MAJOR AWARD FOR GREEN SAFFRON

Local Food Company Wins Major Bord Bia Award

~ Green Saffron win at Bord Bia’s Food and Drink Industry Awards ~

Tuesday 22^nd November 2011 Arun Kapil (right) of Green Saffron, the spice company based in Midleton, Co. Cork, has won the Entrepreneurial Award at Bord Bia’s Food and Drink Industry Awards 2011, taking place in Trinity College Dublin tonight. In 2007, Arun Kapil set up Green Saffron, a company which specialises in premium, farm-fresh whole spices and blends for use in home and professional kitchens.

Eight Irish companies in all were honoured at the Bord Bia awards ceremony, which attracted over 220 senior representatives from the food and drink industry. The Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Simon Coveney TD presented the awards. Speaking at the event, Michael Carey, Chairman, Bord Bia said “in spite of all the challenges we face – it is also probably the most exciting time ever to be in our industry. The increase in exports would be impressive at any time but against the backdrop of global economic uncertainty and our own domestic difficulties it is truly remarkable. Equally remarkable are the achievements of the award winners, who have demonstrated success in areas critical to future growth, from innovation and branding to sustainability and entrepreneurship.”

The Food and Drink Industry Awards, held in association with Rabobank, were open to all food and drink products manufactured in Ireland. This year, Bord Bia received a total of 184 award entries across the six categories. The Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Simon Coveney TD presented the overall category award winners which included: (See Notes to Editor for profiles)

·         Innovation Award  – Natasha’s Living Food for Kale Crunchies, a healthy crisp alternative made from dried locally grown kale

·         Sustainability Award – Country Crest, a family owned business, situated in north County Dublin. As part of its environment philosophy, Country Crest includes a wind turbine, water recycling, and a wildlife pond. The company aims to be energy self-sufficient by 2015.

·         Branding Award – Largo Foods for Tayto, Ireland’s Number 1 crisp and snack brand and Ireland’s 5th largest grocery brand (Nielsen). Over 3 million bags of Tayto are sold in Ireland each week.

·         Entrepreneurial Award – Arun Kapil, Managing Director, Green Saffron.

·         Export Award – Jameson Over one billion glasses of Jameson are consumed around the world each year. Jameson is a global brand with a presence in over 120 markets.

·         Domestic Success Award – Flahavan’s Flahavan’s, one of Ireland’s leading private companies, has been milling quality Irish oats for over six generations.

Kerrygold and Cashel Blue were also honoured with a Special Award in recognition of their co-branding, ‘co-opetition’ initiative in the US market. The Irish Dairy Board, owners of the Kerrygold brand, has recently joined forces with Cashel Blue in a new co-branding and distribution agreement to build brand awareness and market share in the US. Speaking at the event Aidan Cotter, Chief Executive, Bord Bia commented “this is an excellent example of co-opetition as a business strategy and how a large multinational exporter can collaborate with a niche player to develop a mutually beneficial brand offering. Kerrygold has added an artisan product to its portfolio while Cashel Blue is leveraging an established international brand with global distribution channels. It’s a win-win situation and we look forward to working with more companies on this exciting new model to develop our exports further.” Bord Bia is actively supporting the principle of co-opetition, where food companies work together to create synergies resulting in cost savings, improved returns and/or increased market distribution.

FOR THE WINE LOVER'S LOVER

Christmas gift (in March!)
Hint. Hint. For the wine lover's lover.
Give the gift that lasts.
Wine weekend: starts €495.


