The Curry Cookbox

Camellia Panjabi’s 1996 book “50 Great Curries” gave a stunning variety of Indian recipes. All of them, together with the book’s excellent illustrated discussion of Indian ingredients, are now available on handy waterproofed cards in “The Essential Curry Kit.” It also includes packets of some basic spices, making it just the thing for those who’d like to get their feet wet in Indian cookery. But be warned: Many of the recipes call for spices not in the package, and the photos are so gorgeous you’ll probably end up going to an Indian market to shop for more spices. And who knows where that might lead?

“The Essential Curry Kit,” $34.95, at book stores, or order from the publisher, Charles E. Tuttle Co., (800) 526-2778.

A Truffled Past

A Dana Point company boasts a serious chocolate heritage. Bodega Fudge and Chocolates uses a fudge truffle recipe going back to the turn of the century, when the great-grandparents of the partners (two sisters and a cousin) sold chocolates at a little grocery, or bodega, in Spain. The company makes familiar-sounding products--fudges, chocolate-covered shortbread, hot fudge sauce and so on--but with the sharper, more intense European sort of chocolate flavor. All products are kosher, and a portion of the profits goes to the Salvation Army.

Bodega fudge truffles, $3.95, $8.95 and $16.95; chocolate-covered shortbread (1 pound), $15.95; hot fudge topping (10 ounces), $6.50; from specialty stores and catalogs, or call (714) 489-0708 or (888) 3BODEGA.

Winning Pottery

Leena Hannonen’s ceramics show Native American and African influences as well as her own Finnish background--and sometimes a wry whimsy, as in the Gotcha plate, with its big fish eating little fish. Her cappuccino cup (upside-down in the photo to show the design) is a capacious one for real cappuccinophiles.

Gotcha plate, $125; tumbleweed platter, $250; and cappuccino cup and saucer, $69; from Ceramics by Leena Gallery, Westwood.

Top Sticks

Are you serious about chopsticks? You might want some elegant rosewood chopsticks with sterling silver ferrules. And you wouldn’t want to set beauties like these on the table--you’d have to have a whimsical chopstick rest, shaped like a lizard or chameleon.

Asiaphile rosewood chopsticks, $25 a pair, and chopstick rests, $10 each, from Magpie, Manhattan Beach, and Algabar, Los Angeles.