So, if you could capture Ireland in a single mouthful, what would that mouthful be?

I think that Pádraic Óg Gallagher, he of the Boxty House, may have captured it perfectly when he drizzled Connemara Peated Single Malt Whiskey over smoked Irish salmon.

Connemara peated single malt whiskey and Irish smoked salmon

It’s like a modern interpretation of a John Hinde postcard. It tastes like you’re sitting close to, or possibly in, a turf fire, an experience that certainly used to go with the territory in rural Ireland.

Classic John Hinde Postcard: Collecting Turf from the Bog, Connemara, Co. Galway, Ireland
(image from www.johnhindecollection.com)

The marriage of whiskey and salmon was only the beginning, though.

It was the opening dish on the menu for the gala Saturday banquet presented as part of the recent Oxford Symposium On Food And Cookery by Pádraic Óg Gallagher, along with Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire and a host of Irish artisan producers.

The theme for this year’s symposium was Cured, Fermented and Smoked Foods and banquet attendees were treated to the full Irish experience of same. Pádraic Óg is the first Irish chef to have been invited to present a meal at what is a highly prestigious event in the food calendar – I only wish I could have been there.

You can see below just what I missed.

The Oxford Symposium banquet menu

And finally, on the assumption that you may not have been invited to any Irish banquets lately, here’s how you can create a little taste of Ireland at home…

I hereby issue a warning to all passing lemons.

I am going through a zesting phase and any lemons within range are likely to be relieved of their outer garments sharpish. Zorro-like, I will unsheath my beloved microplane zester, draw razor-sharp blades across their citrusy skins and have my wicked culinary way with the finely shredded results.

Other citrus fruit, I might add, are also at risk.

No lemon is safe...

Ah, yes, it’s true that the zing of a little citrus zest has lifted many a meal lately. I think, however, that my zesting habit started with my first attempt at lemon shortbread bars.

There I was, ready for kitchen action, lured by the promise of the most lemony of lemon bars ever. Suffice to say that the author of the recipe should have their license to use superlatives revoked, because the lemon bars were nothing of the kind.

Fortunately, I realised that the situation could be retrieved by means of emergency zesting. A generous sprinkling of lemon shavings on top and at least I now had bars that spoke of lemon, rather than vaguely hinting at it.

Needless to remark, I have been zesting generously ever since.

Redcurrant shortbread bars with a little inner lemon zest

Many lemons later, the time finally came to return to the scene of the shortbread crime and make a properly tangy shortbread bar.

Rather than go the pure lemon route, however, I looked to my recent harvest of redcurrants, which boast their own particular brand of tartness. They made for a gloriously pink topping but, sharp and all as redcurrants are, they still lacked the oomph I was looking for in my shortbread bars.

One zested lemon later and they had all the oomph they needed.

]]> http://www.thedailyspud.com/2010/07/14/lemon-bars-shortbread-redcurrants/feed/ 22 http://www.thedailyspud.com/2010/07/09/cirque-de-legume/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=cirque-de-legume http://www.thedailyspud.com/2010/07/09/cirque-de-legume/#comments Fri, 09 Jul 2010 15:52:54 +0000 Daily Spud http://www.thedailyspud.com/?p=21039

Sensational indeed.

The Temple Bar Summer Sensational, which started yesterday and runs until Sunday, is serving up a feast for the senses in and around Dublin’s Temple Bar. The festival menu, put together by the Temple Bar Cultural Trust, is bursting with drama, music, art, film, comedy, dance and, well, vegetables.

Wrap your laughing gear around Cirque de Légume

Yesterday evening, as part of the festival, Cirque de Légume dished up what was by far the most creative and entertaining vegetable medley I have ever seen. Here’s the recipe.

That’s the trouble with words. They mean different things to different people.

Time was when any self-respecting paddy would not have thought to call the items in the picture below anything other than biscuits or biccies.

Oatmeal, chocolate chip and redcurrant whatsits

But the fact is that we’re pretty comfortable with the term cookie these days, it being many years since “American-style Chocolate Chip Cookies” started to appear on Irish supermarket shelves.