(Also, below: Faustino 1 gift set €99
and Pandora Bell hampers form €29.99)




WINE WEEKEND COURSE AT BALLYMALOE HOUSE
2^nd – 4^th March 2012
Mary Dowey’s Weekend Wine Course has become a firm fixture on the spring calendar at Ballymaloe House, Co Cork twice yearly for the past 11 years. Guests come from far and wide to learn the essentials of wine appreciation while enjoying superb food, great wines and good company in one of Ireland’s loveliest country houses.
Mary’s Introduction to Wine Appreciation  is suitable for anybody who enjoys wine and would like to know more about it. The course focuses on key grape varieties. Besides quickly mastering the characteristics of Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Riesling, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Pinot Noir, guests will learn how to recognise quality, buy wisely, serve and store wines correctly and match them with the most suitable foods.  ‘The wine-tasting weekend was fantastic and we will highly recommend it to our friends.’  Emma-Jane Dockery, Dublin 
Listed among the Top 10 Wine Courses in the UK & Ireland by the Daily Telegraph, and Lonely Planet Top 10 Weekend Breaks. Ballymaloe House is also recipient of the Georgina Campbell Wine Award of the Year 2010.
Mary Dowey (www.marydowey.com) has built up a large following through her enthusiastic and refreshingly unstuffy approach. She is wine editor of The Gloss magazine and a contributor to the internationally acclaimed wine magazine Decanter, having been wine correspondent of The Irish Times 1995-2005. She has visited most of the world’s major wine-producing regions and is the author of several books including Food and Wine – Matching Made Simple and 101 Great Wines Under €12.

Wine Weekend Format

Friday evening:  welcome aperitif, dinner with specially chosen wines and brief talk

Saturday: wine course all day (9.30am – 4.30pm) with lunch, afternoon tea and a six-course wine-tasting dinner in the evening

Sunday morning: champagne and sparkling wine workshop (10am -12.30pm) 

Wine Weekend Packages  (course open to both residents and non-residents)

€495pp standard room; €595pp superior room, all inclusive of the following:

2 nights bed & breakfast; with Friday dinner and wine talk; Saturday all-day wine course with lunch, afternoon tea and gala dinner; Sunday morning champagne workshop. It is also open of to non-residents - and the price for that is €295 per person, which includes everything as already listed, except of course, bed & breakfast.

Gift vouchers available: the ideal birthday or Christmas gift for a wine-lover.  

Ballymaloe House, Shanagarry, Co. Cork. Tel: 00 353 (0)21 4652531

E-mail: res@ballymaloe.ie  Website and online booking: www.ballymaloe.ie

Now, if he or she is not worth the €500, don't worry. If you spend 99 euro, you can get a gift that can be shared on the spot and you don't have to wait until March. I'm talking about the Faustino 1, Gran Reserva 3 bottle wood gift set.  This  Spanish icon, which was first released in 1964, is one of the greatest traditionally styled Gran Reservas. Thirty months in French and American oak and at least three years in the bottle results in a wonderful combination of complexity and harmony. This wine is the perfect accompaniment for all your festive meals. Serve with stewed meat, roasts, sautéed seasonal vegetables, chicken confit, pork cooked in the wine or mushrooms. The box is available in independent outlets for €99.99.

No wine drinker in the house? Not to worry. Why not try Limerick's Pandora Bell. Nicole has a range of luxurious hampers, featuring her fantastic nougat creations and more, with prices from €30 to 50. Check them out here.

Start freezing now..

Your freezer makes it easier Start freezing now to skip the stress later! Make it easy on yourself in the busy weeks to come with our freezer friendly suppers, or get a head start by freezing some party nibbles. What are your get−ahead recipes?

Top freezer friendly fare Shortcrust pastry Steak chilli Mini spanakopita Chocolate brownie cookies All Freezer friendly recipes

MY NEW FAVOURITE FROM THE DOURO

BY QUINTA DO JUDEU’S VINHO TINTO, DOURO 2008, 14% ABV, €14 to €16, STOCKISTS, 4.5 STARS

This one is going straight into my list of favourites of 2011. It has quite a dark red colour and the tempting nose is full of red and black fruits and hints of spice. It is warm and fruity in the mouth, no shortage of spice and the tannins are still at work.

While you will no doubt get smoother, this is quite an accomplished wine, one you could bring anywhere though perhaps you may prefer to keep it at home for your red meat dishes. Excellent wine at a very good price.

