Archive for March, 2009
How not to waste an hour
Posted on March 29, 2009, by Conor O'Neill, under Food, Gardening, Health.
We’ve just had the third annual waste of time known as Earth Hour where millions of people worldwide pretend to do something useful about global warming and turn off lights for an hour. For 99.999999% of those people, that’ll be it for another 365 days. End result for the Earth, big fat zero. Perhaps if we take all the energy expended by the media covering this story, we may even have a net negative?
Imagine if, instead, those millions of people went outside, dug up a square metre or two of their perfect lawns and planted some vegetable seeds? Or if they lived in an apartment in Ireland, they contacted Irish Allotments about organising patches in their locality?
Then instead of some silly hour-long nonsense they could:
- Reduce CO2 throught the action of the plants
- Reduce petrol consumption through less shopping
- Reduce fuel miles by not buying foreign vegetables
- Save money
- Get their kids outside
- Take part in Seed Saver schemes
- Eat healthier
- Get fit
We could call it Gardener’s World 
Of course taking care of this veg patch takes a wee bit longer than one hour a year and isn’t news-worthy so maybe we should just turn off the lights and keep playing mushroom instead.
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Whatchoo Readin’ For?
Posted on March 27, 2009, by Conor O'Neill, under Cork, Entertainment, Ireland.
(In the immortal words of Bill Hicks).
Just got an email to tell me that the West Cork Literary Festival will run from July 5th to 11th.
Now I’m not the most literary person in the world. My last three books were “Presenting to Win”, “Bad Science” and something by Harlan Coben. Next up is “On the Origin of Species”. But even I’ve heard of some of the heavy-hitters who’ll be attending the festival. Annie Proulx, Roger McGough, Francesca Simon and Louis de Bernières are just four of the writers appearing at this year’s event which features some of the best writers, poets and illustrators from Ireland and abroad.
The Official Festival Launch is in Bantry, leading to a top few days of readings, seminars, workshops, children’s events, exhibitions, music and good old-fashioned hospitality.
Booking for the Festival is on 027 55987. All info on the web-site.
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Brian Cowen now available as a t-shirt
Posted on March 25, 2009, by Conor O'Neill, under Commentary, Politics.
I’ve ordered mine, have you?
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Dear Brian, welcome to the Internet
Posted on March 25, 2009, by Conor O'Neill, under Commentary, Politics.
Fianna Fail may be able to censor RTE and turn it into a toothless Soviet-era Pravda but luckily we have the internet to enable democracy and freedom of speech and expression.
Here is the original RTE piece on the Cowen nudes that they removed from their site and then apologised for mentioning. Thanks to Mr Mulley.
“Against us are… all timid men who prefer the calm of despotism to the boisterous sea of liberty… We are likely to preserve the liberty we have obtained only by unremitting labors and perils..”
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West Cork Tweetup
Posted on March 24, 2009, by Conor O'Neill, under Cork, Entertainment, Ireland, Technology.
If you had never heard of Twitter before, the relentless coverage of it on RTE and elsewhere recently must surely have changed that. It’s a simple system for messaging people who follow you but in a completely public way. You can pick whose messages you see by default too. Here’s a quick snapshot of those I follow:
One of the nice aspects of Twitter is that it leads to real-world interactions too. There are regular meet-ups called Tweetups where people can have a few drinks, maybe a bite to eat and have a bit of proper social interaction.
Ann Donnelly is organising West Cork’s first ever Tweetup in Clonakilty this Friday. It’s on in the Courtyard Bar in Clon from 8pm. If you are on Twitter or want to find out more about it or just want to meet with some friendly people then why not head on over? All details are on the blog.
Here are some of the West Cork (I’m including up to Ballincollig and Macroom in West) Twits that I know about: Ann, Mike Kane, Matt Kane, Anthony Creswell, Catherine, Simon Whelband, Calvin Jones, Walter Higgins, Me, Randy, Margaret Jordan, Gordon Murray. If I’ve missed you, leave a comment with a link to your profile!
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In honour of today’s historic episode of The Simpsons
Posted on March 17, 2009, by Conor O'Neill, under Drink, Entertainment.
Cheers Homer!
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Some videos of today’s St Patrick’s Day Parade in Bandon
Posted on March 17, 2009, by Conor O'Neill, under Bandon, Cork, Ireland.
Fantastic day for it. Hopefully some more music/bands next year?
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It’s funny cos it’s true
Posted on March 11, 2009, by Conor O'Neill, under Humour.
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Back to the Food Future
Posted on March 8, 2009, by Conor O'Neill, under Reviews.
This isn’t good food, it’s fantastic food. The Irish have forgotten the power of preserving and this is a big wake-up call. Lip-smackingly gorgeous duck confit that is an absolute bargain and a doddle to prepare.
Disclosure: I received several of these products for free and did not pay delivery.
Quite a while back Laurent of Confit de France contacted me and a bunch of other foodie bloggers about his new ecommerce store which was selling a variety of preserved French foods including confit, pate, rillettes and foie gras. (yeah yeah vegans, we’ve heard it all before, do something useful and go annoy someone about battery chickens instead).
Laurent was particularly excited by the confit and I went to order some. Unfortunately whilst the products themselves were great value, the delivery was very expensive if you didn’t order a lot. Therefore Laurent offered to send me some for free to try out. The great news is that since then, he has dropped the price of delivery by a huge amount and everything is now a bargain.
Over the past few weeks I’ve been trying the various things he sent me and I’ll mention them all. But first, the duck. I got a large four-portion tin which was filled to the brim with duck fat. I poured off the fat and the gelatin and put the four very large legs into a frying pan.
I kept them on the heat until they were hot through and the skin had started to crisp up. However I think the oven method would be better for crisping and will try that the next time.
We just had it with a simple green salad and it was stunning. When you see how expensive duck breast is and how many times I’ve messed up the cooking of it, these confit legs are a doddle and more tasty in many ways. The fat makes amazing roast spuds too!
The other products I got were as follows:
- Goose Rillettes: I discovered the joy of rillettes at Taste of Cork and had tons of it on holidays in France. It’s basically pate with the meat shredded rather than pureed. Gorgeous on toast.
- Confit Duck in Orange: The duck and sauce were excellent but there wasn’t enough fondant potatoes.
- Cassoulet de Castelnaudary: This is a classic cassoulet with goose confit, sausage and beans. Very tasty and filling.
- Foie Gras: Not eaten yet. Will report back.
As I mentioned above, we seem to have forgotten the importance and usefulness of preserving. With all the money people were making in recent years, it was like curing/pickling/preserving/canning were somehow from our poor past. Apart from bacon, all we wanted were expensive cuts of meat or stupidly priced “premium” ready meals.
The tin of baked beans is one of the most perfect food products ever. Our holidays in France reminded us of all the other things like duck confit and casoulet which came from poverty and lack of freezers but which are now pinnacles of gourmet food.
I hope one of the upsides of this recession is that we look again at our past and start learning how to cook the cheaper tastier cuts of meats, how to use pulses and grains, how to use preserved goods and how to live on a budget whilst still eating beautiful food.
Some might think this is the wrong time to be launching a site like Laurent’s. I disagree, I can’t think of a better time.
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