Articles

With St Patrick’s Day the highlight of this often chilly month, there’s nothing to beat one of our really traditional dishes, such as a warming bowl of Irish Stew, a plate of bacon and cabbage or a beef and Guinness casserole. The Irish midlands, especially Co Westmeath, are renowned for the quality of beef raised in the area – and sold by...
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Simon Dougan is one of the luminaries of Irish food, and undoubtedly one of the great influences for good in the development of Northern Ireland’s (and indeed the island’s) food culture. Television has introduced him to the wider public in recent years, but it is his simple, uncompromising philosophy of food – shared with his equally respected wife, Jilly Dougan, of Moyallen Foods – that has earned him, and his Yellow Door businesses in Portadown and Belfast, huge loyalty from an appreciative clientèle.
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The “Just Ask!” Restaurant of the Month winner for February is Café Rua, in Castlebar, Co Mayo.
When Ann McMahon opened Café Rua on New Antrim Street, Castlebar, in the mid ‘90s there were few enough establishments concentrating on combining quality with simplicity and making the very best foods accessible to all. Today the business is run by Ann’s children Aran and Colleen and, not only has that philosophy of serving ‘uncomplicated food using seasonal and local ingredients’ endured...
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Fast food has come in for a right royal bashing lately and, with certain noble exceptions (stir-fries, for example), quite right too. The irony is that, in true tortoise and hare fashion, traditional slow cooking methods may actually be easier on your time than rushing to get a meal on the table in a hurry. Getting organised several hours ahead leaves you free to do other things while the dinner is gently cooking away – and, with slow cooking, you can use less expensive cuts of meat in slow roasts and casseroles that are meltingly tender and have loads more flavour than the pricey prime cuts.
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Quality chocolate production is perhaps an unexpected speciality for Ireland but, although the main ingredients are of course imported, it has become an important – and increasingly successful – area of artisan production throughout the country. What’s more, it’s one of the few that seem to be recession-proof; we all need our little treats, apparently, and – unlike many of the things we had become used to in recent years - the feel-good factor induced by a good chocolate is not beyond reach, so sales are surging as never before. Google ‘Irish chocolates’ and you will be amazed at the number of speciality brands that come up...
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A remarkable book by any standards, it comes as no surprise find that Prannie Rhatigan’s Irish Seaweed Kitchen (Booklink; full colour hardback 288pp, €35) was many years in the making – the wonder of it is that this wide ranging, searching and very beautiful work ever went to press at all, as its subject is clearly a work in progress for this gifted medical doctor, organic gardener and Slow Food cook.
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Lucy Madden considers the paradox of death by health & safety, among other things. To the jaw-dropping astonishment of my husband, our accountant recently suggested that we might like to pay him less. This may have had to do with the alternative, as he saw it, of not being paid at all, or perhaps it was an acknowledgement that fees paid in the past are unsustainable.
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A brilliant fish at any time, smoked haddock is especially welcome in the early months of the year, when storms may affect supplies of fresh fish. The essence of cold-weather comfort food, it’s at its best in dishes like creamy fish pies and steaming chowders, bubbling smokies and less usual breakfast dishes such as kedgeree. Mainly from the North Atlantic, melanogrammus aeglefinus is a fish of the cod family and is processed in numerous places, including Ireland.
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“Good food, simply cooked” is David Fitzgibbon’s guiding principle and it’s one that has stood him in good stead at Aherne’s Seafood Restaurant in Youghal. Selected as BIM Seafood Circle Seafood Restaurant of the Year 2010 by Georgina Campbell’s Guide, Aherne’s is an unmissable stop on the south coast, as noted for the warm hospitality as the sparkling fresh seafood that attracts visitors as well as devoted locals. It’s a fitting tribute as the one-time pub celebrates its 100th year in the ownership of the Fitzgibbon family, and is now run by third generation brothers John and David.
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No winter morning begins in our house without a bowl of porridge, enjoyed with Irish honey and a good splash of full cream milk - we make the porridge overnight, cooked on Low in an electric slow cooker (1 cup porridge to 3 of water, plus a good pinch of salt). It’s completely effortless, convenient for schoolchildren in a hurry and handy too if several people need to eat at different times.
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