It is a blend of five Portuguese grapes: Touriga Nacional, Touriga Franca, Tinta Roriz, Tinta Amarela and Tinta Barroca. It has been aged for 8 months in French oak. It is not filtered and they advice you to decant. I did decant but it was hardly necessary though I would say it is important to have it in the room for a few hours before serving.

You may check out other technical details and more about the vineyard here.

FENNS QUAY FISH SPECIAL

FENNS QUAY FISH SPECIAL

Click on image to enlarge

All the buzz in Fenns Quay is about the Chef du Jour joust next Tuesday and Wednesday but regulars have to be fed in the meantime and I must say there is no slacking in that regard. I thoroughly enjoyed my visit last night where the Fish of the Day special was a highlight of a very satisfying meal.

There are usually plenty of choices in Fenns Quay, including a very attractive Cork on a Fork menu. Both it and the A La Carte are supplemented by a bunch of daily specials.

The Bream was their Market Fish of the Day Special and you can see why were tempted. Quite a plateful, topped by fillets of very fresh fish. And all the extra bits and pieces made for a very tasty and very well balanced dish, also very filling.

Well perhaps the “filling up” feeling also had something to do with the starter, a rather large one. Again, we picked from the specials and Seared Scallops, done to a “T”, and the ever so tasty Rosscarbery White Pudding were an excellent match, enhanced by the parsnip purée.

After all that, we did manage one dessert between us and that was their house specialty: V’Ice-cream (a pichet of  Pedro Ximenez sherry with vanilla ice cream). Just the job, as it sweetly slid down!

New Zealand’s Marlborough has a strong reputation for producing high quality Sauvignon Blanc and our fruity and full of flavor Fair Hall Cliffs 2010, at €6.95 a glass, didn’t damage that reputation in any way.

PICHET SCOOPS SANTA RITA AWARD

Top restaurants announced at

The Dubliner 100 Best Restaurants 2012 in association with Santa Rita

Santa Rita People’s Choice Award goes to

Pichet while Derry Clarke scoops the

Santa Rita Chef’s Chef of the Year Award

Pichet has been announced as the winner of the Santa Rita People’s Choice Award at the launch of The Dubliner 100 Best Restaurants 2012 in association with Santa Rita, the must-have annual guide to the best eating out destinations in Dublin.

The Santa Rita People’s Choice Award ten most popular restaurants in Dublin, as voted by the public, are as follows:

1. Pichet
2. The Exchequer
3. Junior’s
4. Chapter One
5. Eatery 120
6. Dillinger’s
7. Jo Burger
8. Dax
9. Saba
10. The Trocadero

Each year, chefs and restaurateurs nominate the Dublin chef they most admire and this year’s Santa Rita Chef’s Chef Award goes to Derry Clarke of L’Ecrivain. Honourable mentions included:

·         Ross Lewis, Chapter One

·         Kevin Thornton, Thornton's

·         Padraic Hayden, Camden Kitchen

·         Dylan McGrath, Rustic Stone

The Dubliner 100 Best restaurants, in association with Santa Rita, which is now in its 10^th year of publication, features a host of dining options across the capital, including fine dining, casual eateries, family friendly venues, local favourites and hidden gems.

Copies of the 2012 guide to the 100 Best Restaurants are on

sale in bookshops across the country.

Sallyanne Cooney, General Manager of Gleeson’s incorporating Gilbey’s, which distributes Santa Rita wine in Ireland, says:

“Santa Rita, the leading Chilean wine in Ireland, is delighted to be associated once again with The Dubliner 100 Best Restaurants guide for the tenth year running. The ‘Santa Rita People’s Choice Award’ continues to be the most sought after accolade for Dublin restaurants, as it is voted for by the public – the toughest critics of all! We’d like to offer our heartfelt congratulations to Pichet, Derry Clarke and indeed the 100 Best Restaurants in Dublin for 2012”

FENNS QUAY CHEF DU JOUR

FENNS QUAY CHEF DU JOUR

Fenns Quay  head chef Kate Lawlor is a busy girl these days. Not alone is she organising the day to day menus for the popular city centre restaurant and, of course the Christmas menus, but she is also running an innovative competition where a guest chef takes over the Fenns Quay kitchens for a night.

