Sales of frozen food have risen by 4.2% in the past year. The rise has been put down to the fact that food costs have soared leading shoppers to look for cheaper alternatives. After five years of little growth, the frozen food sector appears to be enjoying a growth spurt with fish products seeing an 11% increase in sales and frozen vegetables a 5.5% increase.

Cheap supermarket alcohol could be banned under new plans by ministers. They plan to introduce a minimum price for alcohol which would put the price at least 35p per unit. The move is aimed at cutting down binge drinking among teenagers. If it goes ahead it would an end to cut price deals in supermarkets and would mean that a can of Foster's would cost at least 72p, whilst a can of Stella would be priced at 88p. Some supermarkets currently sell a can of beer for as little as 23p.

Concerns have been raised about the safety of microwave heat packs after an elderly died whilst using one. Doreen Ghiloni had used a heat pack called a Hottie rather than a traditional hot water bottle. Heat packs are heated in the microwave and are made to slowly release heat over a period of time. In this case the item caught fire in her bed and it is thought she was overcome by the fumes. Firs investigators in West Yorkshire have dealt with six other incidents involving heat packs in the past year and Mrs Ghiloni's family are now campaigning for the instructions of the packs to be changed to try and prevent any further accidents.

I tried a new shampoo from Lush the other day. It is called Curly Wurly and according to the lush website it is meant to "calm curls and tame tangles. It has quite favourable reviews on their site but I hated pretty much everything about it. Firstly the smell and texture of the shampoo is fairly awful. It contains lots of pieces of coconut and after applying the shampoo it took me over an hour and half to try and remove these from my hair. I can only think that it is meant for people with thin hair, but if you have thick hair, be warned that coconut will take a long time to wash out. Secondly rather than removing tangles it seemed to add them to my hair, it also dried it out leaving it more fluffy and if possible thicker than usual. The only thing I liked about the shampoo was that the next day my hair smelt really nice but I will not be using this again.

I was looking around for some gift ideas and found this website that sells silver jewellery. They are based in the UK but can ship items all over the world. The interesting thing about their range of jewellery is that the items are not available on the high street. They are sourced directly from the jewellery makers in Thailand and sold through the keysilver website. As they are not available at any larger retailers and are not produced in large quantities  you can you can find something a little more unusual and exclusive.

Their range includes silver bracelets and bangles, silver necklaces and silver pendants. All of their items are stamped with a quality mark of 925 to indicate the purity of the silver and most items are available for shipping within 24 hours. I particularly liked their range of silver bracelets especially the silver star bracelet (pictured) which costs £15.00. Many of the items also have matching necklaces and all items are sent packaged in an organza jewel bag so are great to send as gifts. They currently offer free shipping within the UK on orders of £10.00 or more and they offer a 14 day money back guarantee. Its certainly worth bookmarking this website for future use especially as they are adding new products all the time.

This article suggests that supermarkets are profiteering from the huge rise in the price of eggs by taking the greatest share of the 47.4% increase in prices. Although supermarkets claim to be protecting shoppers from the rising prices of food, they have taken the bulk of the profits made from the rise in egg prices. Eggs have gone up by 47.4% or 83p since last May but farmers have seen only 12p of this which is barely above the cost of production. In contrast the supermarkets and packers get 71p of the rise.

Carphone Warehouse will offer a free laptop with broadband. Customers will be able to choose from six different models of laptop when they buy a broadband package from one of seven providers. Customers will be able pay more if they want a higher spec laptop. The offer is currently available at 100 of their stores but will be rolled out across all 800 stores this summer.

This article suggests that the CD single might have had its day. It is based on the fact that the leading high street chain Woolworths plans to stop selling them and instead concentrate on music downloads. The store will not sell CD singles from August although it will stock some one off event singles that are guaranteed to be large sellers. It has launched its own website for music, video and games to offer downloads. I wonder whether other high street stores will follow their lead.

Not surprisingly it has been found that cows that eat outdoors produce healthier milk. A study showed that milk from cows that graze outside on grass and clover contains more antioxidants and vitamins than milk from conventional dairy farmers. Its not rocket science cows are meant to eat grass.