Articles

With the 2013 growing season nearly upon us, I’m intrigued by the idea that 2012’s GIYing is still paying dividends. It’s a good time of the year therefore for a bit of stock-take. I use various locations to ‘store’ vegetables – our kitchen doubles up as a larder at this time of the year (you can barely get in to the kitchen - there are veggies hanging out of every available space!); then there’s the garage where I keep vegetables in sacks, boxes and the freezer.
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We are nearly back to normality after the Christmas break at Castlefarm. In preparation for our spring herd of 70 cows to calve down, we have disinfected calf sheds and re-installed calving cameras in the calving boxes. From the end of January the monitor in our bedroom will allow us to check on expectant mothers through the night without leaving the warmth of our house.
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Even though we have been living full time out here for four or five years and spending a lot of time here before that, this turned out to be the first time we have spent Christmas out here, not just that but we persuaded the full family, daughters, sons in and out of law and the totally precious grandsons to come here for the holiday also.
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This month’s books have both been written in celebration of great Irish institutions. Firstly, Michelle Horgan’s Recipes From The English Market is another handsome food book from a division of Cork University Press. While in the North-West, and in celebration of tens years at the popular Lyons Café in Sligo Town, talented chef-proprietor Gary Stafford has published the book that his customers of this charming café have been asking for - Lyons Café, The Recipes
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The lemon (Citrus × limon) is a small evergreen tree native to Asia - although now widely grown in other areas including Europe and America - and its cheery yellow fruit is one of the most versatile ingredients in the kitchen. Lemons can also be grown here with care, in pots as they not reliably hardy. Anyone who has ever tasted fresh lemons will want to do so again...
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MARILYN BRIGHT talks to our Seafood Chef Of The Year For 2013, Billy Whitty, of Aldridge Lodge, Duncannon, Co Wexford. A chef who has grown up living just 200 yards from the Ducannon quayside just has to know something about fish.
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Even if you’re very pressed for time coming up to Christmas, cooking a few bits and pieces is very satisfying, gets you into the festive mood - and it makes the house smell lovely too. And it needn’t take a huge amount of time either, as these tried and trusted recipes show – they’re all from that old favourite, my 1996 book The Best of Irish Breads & Baking, which is still in print (€15) and I use it all the time.
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Craft beer is perhaps the biggest success story of Irish food and drink over the last couple of years and we are delighted to introduce our new columnist Kristin Jensen, who is not only one of Ireland’s top food bloggers – she just happens to be an expert on pairing food and beer!
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A surprising number of small producers are bucking the system at the moment, doing well in businesses that you’d never expect to succeed in recession. One of these success stories is still in the making in deepest Kilkenny, where Ger and Mags Kirwan continue to develop the Goatsbridge Trout Farm at Thomastown, building on the established success of their excellent quality fresh and smoked rainbow trout.
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These delicious buttery spicy buns are a real quick fix for Christmas. They are a huge hit as a gift or just to have at home with a few friends for your elevens’s. I bake these all the time in December...
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