Some Irish people might even use the terms biscuit and cookie interchangeably, though I think there is a perception that cookies are a bit fancier than your average biscuit. I mean to say, nobody that I know of ever elevated plain ol’ Marietta biscuits to cookie status, while I, personally, have great difficulty in separating the word cookie from the phrase chocolate chip. Where one goes, the other inevitably follows.

Plain old Marietta biscuits
(image from jacobfruitfield.com)

Still, while these words might be the little pegs on which we hang our cultural identity, what I call said baked goods, in the end, really matters less than the fact that they are just the thing to have with a nice cup of Irish tea.

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Dried Redcurrants

One of the joys of having a generous redcurrant harvest is that I could afford to experiment with slow-roasting as a means of drying some of my redcurrants out. They lose a lot of volume in the process, but there really is a nice concentrated tartness to the end result.

You’ll need:

• redcurrants

You’ll also need:

• One or more baking trays – enough to hold the redcurrants in a single layer

The Steps:

• Preheat your oven to 110C
• Wash the redcurrants and drain on kitchen paper
• Spread the redcurrants in a single layer on your baking tray(s) and roast for about about an hour and a half or up to 2 hours, until darkened, shriveled but still a little bit juicy.
• Scrape from the baking trays and use for baking or add some to your breakfast cereal.

The Results:

• 500g fresh redcurrants will yield around 75g dried redcurrants

It was one of those moments when you try something new and you know what the joy of good food is.

So said resident sis after we had practically inhaled a lunch of mildly sweet and delicate gravad lax from Kinvara Smoked Salmon (proving that you don’t have to be famous to get quoted on this blog, but it does help if you’re related).

She’s in good company as far as her opinion of Kinvara’s smoked salmon goes. Nigel Slater and Jeffrey Steingarten are among the noteworthy food writers who have had kind words to say on that particular subject. Having worked my way through the samples very kindly sent to me, I can’t say that I would object to finding any of them on my plate (though the gravad lax remains a particular favourite).

Pressies from Kinvara Smoked Salmon

And though it is fair to say that you should do very little to good smoked salmon except eat it, I think that there’s nothing wrong with using some classic potato salad to provide a soft, creamy filling around which to wrap a slice of perfectly smoked salmon. But there again, I would say that. You can quote me if you like.

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Smoked Salmon Stuffed with Potato Salad

This part hardly needs a formal recipe – just wrap your slices of salmon around a dollop of potato salad, serve with a wedge of lemon and some dill and you’re done. Apart from eating the end result, that is, but I was taking that part as read.

The amount of filling you can add to a slice of salmon will naturally depend on the size of the slices you have. The slices of Kinvara smoked salmon were around 15cm long and between 5cm and 8cm wide and I filled them with 2 heaped tablespoons of the salad. Adjust according to the size of slices you have.

You could serve a couple of these as a starter, say, or for a lunch serving, have two or three of these with an additional helping of the salad on the side, along with some brown soda bread.

You’ll need:

• Smoked salmon, sliced fairly thinly, with individual slices large enough to be formed into a small filled roll
• Potato and egg salad (see below)
• Lemon wedges to serve
• Chopped dill to garnish

The Steps:

• Scoop around 2 heaped tblsp of potato salad onto the centre of each slice of smoked salmon and form into a roll.
• Garnished with chopped dill and serve with a lemon wedge.

The Results:

• As many filled smoked salmon rolls as you have slices of salmon.

My 18 year old niece was objecting to the liberal application of herbs on food of any kind.

Rosemary she found particularly objectionable. “Makes things taste all planty”, says she. Well yes, I suppose it would.

I think I can safely say that it not had not occurred to me that a “planty” taste was something to avoid. I forget that copious amounts of herbage may not be to everyone’s taste, being firmly of the opinion that a handful of fresh herbs can do a lot to enhance most things. Like potatoes.

My very own parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme

As it happens, I have, growing just outside my back door, that very tuneful collection of parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme, any of which can make a potato sing. You will also find chives, oregano and mint, and they, too, will blend harmoniously with any passing spud. And if I could manage to successfully grow dill, coriander or tarragon, they, too, would join my potato-friendly herbal chorus.

