Articles

Why not push out the boat this year and indulge in some Irish spring lamb for a special Easter meal? Although I generally prefer to wait until the roasting joints are bigger, more flavoursome (and better value) later in the year, a very late Easter brings more choice of local foods as the season is more advanced - and, while very wet, the mild winter and early spring has allowed good growth recently and there may also be more early vegetables than usual to enjoy.
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This month Darina shares some of the culinary highlights from Lucknow, a place that turned out to be full of surprises on a recent visit to India
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Rachel Gaffney, the famous foodie who’s flying the flag for Ireland in Texas, is turning her attention to other aspects of Irish culture - especially our historic buildings
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Continuing her series all about craft brews, our expert columnist and food blogger KRISTIN JENSEN says “This pleasant, fruity, easy-drinking red matches well with food but, at 4.2% ABV, it would also hold its own as a session beer: a good all round red.”
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This month Lucy Madden questions whether Irish food is really getting better - saying that, in rural Ireland, a good meal at a reasonable price is hard to find. It was a recycled wine bottle filled with a brownish liquid lurking on the table that alerted us to the fact that all was not well. We were a party of 8, meeting for lunch in a restaurant in the Midlands and, having pre-booked, arrived at the venue to see that we were the only customers there.
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The luck of the crop rotation draw and bad design in my veg patch means that particular veg families tend to have what might be described as ‘off years’ depending on the area they are destined to spend their growing season in. There’s a particular part of my veg patch that is hampered by being simultaneously the closest to the garden perimeter and the lowest point in the garden.
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Euro-Toques chef Martin Dwyer, is much missed in Ireland since he and his wife Sile sold their eponymous restaurant in Waterford and moved to France. They now live in the Languedoc, where they take guests - and feed them very well. This month Martin finds amusement in on the way things in another country can sometimes get lost in translation.
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Chocolate may once have seemed an unlikely speciality for artisan producers in Ireland to adopt in their droves, but it has proved a very successful one. There seems no limit to the Irish passion for chocolate and, fortunately for producers, no seasonal downs either, although there are pleasing peaks at Christmas, Valentines Day - and Easter.
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There may be nothing new about black (and white) pudding in Ireland, it’s been a great everyday food for generations. But this traditional pork product did slip a bit in the popularity stakes for a couple of decades while we were getting used to the idea of ‘being modern’ and enjoying international cuisine - and eating less of the full Irish too.
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At this stage 80 of our cows have calved. We have 26 heifer (female) calves out on grass, although we still feed them milk twice a day. Spring has been difficult. The calves got a bug, which spread, from calf house to calf house. 50 sick calves is no laughing matter. Still the hardship of calving time is now nearly over.
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