This is an unusual event and should be great fun for foodies. Places are limited and the number to ring to reserve is 021 4279527.

Paul Callaghan is the first to enter the stage. Paul is from County Clare and, briefly, this is his story: Ran my own Plastering business but have had to adapt to change, Irish food blogger, veg grower, trying sustainable living and loving it! You can find out more about him and his cooking skills on his blog at http://www.thesustainablelarder.com/

Paul will be on next Tuesday (22nd) and the following night the spotlight will be on Waterford’s Jeni Pim who is looking forward to the night: “Yes, a big change from my little kitchen in the middle of nowhere, at least I won't have to dig all the veg for it!.” You’ll find her on Twitter at JeniPim.

Kate has been looking for judges for the event and yours truly has been roped in. On the opening night, I’ll be with Elke O’Mahony of Cork Slow Food and Evin O’Keeffe . On Wednesday, I’ll be joined by Margaret Smith  and by Michael Logan of River Wines.

Kate Lawlor (right) is determined that the foodie fun won’t stop there. “We are planning a second head to head between two different chefs in January with a final pencilled in for April. And already there has been some interest in those!”

A good start is half the battle so get on down to the Sheares Street venue next week (22nd and 23rd) and have yourself a great night out which, including the wines, will cost €50.00.

Sturdy Douro white...parade ground not catwalk...

QUINTA DO JUDEU’S WHITE WINE, DOURO (PORTUGAL) 2010, 14.5% ABV, €18 TO 20, STOCKISTS 

I generally prefer wines made from old vines and this sturdy white from the Douro is no exception. It is a mix of native varieties: Malvasia Fino and Rabigato. Quinta do Judeu aim for high quality wines, using traditional methods including treading the grapes in granite tanks.

Colour of this full and complex wine is yellow with hints of green and it has aromas of white fruit, including peach. The initial impressions in the mouth are, for me: fresh, fruity, dry.

This is parade ground not catwalk, brawny not scrawny. It is a gripping engagement from the start and it remains strong to the end. No fade away here to a skinny citron pressé. It is also built to last, with a recommended drink-by date of 2015.

It has a pretty high ABV for a white but it is nonetheless a well balanced wine. More than a match for the turkey and ham!

The white is imported by Wine Alliance and you may check all the technical details, and more, here.

Very old vine at Quinta do Judeu

AMUSE BOUCHE

 “......a woman held up a duck whose throat she had cut and stroked her gently while a little girl held up a cup to catch the blood for making gravy. The duck seemed very contented and, when they put her down, she waddled twice and found that she was dead. We ate her later, stuffed and roasted.”

Hemingway, describing a visit to Miro’s summer home near Barcelona.

DUBLIN & CORK CHRISTMAS TASTINGS

FromVineyardsDirect.ie Christmas parties & tastings in Dublin and Cork


Dublin Christmas Tasting & Party
17th November 2011  
Royal Irish Automobile Club,
32 Dawson Street,Dublin 2
6.30-8.30pm  

Cork Christmas Party & Tasting
24th November 2011
Crawford Art Gallery
Emmet Place, Cork
6.30-8.30pm

