Ballymaloe LitFest

If you are not aware of the Ballymaloe LitFest where have you been living?!?

What a weekend. The sun shone, the atmosphere buzzed and I met my food hero. Yes, I met the incredible Madhur Jaffrey. She is a legend that brought Indian food to the Western World some would say.

She is a petite, beautiful 80year old woman who learnt to cook through her Mother and the other women in her family and continues that tradition of teaching others to cook.

The weekend was a conglomerate of chefs, authors, foodies, non foodies, stall holders, local producers. The list goes on and on. Over three days there were cooking demos, panel discussions, dancing, lots of eating and drinking, pop up wine shops, pop up bands and much much more.

I met some brilliant and world renowned chefs, David Thompson, Stevie Parle, Thomassina Miers, Stehpanie Alexander, Claudia Rhoden and many more. 

It was literally a who's who of the cooking world and what was fantastic to me as a young woman chef was how many more female cooks where speaking than men. A push in the right direction where, in todays world head chef posts are male dominated.

Sandor Katz the fermentation guru speaking over the weekend and showing us the art of fermentation.

There was the big shed, where drinking and eating activities where part of the weekends events. The pop up bar was a creative explosion with books hanging from the ceiling, old beer kegs as lights and a chandler made from an old whiskey barrel. All adding to the atmospherical aromas of food.

There were gardeners and foragers, dogs running around with children, laughter and ideas. Lots of them. New friends were made, old friends were introduced and it was just a melting pot of cultures. A beautiful melting pot that had all of us who attended in awe once again at the power of Ballymaloe.

I love a smoker

It's true. I can't help it. Since my time at Ballymaloe and meeting all the hardworking local producers, I've become a little bit obsessed. The first one I came across was Frank Hederman, smoking genius that he is and then, we met Bill Casey who works literally a stones throw from the school grounds. Frank does hot and cold smoking, Bill only does cold if I remember rightly. Everytime I meet another smoker I get a big knock somewhere in the back of my head telling me how I'd love to do this, what recipes I would try and what my smoke shack would look like...

While I was visiting the West Coast of Scotland I managed to go and visit Mandy. Shieldaig's very own smoker. Ever since I can remember smoked salmon from this smokery has been finding it's way into our postbox every Christmas. First John started it and since he retired Mandy has taken over. She does both hot and cold smoking and the recipe hasn't changed since John started smoking back years ago

Roughly 2100 salmon find their way onto the filleting block and into the smoker to either be smoked cold as a whole side or sliced into fillets for a hot smoke. The taste is fantastic and with all the fish coming from local fishermen in local waters it really doesn't get any better. Salmon deemed for a cold smoke is first dry salted and the hot smoked is brined instead.

I loved visiting and seeing that anybody can set up a business in their back garden. It gave me real hope that I can be that person, I can have my own food business and be successful. Keeping it local, seasonal and being passionate about what you're doing are the real key components and I can't wait to find my way.

A quick trip over to the left.

These last couple of days I've been over on the West Coast of Scotland. Having the Great Aunty living there helps a treat as it seems hipsters from every corner of the globe are buying up tiny crofters houses, which means, there's no accommodation to be had and the pubs are all full. With the hipsters though comes new imports such as olive oil. It's hard to remember that they only had a road put in in the 70s.

Friends of ours have a prawn business over there and each visit we are gifted several kilos of prawns. For those in Ireland they would be Dublin Bay Prawns. For those in Scotland they are obviously Scottish Prawns and everywhere else in the world I'm sorry, but you'll have to chose which you want to call them. Having prepared, cooked and eaten these yummy, sometimes arm length prawns at Ballymaloe Cookery School I was quickly put to work and set to cooking. Throw in some homemade mayonnaise, using the olive oil that's now being imported, supper was delicious with a view that people would pay thousands for. Oh right, they do.

We had beautiful sunny weather most of the time and for anyone who's been to Scotland, 5 days in a row of sun is quite exceptional. Lapping it up, we went on walk after walk with the puppy. Snow peeked mountains looming over us as, we slowly and heavy breathed our way further up and up until the view got the better of us and we stopped to admire. This moment, here. Is what has made me understand why my Great Aunt moved up here in the 60's. No roads, no running water or electricity is pretty hard core. But when it's sunny and you can see for miles and mountains I can understand.

It's been a spectacular couple of days with my Maman. Hanging out, no TV, no internet just the heather on the mountains, highland cows, lambs, deer and good conversation. I've loved it.


Ballymaloe Cookery School Mayonnaise:

3 egg yolks
¼ tsp mustard
2 tbsps vinegar
8floz of oil (they do 6 of non flavoured veg oil and 2 of olive oil)

Whisk together the egg yolks, mustard and vinegar. Then very slowly but steadily drizzle in the oil, whisking all the time. Add more vinegar or mustard at the end if needs be.

Super Snack Time

These little spicy crunch of yumminess are one of the simplest things to make. Granted if you were using fresh pepitas from a pumpkin/squash and had to open the fruit, then get all the seeds out etc it would be more effort, but well worth it! Supplying minerals such as phosphorus, magnesium, iron, zinc (which is great for us girlies) and a great source of Vit A, B1, B2, B3 and protein. Let just say, this is one snack that we shouldn't be without!

I use dried pumpkin seeds here but like I said, fresh ones are just as good and offer a different flavour. You can utterly decide what flavour you like on your pepitas. I chose cinnamon to give me a little bit of the sugary sweetness I'm craving without eating sugar and some cayenne, cos I need a little spice.

