Posts Tagged ‘Avoca Irish Butcher’

There is only one way to eat ribs and that’s with your fingers. It’s a messy business, so napkins and finger bowls are essential! The combination of sweet and spicy with fruity overtones turns a strip of ribs into a feast. The ribs should be marinated overnight for the best result. Download Pork Spare Ribs Printer […]

James Whelan Butchers Beef Dripping wins 3 star Great Taste Award! Selected as a 2014 Top 50 Food Beef Dripping, produced in Clonmel, Tipperary by Pat Whelan, a fifth generation butcher, has just been announced as one of the Top 50 best foods in the UK and Ireland. Of 10,000 entries to the Great Taste Awards, […]

The kids and I did some blackberry picking at the weekend.  It’s hard to believe that it’s that time of year again.  And where there are blackberries there are new school bags, packed to gills with new books and virgin stationery waiting to fulfil their very purpose.  In nature the schoolbag would be seen as […]

Generally I’m not that fussy about how people use words.  Language is for the living and it evolves as we do.  Read any Chaucer poem and you’ll see how far we’ve come.  I’m not for jumping up and down at the omission or misplacement of an apostrophe, but there is a problem when we start […]

If you’re just up it might take a second to wrap your brain around this but stick with me.  New research has just been released that suggests people are not fat because they are lazy and don’t move but instead are lazy and don’t move because they are fat!  It took me a while too, […]

On Monday of this week I had the privilege of presenting a masterclass in Irish beef at the Irish Ambassador’s Residence in Brussels. The audience for the masterclass were members of the “Irish Chefs Beef Club” in Europe which was established some time ago by Bord Bia. “The Club which includes some of Europe’s top […]

With the chocolate eggs of Easter already a memory, the longer evenings and brighter mornings are just bursting with potential.  I feel summer is only around the corner and with it comes an urge to think carefully about what I’m eating.  Maybe it’s the fact that we can go outdoors again without three layers of […]

Who remembers the ‘mixed grill’?  There wasn’t a fashionable restaurant in the land that didn’t carry a mixed grill on its menu back in the 1970s.  It was usually a combination of pork; be it chops, rashers or sausages but, somehow it managed to be evening food rather than breakfast as we’ve come to expect […]

Oxtail, a tough gelatinous cut of meat that was a favourite for stews and soups, has had an interesting cycle when it comes to fashionable eating.  Our ancestors knew all about nose to tail eating and everything was used.  They were very aware that once the prime cuts were sold there was plenty of meat […]

Is it over?  Is it really over?  Is the entire month of January now in the past?  Thank God for that as I’m not sure I could have taken much more of those on the New Year abstinence kick. Somehow there seemed to be more of them this year than ever before.  Everyone I met […]

Speedy and very tasty, this is one of those dishes that makes you realise that cooking at home is so much better (and better for you) than ordering takeout. Beef Noodle Soup with Pak Choi – Printer Friendly Download Ingredients 4 tablespoons sake 3 tablespoons mirin 1 tablespoon soy sauce 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped […]

In recent years this has been an addition to our Christmas feast.  The bacon can be omitted but I don’t advise it. Braised Red Cabbage with Apples and Wine – Printer Friendly Download Ingredients 1 red cabbage 3 tablespoons butter 1 large onion sliced thinly 3 Bramley apples  peeled and chopped into dice Salt and […]