In fact, while I would never, ever object to a simple new potato, boiled and served with butter and salt, add grace notes of mint, dill, chives or parsley and I’ll soon be singing myself.

Boiled new potatoes and fresh mint, a classic duo

Well, would you mess with this man?

That man is Pat Conway, butchery lecturer at GMIT, and he showed the collected masses of Irish food bloggers a thing or two about butchering pork last Thursday.

Hang on there just a minute says you. Masses of Irish food bloggers?

To be fair, even I didn’t know we were so many. But last week’s Irish Food Blogger event, instigated by Donal Skehan and sponsored by Bord Bia, saw a whole bevy of bloggers emerge from behind the internet curtain and take physical shape. They came to Dublin, they saw and heard much about food and food styling, and they got swag.

Clockwise, from top left:
Lorraine Fitzmaurice on things veggie, Maire Dufficy on pork, Erica Ryan on food styling

While there was a definite emphasis on things porcine, with Bord Bia outlining their quality assurance scheme for pork and Maire Dufficy showing what to do with assorted porky cuts, Lorraine Fitzmaurice from Blazing Salads stayed pig-free with a demo that included miso pesto and spelt bread. In an attempt to distract us while lunch was being prepared, Damien Mulley talked blog marketing while Eoin Purcell did a little after-lunch blog-to-book talk. Afterwards, food stylist Erica Ryan and photographer Jocasta Clarke shared some of the secrets behind getting food to look good on camera (several of which involve glycerine, that’s all I’m sayin’).

And then there were the bloggers.

While I didn’t get to meet even half of the folks there, it was lovely to catch up with Bibliocook, I Can Has Cook, An American In Ireland, Nine Bean Row and the CheapEats folks, and to meet Smorgasblog, I Married An Irish Farmer, Dinner du Jour, Adventures in Veg, Mangoes With Lime and Supper Satisfaction among others.

And I am happy to report that my swag, which included cheese and chutney from Sheridan’s, herbs from Living Flavour, smoked trout from Goatsbridge, Good4U sprouts and seeds, and very cute homemade biscuits from Lilly Higgins, all managed to survive the post-event cider and sushi which may have delayed my return home just ever so slightly.

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Smoked Trout Dip

It’s just as well I made it all the way home with swag intact, otherwise I might have missed the experience that is smoked trout from Goatsbridge. To tell you the truth, the trout is so lovely that it hardly needs any accompaniment, apart, perhaps, from a squeeze of lemon juice and a twist of black pepper. I really haven’t done too much more to it than that here.

I did eat this as a dip with the oven chips below, but stir in some steamed new potatoes and mayonnaise and I’ll warrant that you have yourself a potato salad.

You’ll need:

• 100g smoked trout fillet, flaked and checked for small bones
• 2 tsp lemon juice
• 6 tblsp natural yoghurt
• 2 tblsp chopped chives
• 1 tsp capers (optional)
• 10-15 drops tabasco sauce or to taste
• freshly ground black pepper
• pinch of salt

You’ll also need:

• A blender or food processor to mix the ingredients – if you don’t have one, you can mix by hand.

The Steps:

• In a blender or food processor, add the trout, lemon juice, yoghurt, chives and capers (if using) and blend to mix. Alternatively, mash everything together well with a fork.
• Add tabasco, black pepper and salt to taste.

The Variations:

• You could certainly try this using sour cream or mayonnaise instead of yoghurt and/or dill instead of chives.

The Results:

• Dip for 2-3.

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Oven Chips

Well, now, seeing as next Wednesday, the 26th of May, has been declared National Fish and Chips Day by the Irish Traditional Italian Chippers Association, I felt a distinct urge to make chips to go with my smokey trout dip (it’s fish ‘n’ chips, Jim, but not as we know it!).

