Spiced Buttermilk

My guru feels that very few of us like to experiment and still fewer like to change. This according to him is the main cause of stress people encounter in their lives. Such a profound start to an article captioned " Spiced Buttermilk " would have totally stumped a lot of readers. Well , I am going to tell you about a simple experiment you need to do to change your brealfast menu.

Most of us love corn flakes for our daily breakfast. It is indeed a healthy food and is easy on time also. Cornflakes is eaten with hot or cold milk with sugar for taste. It may come as a surprise to lot of Indians that its only in India that most people eat cornflakes with hot milk. Worldwide cornflakes is predominantly eaten with cold milk.

People who prefer eating corn flakes with hot milk and are not ready to change will have to give this experiment a miss. Others can try eating corn flakes with cold spiced butter milk. I bet you will love it.Its healthier ( no sugar ) and tasty. Experiment this new recipe !!!!!!

What the hell !!!!

Isn't the caption bold ? Writing the caption is the easiest thing to do but writing something which pleases you and at the same time appeals to the readers is the difficult part. So far I have written on environment and metal packaging and now for sometime I would like to experiment with general things. May be about people , may be about food , may be on how one of the caption of an article of mine got plagiarised , may be on how I am feeling , maybe on anything. So guys out there watch out for something interesting in the next few days.

Inflation - Health and Food Packaging Material

Inflation has crossed 5 % in USA , it is touching 12 % in India and whizzed past 2.2 Million % in Zimbabwe. People in all these three countries are reeling under galloping inflation. In a broader sense inflation above 2.5 % starts worrying Americans and an Indian starts worrying only when inflation crosses 5 %. What will worry a Zimbabwean is any body's guess !!!
Today inflation is a global phenomenon and is mainly due to sky rocketing crude prices coupled with rising food prices.
Mr. Al Gore will be a happy man today. High gasoline prices have forced the average Americans to reduce the usage of their cars. In the last two months air pollution on account of vehicular emission has reduced slightly. People are breathing cleaner air. Isn't that good ? People have started walking more and thus people have started becoming healthier. Cheers !!
Rising food prices and reducing real income has forced people to imbibe healthier eating habits. People are not only eating less ( good for health ) but are also avoiding their favourite junk foods. Hotels & restaurants are using lesser edible oil in cooking food items.
With people concentrating on basic food items ( staple food) the demand for snack foods and processed food items is reducing thus slowing the demand for food packaging material.
But aren't we aware that all this is a part of a cycle. Lower demand will force the prices to come down . Lower prices then will improve the demand and it will be hunky dory once again.
Aren't we being forced to adapt to a healthier life style , albeit unknowingly. Human beings do not like to be forced to do what they do not wish to do. Very soon we will go back to using our cars where we can walk and eating junk food as much as we like. And then we would have missed the bus to healthier life style.

Tin is not in

I had planned to write on "Tin is in ". Unfortunately most people who wrote to me or interacted with me tended to believe that we are still few years away from saying that in India Tin is in. The apprehensions remained the same -- tinplate availability , tinplate prices and overcapacity in can making. I guess I 'll postpone my writing on "Tin is in" for some later date.
Here's a bit of information for tin can manufacturers. In case you want to keep a tab on international tinplate prices and trends have a look at www.tinplateoutlook.com.

Is Tin in

I shall be next writing on "Is Tin in". Is tin can really making a strong come back in India. Can tin can ride on growing enviornmental concerns to get its rightful place in packaging industry. I hope people in trade will join in to give their inputs so that a meaningful discussion can be started . You can either leave a comment or can get me at tinplate@vsnl.com.

TINPLATE & SITA

A hindu friend who is in tinplate trade has send this story which dates back to mid 90 s when he was just starting and had gone to England to source tinplate for his Indian customers. This friend is an extremely religious man who says his daily prayers and without fail makes four visits to various temples in a year.
He had a meeting with the Sales Manager of then British Steel ( now Corus) . After exchanging pleasantries the friend gave the sales manager the various specs of tinplate he was looking for. After seeing the specs the sales manager asked my friend " How many SITAs are you looking for ?". My friend not understanding the question just said " What ? ". The sales manager repeated his question. My friend had by now started thinking of Ramayan and how Sita could be linked to tinplate. He almost started imagining of religious slur. He just said " I 'll get back tomorrow " and walked out of the sales mamager's office. The whole of that evening was spent calling his contacts back home to find the relationship between tinplate & Sita. Unfortunately no one could help him.

The next day he told the sales manager that he was looking for 200 tonnes of tinplate. The sales manager gave him the quote and later my friend got the tinplate he wanted without knowing what " SITA " was.

For the uninitiated , tinplate world wide is sold in terms of area and SITA is an acronym for System International Tinplate Area. SITA denotes a area of 100 sq mts.
This friend now is fully aware of relationship between tinplate and SITA. He now gets all his quotes in Sita terms and then converts it to tonnes for his Indian customers.

Bright Finish Tinplate

This fact was sent to me by a very knowledgable user of tinplate. I have known this person both as a customer and someone you could rely on for accurate market information. For his varied product range he uses different kinds of steel like CRCA , GP , tinplate , stainless steel etc.

In India most end users of tinplate believe that for any tinplate to be classified as Prime Tinplate it has to have bright finish. This mis conception has its roots in what was being offered by domestic manufacturers in the past. The domestic manufacturers only offered bright finish tinplate. If it had any matte finish it was downgraded to waste-waste and sold as such. So if you bought waste-waste you were sure to get matte finish tinplate. Hence it became established fact that any finish other than bright finish was not prime material.

Another misconception my learned friend has shared with me is in stainless steel category.

Most of us believe that for steel to be called stainless steel it has to be non-magnetic. The truth is quite different. Stainless steel can be both magnetic or non-magnetic. Non-magnetic stainless steel is costlier ( because of nickel content) . Kitchen Utensils can be easily made out of magnetic stainless steel but an Indian consumer invariably tests the stainless steel utensil he / she buys using a magnet. No wonder stainless steel utensils are costlier than what it would be if this mis conception is corrected.