Articles

This month Darina considers something that many of us are likely to be thinking about at this time of year - Family Reunions. Nowadays, in our crazily busy lives, years can flash by in a hectic blur. Suddenly we realise that we haven’t seen or sometimes heard from favourite cousins or even aunts and uncles for years.
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What is it about a school excursion that makes us all revert back to our carefree childhood temperament? asks Darina, as she recounts the fun she and her 12 Week Certificate course students had on their latest fact finding field trip
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This month Darina talks about the pleasures - and rewards - of foraging. You’ll find lots more foraging information and recipes in her wonderful book Forgotten Skills of Cooking (Kyle Cathie).
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This month Darina talks about one of the West of Ireland’s biggest food heroes, JP McMahon. The larger than life author of ‘Cava Bodega Tapas, A Taste of Spain in Ireland’ is a speaker at this year’s Kerrygold Ballymaloe Lifest LitFest (15-17 May 2015)
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This month Darina considers our food history, and the many fascinating old recipes that have been discovered in ‘manuscript cookbooks’ - maybe you have some tucked away in a copy book somewhere too!
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It’s not as easy as it sounds to give visitors ‘a real taste of our Irish produce’ - but Darina has the answer to this common problem. I got a wonderful letter recently, beautifully hand-written by a woman who described herself as an octogenarian.
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This month Darina talks about one of the most anticipated restaurant openings in London for several years, a place where “beautifully fresh ingredients shine through with the minimum of interference”. How good is that.
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Darina says there are worse things to be addicted to than her new pedometer - and her other health resolutions this year include cutting the sugar content in Ballymaloe Cookery School recipes, and adjusting the balance of vegetable to meat consumption
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The scent of spices is synonymous with Christmas, so what better time for Darina to think back over the changes she has seen in our use of spices over three decades at Ballymaloe Cookery School - and to welcome Arun Kapil’s recently published cookbook, ‘Fresh Spice’.
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IFEST, the first major celebration of Irish culture and food was held in Boston recently - and Darina was there. It’s the brainchild of Rachael Kelly, the young entrepreneur who was behind the Taste of Dublin festival for many years. Her vision is to take IFEST to all the American cities where there is a strong Irish diaspora and not just to celebrate Ireland but to generate both business investment and tourism.
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