I based today’s chips on a method described in Cook’s Illustrated and which first came to my attention when Domini Kemp wrote about it in The Irish Times. It includes soaking the chips in hot water for 10 minutes before cooking. The idea is to remove excess sugars from the cut surfaces, which should reduce over-browning and development of a tough crust. The water should also make the interior of the chips less mealy. I will say that, in a straight comparison of chips that had been soaked and chips that hadn’t, the ones that had been soaked did come out better crust-wise.

And for those of you curious about the history of Italian chipper in Ireland, you could do worse than head over here.

You’ll need:

• 600g floury potatoes, about 3 medium-sized specimens
• approx 3 tblsp olive oil
• your choice of herbs / spices

You’ll also need:

• One large heavy duty baking tray or shallow roasting tin, or use 2 smaller tins (I used a couple of 20cm x 30cm tins) – a heavy duty tin helps with even browning.

The Steps:

• Preheat your oven to 220C. Cooks Illustrated recommends placing your shelf close to the bottom of the oven.
• Scrub your potatoes and cut into roughly even-sized wedges, about 1cm thick.
• Soak the potatoes in hot tap water for 10 minutes, then drain, lay out on some kitchen paper and pat very dry using additional kitchen paper.
• Pour the oil onto your baking tray(s) and place in the oven to heat for 3-4 minutes. Then remove the tray(s), pour the hot oil over the potatoes and toss, adding any other spices or seasonings you wish.
• Place the oiled potatoes onto the baking tray(s) in a single layer and cover with foil.
• Place into the oven for 5 minutes, then remove the foil and return to the oven for 10-15 minutes or until they have started to brown in spots on the bottom. Turn the chips over using a tongs and return to the oven for another 5-15 minutes or until nicely browned.

The Variations:

• When tossing the chips in the oil, add some crushed garlic and rosemary or some smoked paprika (or, really, any other number of herbs or spices).

The Results:

• Should serve 2, although I will neither confirm nor deny that I ate this amount in one sitting.

There I was, waiting patiently throughout the spring extended winter for my rhubarb plants to make their entrance proper and bring forth stalks enough for me to cook with.

I had very particular plans for the first rhubarb of the season, in the shape of a recipe that may possibly explain why Martijn Kajuiter of the fabulous Cliff House Hotel in Ardmore, Co. Waterford, has a Michelin star and I do not.

My somewhat over-enthusiastic rhubarb

I was a little perturbed however, when, with a dry spell and a little bit of heat, my rhubarb plants got ahead of themselves and started producing seed heads – a thing I have not seen rhubarb do before. Pretty though the seed heads may have been, they weren’t going to do rhubarb production any favours. They consequently met a swift end and the plants were left to get on with their normal stalk-producing business. Thankfully, there was enough of that happening to meet my stewy dessert purposes.

It had all started a couple of months ago with a conversation on Twitter between myself and Martijn Kajuiter, which went something like this:

What can I say. I was intrigued by the idea of a dessert which called for the addition of beetroot juice to stewed rhubarb. And now, several months later, having finally had the opportunity to try the combination out, let me tell you that it was well worth the wait.

Rhubarb and beetroot together. Sweet.

It’s a conspiracy. No doubt about it. A conspiracy I tell you.

The fact of the matter is that London-based Michelin-starred chef Atul Kochhar is being thwarted in all of his attempts to meet me.

First, it was the January snow that scuppered travel from the UK and resulted in the cancellation of Atul’s one day course at the Dublin Cookery School, which I was due to attend. Then it was the preponderance of volcanic ash in the airspace hereabouts that meant he was unable to travel for the rescheduled date this weekend.

Much admired for his masterful use of spices, I had really hoped, by now, to be in a position to reveal Atul’s thoughts on the subject of spices for spuds, but there are forces at work that have determined otherwise. Perhaps it is the case that Atul is simply not ready to meet me yet – it’s a naturally big step in any chef’s career – but I rather fancy he can handle it.

And so, while I wait to hear of a new date for my tuition in the ways of Indian spicing, I content myself with using Atul’s rather wonderful book, Indian Essence, as my spicy guide. These potatoes with cashew nuts are a great example of where that can lead.

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Potatoes Cooked With Cashew Nuts (Aloo Dum)

This is slightly modified from a recipe in Atul Kochhar’s Indian Essence.

