jaffa toffee with sherbet in the middle. What were they called.
However, I also came across this yesterday:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091001081221.htm
Makes sense to me.
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My little brother once bought me 10 penny snakes for my birthday. I think he received five cents a week pocket money so this represented a substantial investment. But by the time I received it, there was only half a snake in the bag.
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Little brothers; “can’t live with them, can’t shoot ’em!” according to my elder sister.
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Gez, I reckon you’re more patriotic than native born skips. And for that I’m very pleased. I’m particularly fond of your finely-tuned bullshit-detecting antennae.
I do like a bit of Vegemite on my toast as a kind of virtuous offset for the jam, honey, golden syrup or even Maple syrup I put on slice 2. Do I like Vegemite itself ? Not sure, but I definitely missed it in Europe and I AM sure I really dislike the piss weak pretenders like the British variant Marmite. I recall when Marmite came out there was an Aussie response of another yeasty sludge product called Parwill. Get it ? Marmite – but Pa Will.
Here’s what I said about the new product – over at Crikey.com.au
Over 100 posts on the ABC’s Unleashed blog on this topic. Probably means that a few thousand ultraconservative ABC readers have also been re-awakened to the Vegemite spread thing.
So, like the other lemmings I saw it in the supermarket, and decided to see what this new wonder product was like. I’d say that that was a masterful marketing campaign, wouldn’t you ? Usually a jar of Vegemite lasts about three years at our place, so buying a Vege-product when I didn’t actually have a shortage is a lifetime first for me….
A product as mundane and as commonplace in the Australian psyche as its near cousin Sorbent is suddenly propelled to the centre of Australian Media consciousness. When ? At AFL grand final time – so we can talk about it endlessly – when there’s nothing else happening.
Something as dull as fucking Vegemite is on the national agenda.
It looks like poop, and unlike the real thing, a small amount does not go a long way.
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How COULD! You actually BOUGHT New Vegemite? Shame, Emmjay, shame! As dull as vegemite indisputably is, it is one of the tried and true products in a Mother’s arsenal. And an Aussie tradition. And the subject of an Orwellian marketing campaign that might see it disappear forever. New Vegemite indeed!
Tell us your brain was dulled by jet-lag. Lack of sleep. Anything! I sense a top ten list coming on …
Top Ten Excuses for Buying New Vegemite
10. Jet-lagged.
9. Sleep deprived.
8. Both bullshit detecting antennae covered by an Indonesian mud-slide.
7. Kraft employee.
6. How did THAT get in the trolley?
5. I was coughing so hard my hand must have slipped.
4. Me and my teenage girlfriends buy ALL the latest products. Giggle.
3. Temporary insanity.
2. You planted it there to embarass me.
1. Je ne parle pas le eengleesh. Je suis français. Où est la plume de ma tante?
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C’est ce qu’on appelle une étude de marché.
Voyez the chat. Mort par curiosité.
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Le singe est sur la branche. Le chat est sur la chaise. Le souris est en-dessous de la table. Est l’horloge de la Pigs Arms n’est pas sur le Daylight Savings Temps.
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Voice, this is a masterful piece of mirth. My guffawing sadly attracted attention – I should have been working – Boy am I up to my tits in culpa.
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But if all is well, we’ve now moved to Daylight Savings Time (Sydney) now. Let’s look at the time on this comment.
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Why can’t they just let Golden Syrup be golden syrup, Vegemite be vegemite?
May New Golden Syrup and New Vegemite go the way of New Coke.
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One of the great falsehoods at the heart of our market system is the notion that any product that does not consistently increase its sales and market share is doomed to failure. Obviously some very highly paid boys and girls came up with this latest attempt to increase the market reach of our beloved spread.
The falsehood is obvious when one considers that the only terminal condition such continuing increase in sales and market share can lead to is monopoly which is of course anti competitive and therefore anti market; but find me a capitalist that wouldn’t relish a market in which they held a monopoly.
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No, no, and a thousand times no Mirriyuula! This does NOT increase the market reach of our beloved spread. This annihilates our beloved spread and uses Orwellian trickery to hide it while leveraging from its brand recognition to sell the replacement product.
Perhaps it is about increasing market share for Kraft. Perhaps it’s another old fallacy: change = progess. Perhaps it’s about a corporate truth: doing something high profile = big budget = good looking resume.
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Oooh. Do that again! I love it when I’m told NO! Its almost sublime to be told a thousand times.
Sorry where was I ….., ah yes.
You’re right; this shambles is unlikely to increase the market reach or convert that extra reach into market share. That might be whats wrong with their strategy.
