Chips

[Tourist]

1 x bag of frozen chips
Salt (optional)
Vinegar (optional)
Sauce (optional)
Gravy (optional)
Mayo (If you're drinking Stella, but not that BUL shit - f%*ken wankers)

Cook in oil or oven (if you're a girl).

Goes great with a VB (or Crownie if it's pay-day)

[matr]

very subtle.

[lob]

<yawn> Hey, if I have time today I'll go into Zeirholz in Fyschwick. Someone told me their 1/2 Pints are $4. (Pints $7.) Should be able to sample a couple of 1/2s and still be able to drive. I'll let you know what the food menu is like.

Subtle?

[matr]

Subtle?

Yeah ya right it was about as subtle as a sledge hammer.. My bad.

On a serious note you can't comapre oven baked to deep fried chips. I've always wanted to get a deep fryer for home for this purpose but haven't because I don't like the idea of having a deep fryer in the kitchen readily available to produce deep fried meals.

[Tourist]

<yawn> Hey, if I have time today I'll go into Zeirholz in Fyschwick. Someone told me their 1/2 Pints are $4. (Pints $7.) Should be able to sample a couple of 1/2s and still be able to drive. I'll let you know what the food menu is like.

Subtle?

Are you crazy? Get the full pint for $1 cheaper!

The food menu is good. Maybe you could try eating something.

[lob]

Works out at 50c more for each 1/2 Pint. I can live with that. Not exactly price gouging. Price gouging would be (i) standing at the fridge at a woolies servo the other day (37 degrees) looking at so-called "Espresso" Ice Coffee (made with powdered coffee). For $4.20 each, BUT you can get 2 for $5.00. FO. Then, as you're standing in line to pay for the fuel (and waiting for the inevitable "do you have a discount fuel voucher"), hearing the woolies-trained-drone saying the EVERY single customer "2 for $3, 3 for $5", etc, etc, etc.)

btw, the FnC recipe link I posted are not oven baked chips, they're just taken out of the oil, put onto a tray and rested for awhile in the fridge. Then they go back into Oh Glorious Stroke and Heart Attack Inducing Fat for a final cook. (Bill Granger does have an okay oven baked chip recipe though. - The secret is to marinate the freshly cut spuds in a freezer bag before baking them.)

[lob]

Other obvious examples of price gouging would be: Epson A3 printer, Teds for around $1500 AU:
http://www.teds.com.au/epson-stylus-pho ... /i2297089/

(Camera House in Canberra - and they never have anything in stock, told me they could order it in for around $1,700.00.) OR I can buy here for around $550 US (With delivery through Price USA around $700 AU in total.)
http://www.amazon.com/Epson-R2880-Forma ... 806&sr=1-3

Best of luck trying to buy a quality Projector (at a reasonable price) at Harvey Norman, etc. From online forums (where everone must a whinging penny-pinching f---ing Kiwi like me), seems like most are buying this model directly from the US:

http://www.amazon.com/Epson-PowerLite-H ... 196&sr=1-3

(Carolyn from Price USA actually has this model setup as a quickbuy it's so popular.)

And don't get me started on my efforts to buy a waffle iron in Canberra. f---ing futile. In the end, I bought this one for 130 pounds (with shipping to a contact in the UK, - a lot of eBay UK stores won't ship to Australia.)

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Waffle-Iron-Belgi ... 1935108838

[Tourist]

Awesome - thanks for the heads-up on the Iced Coffee.

[lob]

I'm glad Tourist you finally get it; when I first moved to Canberra in the mid 90s from Oh Glorious Best Nation Bar None (NZ), Canberra had a thing known as competition. Then I went away to live Sydney for a decade, I come back, and Coles & Woolies own the place. Magnet Mart, btw, just sold out to Woolie (who are, in partnership with a US chain, plain to setup their own Bunnings-style hardware stores.) The only good thing on the horizon as far as competition goes is Cosco (who should open late this year.)

It's a simple tactic, they price hike (Mars Bar at $2.50), and then say 3 for $5 [not giving a f--- about Canberra's obesity epidemic - another change since the mid 90s when I last lived here.)

I could be wrong, but I think some non-Coles/Woolies (the few that exist) retailers are picking up the same "we're-not-price-gouging-we're-value-by-buying-bulk" sales tactic." I guess it's a glass half full/half empty thing...

An example might be a schooner of beer priced around $7.70 when you'd think based on the fact that a pint is $8.80 (1/3rd more), a schooner might be expected to sell for $5.90. But, you see, they're not "price gouging" for the schooner, they're "value-by-buying bulk..." if you buy the pint.

But then, maybe I'm wrong [like in the Radiohead song], maybe I really should start trying to be more of a glass half full sort of person. I'm gonna buy 2, na f--- that, FOUR ice coffees next time I'm at a woolies servo. Why pay $4.20 for 500ml of Dare Ice Coffee when the good folks at Woolies will sell me 2Ltrs for $10? I'll stock up on chocolate bars also. These discussions - which started with some idiot having a go at everyone's favorite pub - have been very educational for me. And, I must stop being such a stuck-up penny-pinching snob when it comes to pub food. I mean beer is beer, er, I mean food is food. $16.90 for thawed schnitzel of chicken on a bun with LARGE portion of frozen chips is good value. And, if one orders Fish & chips for $18.90, and the fish has no flavour because it's been frozen for the past month since it left McCains factory, then that's what tomato sauce was invented for...

[Tourist]

I feel like we're really going places, Lob.

[lob]

I'm making "scotch-fillet" American-style burgers for dinner tonight. I'm going to take some pics, and put it up as a recipe. You should have a look, might go well with your chip recipe.

[Tourist]

Sure, if you can come up with a vegetarian option, I'd be most interested.