The recipe as given in the book is for potatoes cooked with melon seeds. However, not having any melon seeds, I used the suggested alternative of cashew nuts. I have also reduced the amount of oil used and skipped the initial frying of the potatoes. There are a couple of other minor tweaks, based on the ingredients I had to hand, but the essence of this wonderfully aromatic sauce remains.

You’ll need:

• 2 tblsp cashew nuts
• vegetable oil for frying (I used grapeseed oil)
• 2 medium onions, about 300g, thinly sliced
• 500-600g baby new potatoes or any waxy variety of potato
• 375g natural yoghurt
• 1 clove garlic, finely chopped
• 1.5 tsp chopped ginger root
• 0.5 tsp ground cumin
• 0.5 tsp ground coriander
• 0.25 cayenne pepper
• 125 ml water
• 1 tsp salt
• 5cm cinnamon stick
• 0.5 tsp fennel seeds
• Seeds from 3 green cardamom pods
• 2 tblsp chopped fresh coriander plus extra for garnish

You’ll also need:

• A blender or food processor for blending parts of the sauce plus a spice grinder or mortar and pestle.

The Steps:

• Soak the cashew nuts in warm water for 10 minutes, then drain and blend to a paste using a blender or mini food processor.
• Place a large frying pan over a medium heat. When hot, add about 2 tblsp of oil. Add the onions and stir and fry until softened and starting to brown, around 10-15 minutes. Remove and leave to drain and cool on a paper towel.
• Meanwhile, scrub and peel the potatoes. If using baby new potatoes, you can leave them whole. For larger potatoes, cut into slices around 1cm thick.
• In a blender or food processor, blend the fried onions and yoghurt until smooth.
• Heat another tblsp of oil in the frying pan and add the garlic and ginger. Stir and fry over a medium heat until golden brown, around 3-4 minutes.
• Add the cumin, coriander and cayenne to the pan, stir briefly, then add the yoghurt and onion mix and the cashew nut paste. Bring the sauce to a simmer.
• Add the potatoes, water and salt, bring back to a simmer and cook for 20-30 minutes or until the potatoes are tender.
• Meanwhile, toast the cinnamon, fennel and cardamom in a small heavy frying pan over a medium heat for 2-3 minutes. Allow to cool slightly, then grind to a powder using a spice grinder or mortar and pestle.
• When the potatoes are cooked through, add the toasted spice powder and chopped coriander and stir to mix.
• You could serve this, garnished with additional fresh coriander, alongside other Indian dishes and breads. I also fancy that this could be used to accompany a simple piece of steamed white fish or chicken.

The Variations:

• You could certainly cook other veg or meat in this sauce along with the spuds – chicken, I think, would work well, or chunks of juicy paneer along with some green beans or peas perhaps.

The Results:

• Serves 2-3 as side-dish.

“I’ll not starve.”

That was the thought that crossed my mind as I pondered some weighty financial issues.

“I could always live on chickpeas” (and, before you ask, there is an implied “and potatoes” in that sentence).

I know for a fact that the modest sum of €3.30 will buy me a hefty 2kg of dried chickpeas at The Asia Market. Allow me to illustrate just how many chickpeas that is:

Chickpeas, lots thereof

I adore chickpeas and would really survive both happily and well if they were my dietary mainstay. I’d eat them in Indian-style curries, stewed Spanish-style with leafy greens, in their many Middle Eastern guises (of which hummus is king), in assorted salads or cooked on a pan burger style. That jar-full, for example, would make about 200 of these little baked chickpea burgers, which would, no doubt, keep me going for quite some time…

Baked Chickpea Burgers

Dried chickpeas are, of course, anything but convenient. They do require soaking overnight and cooking for hours on end (unless, like me, you have a pressure cooker). But they are cheap. And cheap in a good, nutritious way, not like industrialised and overly-processed foods which can be made cheaply but which lose so much of their value as real food in the process. With a little bit of advance planning and perhaps a weekend at your disposal, dried chickpeas will repay your investment well.