Award-winning blog of Irish food writer and broadcaster Caroline Hennessy.
We are nearly through our first apple season at the cottage – the few that have been too small to pick are still grimly clinging on to the tree through November wind and rain, while the fallen ones are being enjoyed by our still-prolific rabbit population and I’ve got a stash for myself upstairs in the spare room.
Here are a few Irish food sites that I’ve been spending time on recently… * Greatfood.ie – I wrote about this site when I first discovered it in April and I’ve been enjoying it...
Cookies, especially chocolate chip ones, are always a winner. But, when they also contain the nutty goodness of oatmeal and you get your hands on them, fresh from the oven so that the chocolate is still warm and melted, they are a treat indeed. A recipe that caught my eye recently on one of my regular wanders around Nic’s bakingsheet blog (her buttermilk pancakes are a regular weekend breakfast favourite) was this one, for Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies from The Frog Commissary Cookbook.
To give my new cooker a good working test last weekend, I invited my family – Mum, two sisters, a brother and my Granny – to lunch on Sunday so, together with the Boyfriend and myself, we were seven. This, naturally enough, entailed several last minute phone calls home to see if they could bring an extra chair and several sets of cutlery!
The dates and presenters for Savour New Zealand 2007 have just recently been announced and, as a participant at the 2005 event, I cannot recommend it highly enough for anyone with even the slightest interest in food and wine. It takes place in Christchurch, from Friday 27 to Sunday 29 April 2007, and this year Lauraine Jacobs, Cuisine magazine food editor, is the Programme Director.
Our last Bibliofemme bookclub – for The Rum Diaries by Hunter S Thompson – was held at my flat on a rapidly-darkening autumn evening. The previous evening had been cold and dreary as I walked home from my webmaster course so I decided to start a soup, leave it sit overnight, and then finish it off as the girls arrived. I’d recently come across a Julie Le Clerk‘s version of Harira in an old copy of Cuisine so this was a good opportunity to try it out. I had made a meatless version of this last year in Christchurch but this time I was going to make a meal in a bowl, stuffed with lamb, lentils, chickpeas and, after a look at Claudia Roden’s version of the fast-breaking soup, haricot beans.
In Berlin most of this week to present the Other Voices website at the Prix Europa internet competition. A total of 22 sites are nominated for the Exploration award, each of which has to give a half-hour presentation. Our area of the competition is fortunately limited to three days – long, intense and tiring but also incredibly rewarding. It’s not often you get the chance to sit down with your professional peers to discuss and share concepts, ideas and inspiration from all over Europe. As for getting to see Berlin, forget it. The most I’ve seen so far is through the window of the bus that takes us to Potsdam every morning or from a taxi speeding through a hushed late-night cityscape. I’ve a free day on Saturday though – perhaps time to explore some markets and discover Berlin – and, of course, have some close encounters with German food – for myself.
Well, after years of searching plus 2½ never-ending months of frustrating to-ing and fro-ing with mortgage providers, solicitors and auctioneers we have finally managed to take possession of a little country cottage, our Irish bach, in North County Cork. It is a typically small Irish cottage with a pair of small bedrooms upstairs. It could not, by any stretch of the imagination, be described as roomy although the current lack of furniture does make it feel slightly more spacious!