At Ballymaloe Cookery School, Darina loved to talk about cinnamon and especially the difference between that and cassia. Cinanamon has a huge amount of beneficial properties, but the one I want to talk about mostly is it's ability to help with regulating insulin and helping with stabilising blood sugar levels. Something else for us girls with PCOS or people with diabetes to think about.

To make:

Pepitas, as many or as little as you want
your spice(s) of choice (in Mexico they use chilli powder and lime juice or zest!)
some unscented, unflavoured oil or spray oil

Drizzle a little bit of oil over, be careful as you don't want to much. Spray oil is best as you hardly ever use too much. Then sprinkle spices over, mix all together till all pepitas are covered in oil and spices then spread out on a baking sheet in the oven on a low temp. I put it to 130C for roughly 15minutes. You want them to be more green than golden as they will turn bitter! So set a timer for 10mins and then check.

Happy snacking!

It's been nothing but tears, long drawn out goodbyes and lots of revision this week. Week 12. The end of Ballymaloe January Course 2013.

We had our practical exams (mine not so good considering I dropped my chicken on the floor and cut myself. I can laugh, now!) then our three theory exams (better than the practical!) and now we have left. Before we left however, there was dancing, food (how could we not) and lots of laughter. Our final supper as we called it with the inspirational Rory O'Connell cooking. What a meal.

I have learnt so many things over these last 12 weeks, met some inspirational people and most important to me, is that I have finally found something that I know I want to do, in any context, for ever. I have found my thing. And that makes me so happy.

I could not though, have learnt as much about myself or cooking, succeeded in so many ways without the help and support from the fabulous and talented team of teachers who work at Ballymaloe Cookery School. Unfortunately they weren't all at our farewell supper but I want to say Thank you. Thank you so much.

Finally to Tim and Darina Allen, Rory O'Connell and Rachel Allen. This journey, my fun, wonderful, sometimes heartbreaking journey could not have happened without you all. I can't wait to pass the message on, teach more people how to cook and make you proud. Thank you.

So what next you, those lovely people who have been along on this 12 week journey with me, ask? I have a job! I'll actually be working in Ireland for a family but before that, I am off to work with the talented Sharon Hearne-Smith and Neven Maguire. I am so excited and grateful for this next great opportunity. So keep reading to find out the next chapter. 

See you later Ballymaloe, I'll be back.

Penultimate Week

Last week was our penultimate week at Ballymaloe Cookery School. Nobody can believe it, we've started thinking about our futures (even more seriously), I've started applying for jobs (yeah, crazy!) and I've also started revising. Can't quite believe it.

Sunday was a special family dinner with the girls. Lots of chat about our final menu, what we've learnt and where we are going.

On Wednesday we were lucky enough to have a guided tour around Ballymaloe House and speak to the legend that is Myrtle Allen. Lucky us! We saw some fantastic stuff, the wine cellar with Colm, the Grainstore which is an event space and also these bad boys below!

These are two of my friends here at Ballymaloe Cookery School. I love this image!

Wednesday we also had sushi class and was lucky enough to try this fellow. The Oyster Plant which actually tastes like oysters!

And this beautiful plant is the Wasabi plant.

The atmosphere has changed too, everyone is a little more serious, practise for our practical exam is being sneaked around our daily menus and the are some heart to hearts going on.

It seems every time we have Rachel Allen for demo there is some wonderful animal she has to hold up! This time it was the stunning Thornback Ray.

We finished Fridays demo with an iced lolly. YUM!

That's right. Everything is green. The pyramids, the houses, the cows even. Everything is green. It's the day of St Patrick, I'm in Ireland and the sun is shinning.

We decided to take a walk high up on the cliff tops overlooking Ballycotton before getting down to some wine revision for our exam on Wednesday. After having our last wine lecture with the wine god that is Colm McCan it got us all into motion. He is a fantastic teacher with such knowledge and passion for wine it's pretty inspiring stuff, not to mention he's a great laugh!

 Nerves are definitely kicking in. Thursday was particularly stressful as we had to hand in our final menu. No changes can be made, if you left an ingredient our of your list you can't go back. With over 200 recipes to decide from it was a pretty tough choice to pick three meals that were cohesive, balanced and showed off our abilities to their best. But, it's handed in now. Nothing to do but practice!

It's all in the hands of the cooking gods now. In the mean time we've had some laughs, a brownie off and recalling some memories. 10 weeks ago we all showed up to this tiny Irish village not knowing who we would meet, the friends we would make or what we would learn. And now, it's almost over. Incredible.

Hope you have had a great weekend celebrating St Paddys and here are some Tips of the Week:

1. Pork is pork until it's cured. Then it's bacon.

2. Egg whites keep covered in the fridge for weeks and make the best meringues.

3. If a recipe calls for self raising flour but you don't have any, just add 1tsp of baking powder

That time again. In keeping with a fish theme, let's fillet a squid. This is by far, and I really mean that, the easiest thing to fillet. 

First you need to get your hands around the head (between the eyes and the body) and pull. You're looking to pull the head along with all the insides out. Don't be squeamish, get stuck in! Then cut between the tentacles and the eyes, preferably as close to the eyes as you can get.

Next grab a hold of the quill and pull it out (squids are called the 'oceans writers')

Next it's time to peel off the wings and then the skin (that speckledy stuff)

Now all that is left is to give it a wash and chop it up. Pat on the back, you did it!

This was my version of Squid'n'Chips (with sweet chilli sauce)