BARACK Obama will be given a jar of kids' Vegemite to tempt him to try the popular breakfast spread when he arrives in Australia tomorrow.

US ambassador Jeffrey Bleich said he was a convert and told the Herald Sun he would try to change the presidential tastebuds after Mr Obama described Vegemite as "horrible".

In March, when Prime Minister Julia Gillard visited a Washington school with Mr Obama, he told students he was no fan of the traditional Australian breakfast staple, describing it as "a quasi-vegetable by-product paste".

Ms Gillard fired back that she loved Vegemite and now has the US ambassador on her side.

"You have to learn how to prepare it properly with warm toast and thick butter and thin Vegemite," Mr Bleich said yesterday.

"I'm going to locate some of that starter Vegemite for him, the one with the orange lid."

Ms Gillard arrives home today to prepare for Mr Obama's arrival after they spent the weekend with other Asia-Pacific leaders in Hawaii.

Despite threatening two years ago to make APEC leaders wear "flowered shirts and grass skirts", Mr Obama said they were there to create jobs and exports and they wore suits.

But as Ms Gillard and Mr Obama walked to have their photo taken, TV cameras captured the PM talking about "grass skirts", to which Mr Obama replied: "Coconut dress, coconut bras, all that stuff."

The annual Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation summit ended with a pledge that Australian manufacturers of climate-friendly technologies such as wind turbine gearboxes, energy-efficient fuel cells and water-saving showers will get freer access to rapidly expanding Asia-Pacific markets within three years.

Australian green energy innovators will get far closer to a level playing field on price in the potentially lucrative markets in China, Japan and Russia.

- with Mark Kenny

Originally published as Showing our 'mite to Barack Obama