is much more than a "gaggle of gossiping women" and the person who described them as such to me yesterday was told that.
I was polite because the man who said this is a city dweller. He may not have come across the CWA - but he has eaten their scones.
I happen to know he is fond of scones. His wife makes scones each weekend. He has demanded them - in the nicest possible way - from her ever since they both retired almost four years ago. He wants them home made and with home made jam and cream.
His wife tells me, "He appreciates my cooking."
So he should. I have been the recipient of her Christmas biscuits on more than one occasion. Those wonderful buttery morsels don't do my waistline any good at all.
And she makes a good scone I believe.
I am not particularly fond of scones. I rarely make them. If I do I tend to use the CWA scone mix. I know. I'm lazy. It also happens to be an excellent scone mix. A lot of people use it.
Using the scone mix saves time. It also means that the scones are likely to be a success - something I can't always claim when I mix my own.
And there is another very, very good reason to use it. Money raised in selling it goes to a fund to help people in rural areas - people in real need. Out there in small communities where people know one another and a family member is suffering abuse or illness or bereavement then others will know. Not so long ago the CWA members in a small community used some of their funds to supply the materials to repair the building the local fire truck is housed in. The men went in and repaired it - and morning tea (with scones) was supplied by the CWA. Everyone benefits from something like that.
So it was with serious alarm that I read that one of the big supermarket chains was going to withdraw the product from its shelves. They weren't prepared to pay more for the product although the company which makes it has been hit with a 50% increase in costs recently. They were asking for a 7% increase in what the supermarket chain was paying. No, we will only pay the old price they were told.
There has, rightly, been a community backlash. It will be interesting to see who wins this one. The CWA should win - but if the supermarket chain has a "home brand" scone mix waiting in the wings they won't.
Fortunately other places will continue to stock the scone mix - if the company can afford to go on making it.
They had better because that is the mix that gets used each weekend to make those scones.
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3 comments:
Thank you Cathryn
I understand that te supermarket in question is backing down for now due to the backlash :-)
Linda B.
For sure there should be a backlash! I didn't know they did products, but I have in my possession a CWA cookery book given to Mum by the Australian cousins when they visited in 1954.
It is full of useful information and tempting food recipes, also houshold cleaner etc recipes. The section that fascinates me most is the table of recipes for a fortnight, for a housewife cooking for all the station hands, and serving three meat meals every day. It starts with the offal as meat - clearly this is the day when the sheep was killed, and then works its way through the carcase, wasting nothing. Those men must have worked hard to need so much feeding!
You're welcome Linda. I was cross.
I have been on a sheep station during shearing Jean - when they had to work even harder than they do now. The station owner's wife showed us what they ate for "smoko" (morning and afternoon tea). The amount of cake she cooked each day was extraordinary...4lbs of sultanas went into it if I remember - about 2kg now.
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