To me Vegemite eaters are a special category. Like people who eat Bullachong. You either do or don’t. Its hard to work that kind of market up into any kind of frenzy and its not as if there’s a lot you can do with vegemite other than put it on bread. Though Sche uses it to flavour soups and some of her middle eastern cooking, but always very sparingly.
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Yes Warrigal. 😈
But my real gripe is that it isn’t really vegemite anymore. They can play whatever other marketing games they like but vegemite is a Good Thing, whether or not you actually like it, and getting rid of it while pretending not to is a Bad Thing.
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Oh shit! I must be thick as. What you’re saying is that the stuff in the new jar isn’t the same as the stuff in the old jars we grew up with. Is that it? They’re modifying Vegemite.
I can’t lie down for that, and I don’t even eat much of the stuff any more.
Is the brand still owned here in Australia, or has it been sold off to the frogs like half our dairy industry, or the yanks like our biscuits?
(You’ll have to fill me in on the meaning of that little devil headed emoticon. For the time being I’m enjoying thinking its just you continuing to be strict with me.)
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Precisely Warrigal! They have mucked with the recipe. So it’s not really vegemite any more. What’s worse, vegemite was not only good for you, but harmless. The new stuff isn’t.
Then they give it the Vegemite brand (albeit with a new name). Hence my description of their campaign as Orwellian. Mucking about with the meaning of the word vegemite in a dishonest way. Although Vegemite is officially a brand name it is in common usage a noun.
(Work out the emoticon meaning youself. 😉 )
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Oooh, you are being strict with me.
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Yes, it is owned by Foreigners. Who cares which ones? Uncaring Capitalist Foreigners (I see some acronymic potential there if those words were rearranged).
BTW, I know someone with a Persian wife who lives in Chatswood. I danced with her (well, I was in the same group of females on the dance floor) just the other day.
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Perhaps you know me and just don’t know it, though I don’t think so. If you’d danced with Sche you’d remember it. And yes, there are large numbers of Persians in Chatswood. Arab Persians, Persian Persians, Armenian Persians; the place is rigid with Persians
We don’t call it Iran here at home. Persia sounds so much more romantic.
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Talking about Persians living in Chatswood, we had a lovely couple staying in our cottage a few weeks ago, he was Persian and his very much younger wife looked Chinese. They were keen bike riders; we were very impressed as he must have been in his late fifties, maybe older.
Interesting people, full of questions about our farming experience. I think she was an artist and he an academic; they said they’ll be back…
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Persia has all the romantic connotations we used to associate with the vicinity and none of the modern negative connotations. This lady is a very graceful dancer.
No I don’t think we know each other, the guy I’m thinking of is nothing like you. Sche is such a lovely nickname.
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Cher Voice,
Vegemite is not all that harmless. Its high salt content makes Vegemite a no-no for high blood pressure folks and those wanting to avoid arterial hardening. Yeast allergy can be a problem too.
I find these aspects very sad because the high salt content is what makes it last for years without refrigeration. The allegedly high B Vit content is not as good as green leafy vegetables.
But recycling beer waste is obviously a good thing. Not as good as consuming the beer, but not so bad either.
The new recipe I think is just adding creme cheese to the old Vegemite. So it looks exactly like poop and spreads like a careless walk across a pet owner’s lawn. Whether it tastes like shit too, is something about which I have no personal experience.
It does taste like a weaker version of Vegemite – which I think makes it pointless. But it was fun to try – not as much fun as the yeast by-products made by our friends at Moet et Chandon or Veuve Cliquot, though.
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I admit I had in mind tummy upsets, when Vegemite is the only thing I know you can safely spread on biscuits/bread/toast to cheer the patient a bit and where green vegetables are a ‘no-go’ (or rather ‘have-to-go’) area.
So, ‘mostly’ harmless.
I see you choose excuse number 4.
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Excuse 4 – harsh !
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No ‘but fair’? In that case I plead leniency on the grounds of aforementioned mirth causation.
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Voice, I think you’re letting yourself off lightly. Perhaps you’re not even taking this seriously. Would it be more appropriate to consider a custard sentence ? How about “Warm the milk over a low cooktop and slowly fold in the lightly-beaten egg yolks”.
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Noooooo. Not the custard. Anything but the custard! Well, anything except ‘New Vegemite’.
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Luckily I don’t care much about sweet or sugary things; as long as they do not flavour my coffee with anything , I’m fine.
I’ll even have the horrid iSnack 2.O on my toast rather drinking flavoured or contaminated coffee…
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