There is still plenty of time to attend and to tempt you here is the list of wines that will be tasted:
1.    1415 Brut, Crémant De Bourgogne €12.95
2.    La Chapelle Blanc 2009, Cotes de Gascogne| SW France €8.95
3.    Torrebrava Manzanilla Sherry, Bodegas Orleans Borbon €9.95
4.    Château Bauduc Blanc 2009 | Bordeaux €10.50
5.    Stanley Estates Sauv. Blanc, Awatere Valley 2011 | Marlborough €15.95
6.    Soave Classico Pra 2010 | Veneto €12.95
7.    St Véran ‘Merloix’ 2009, Pierre Janny| Burgundy €13.95
8.    Mercurey 2005 , Pierre Olivier | Burgundy €15.95
9.    Chablis 1er Cru ‘Beauroy’, Dom De la Motte 2008| Burgundy €17.95
10. Meursault
11. Primitivo 2004, casa Catelli | €9.95
12. Cotes Du Rhône Villages ’Les Trois Soeurs’, Dom Des Grands Bois 2010 €10.95
13. Altos De Oliva Gran Reserva 2004 | Catalunya  €9.95
14. Bourgogne Pinot Noir 2009, Mark Haisma | Burgundy €17.95
15. Barbera D’Alba’Granera Alta’, Cascina Chicco 2009 | Piedmont €12.95
16. Crozes Hermitage ‘Nouvelere’ 2007, Jaboulet | Rhône €22.50
17. Ronan 2009 | Bordeaux €13.95
18. Virginie-Thunevin 2006 | Bordeaux Supérieur €14.50
19. Pauillac 2006, Pauillac | Bordeaux €23.95
20. Commanderie de Mazeyres 2001, Pomerol | Bordeaux €32.95
21. Château Haut-Charmes, 2009, Sauternes | Bordeaux €34.95
22. Churchill Graham, 10YO Tawny Port | Portugal €24.95
23. Churchill Graham Reserve Port | Portugal €18.95


If you would like to attend any of these tastings please call or email Gareth on gareth@fromvineyardsdirect.ie / 01 845 7645
  www.fromvineyardsdirect.ie

A WORLD OF COFFEE

A WORLD OF COFFEE

Joined the Robert Roberts Connoisseur Coffee Club at the start of the year and have enjoyed the experience so far. A new pack arrives every month and the cost, paid upfront, works out at about four euro a pack.

A high standard was set by the first one in January, a medium strong Brazilian Bruzzi and the packs that followed, which came from all over the coffee producing world, maintained the high standard.

Next came the unusual Monsoon Malabar  from India followed by the more delicate Sigri A  from Papua New Guinea.

April saw the arrival of the Columbian Paraiso followed by a purple patch as far as I was concerned starting with the Malawi Mzuzu AAA.

The June edition featured another African, a good strong Organic Yirgacheffe from Ethiopia, and then followed two more of my favourites: Organic Peruvian Cecovesa and August’s Finca La Bastilla from Nicaragua. Just finished the September pack of Guatemala’s Los Volcanes, again good and strong.

That means an opening later on today of the October pack which comes from Kenya and is named the AA Mweiga Estate. Gareth Scully, the Master Blender at Roberts , is very happy with this very aromatic full bodied cup and he hasn’t let us down yet! Looking forward to that!

CORGO DA REGUA - YOUR EVERYDAY RED

QUINTA DO JUDEU’S CORGO DA REGUA, DOURO (PORTUGAL) 2008, 14% ABV, €10 TO 12, STOCKISTS, 4 STARS

The folks at Quinta do Judeu claim that this wine, named after a local river, is perfect to match everyday meals. I reckon they are right. Get a couple of these and you’d be ready for most red wine occasions.

Made my first acquaintance with this red over the weekend and must say I am impressed. Quite a lengthy introduction as the grapes used are not that familiar to me. They are: Tourigo National 10%, Tourigo Franca 20, Tinto Roriz 35 and Tinto Barroca 35.

The colour is dark red and there are red fruits, and spice, on the nose. On the palate, you again come across the fruits and the spice (a comfortable level) and a lovely warming medium weight mouthfeel. The tannins have smoothed the way here, all the way to an excellent finish. Good value too.

Must say I like this stuff, generous from start to the finish when the last drops tumble down from the commodious hollow stem of the standard Riedel receptacle. Not just a happy ending. More a happy story.

The Corgo da Regua is imported by Wine Alliance and you may check all the technical details, and more, here.

CHRISTMAS PUD - MAKE IT NOW!

Getting better with age   Your Christmas cake and pudding are best made this month, for time to age that leads to an incomparable flavour come Christmas! Email us your Christmas tips

Recipes and tips How to steam Christmas pudding Amazing Christmas cake Luxury Christmas cake Traditional Christmas pudding Ultimate Christmas cake