I've been away

I hope you have, but that you're not mad. I promise I was away scouting the world for tasty treats, tidbits and a tan. It wasn't easy, but someone has to do it right?

After completing the last couple of days at Camp Cavan with Neven, Sharon, Jo and the rest of the team I headed off to Palma de Mallorca. I've been before and loved it. In the sense that if someone offered me an apartment I would be there, like yesterday. It's an old town with the biggest Superyacht marina in the world. Pretty darn fancy (or it can be if you forget Magaluf)

I walked around, went for coffee, I always seemed to find my way to my new favourite cafe, The Room in Santa Catalina. Please visit if you can. It's a modern mix of easy style furniture on an old street with the Grannys and Grandpas walking around, sitting on their doorstop and generally running a muck!

It was lovely to be back in markets where the colours were so vibrant. Don't get me wrong, Cork has the English Market, Dublin has many all of which which are fan-bloody-tastic but it's cold, miserable and kind of grey on a regular basis. Imagine if the sun was shinning down, making every colour brighter, every smell stronger, everyone friendlier. There's just something about it. About a market in the sun.

We went to the beach and saw the boats, we played with the puppies and ate lots of food. There were a couple of days of really sunny weather in which I think I have turned one shade darker although, being half Indian, I still look albino!

I caught up with friends, walked the streets and tried to make menu plans. Honestly it was a little tough,  having to think about my soon to appear responsibilities and all that grown up stuff that come with my new job when the sun was shinning, the beach was calling and my friends were talking. Don't worry though, I worked as well! For a long time I have realised I meant to live a warm weather country but truth be told, until I had spent the last 4 months in Ireland I still was not convinced. I am now.

So now I'm back in Ireland at the Castle. The prep has been done, the shopping been shopped and I'm waiting for the bosses to turn up. The nerves are zinging (yes, it's a word) but I'm excited for a new challenge. Personally I think challenges are good.

In the meantime though, until the job finishes and I can head off towards sunshine. I have memories of the sun. Let's hope for a sunny Irish summer…

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.

Exams, Dingle and Ice Cream

On Friday we had our midterm exams. Yes, that's right, I know I've been talking about them but they actually happened. People were worrying whether this leaf is an oak leaf or a butter leaf, a mibuna or mizuna. If it wasn't so serious, it would be funny. Ok, it was a little funny and let's face it, not really worth getting all in a tizz about but, Ballymaloe Cookery School and Darina take lettuce leaves very seriously so we were all revising like mad chefs.

Apart from our exams to look forward to this week, I had set up a nutritional talk with our Ballymaloe Cookery Schools very own nutritionist, Debbie Shaw. A small group of us got together after a long day of lectures and spoke about PCOS (Polyststic Ovarian Syndrome), cholesterol, whole-food diet, blood sugar balancing etc etc. Two hours flew by and we literally could have talked all night. 

As a young woman who has had severe complications with PCOS it was utterly fascinating and a real eye opener. Debbie is a naturopath, not a classic doctor, or a surgeon. She looks at the whole body, the problems AND the symptoms. She looks at what you eat, your lifestyle, the things you worry about. 

It made me take a long hard look at the way I eat. Here at Ballymaloe Cookery School, we are inundated with food. Every day, 3 course meals are put in front of us, then demo tastings then extra work. It's literally food overload and I have to really put my will power in full force to stop myself from tasting all the yummy things. In the coming weeks, I'm going to be looking at PCOS in depth, foods and recipes that help the symptoms. 1 in 15 women have it in the world. That is a big number!

So, because we had worked so hard for our exams, as a little treat to ourselves, some of the girls and I went off to Dingle, stopping off along the way. Have I mentioned how much I'm falling in love with Ireland?! The countryside, the people….We had a great time, walking along Inch Beach, eating Murphy's Ice Cream (twice), enjoying fresh mussles at Ashe's, eating at the Smoke House in Killarney, drinking Guinness in a hardware store (don't ask!) and much more! All in all, a Yummy weekend.

Bring on the next 6 weeks and the future!

Getting excited and a little nervous!

I am currently sat in a small BnB in Fishguard awaiting my decided time to board the ferry to the Emerald Isle so that I can get started at Ballymaloe Cookery School.

For the next 12 weeks, I will be moulded, instructed, chopped up, burned and be filled with so many recipes and new information I might explode.

Since having booked on the course I seem to know more and more people that have attended, and loved, so something has to be right! Hopefully I will exit having fantastic technical skills, a myriad of traditional recipes, able to cook for 100 people whilst feeling confident and some fantastic contacts.

Fingers crossed.
x

Pet Travel Scheme

So, with all this dust and work happening on my house, I have also been very stressed in trying to find tickets, vaccines and all the shabing I need to get the puppy back to England.
First off, England governement (defra) have been super duper fantastic and so helpful. They are very well informed, they always give the same information and you couldn't ask for a better help line!
But, and yes, there always seems to be a but doesn´t there! Now, Contintental/United have been very very unhelpful.

First I can buy my own pets ticket, it will only cost $559 usd and she can be on the same plane with me. Then I phone back with all the info I need to give them (size and weight of her + crate), all the paper work in order and it turns out that 'oh, well actually M'am, you can´t buy our own pets ticket and it's actually going to cost you almost $1500usd and you'll have to pay a handlers fee in Mexico'. Ummmm, helloooooo!! Get your facts straight people!

So now, I have to do all the running around to find the cheapest handler and out of which city is the best. Turns out puppy can't get through on the same flight as me. In fact even though there are two flights a day flying into the UK she can only be put on the flight at night which arrives at 6.30am and yep, you got it. Muggins here has to pay an out of office fee!

Oh yeah. It's been very very fun and still not done.

Here is a cute picture of the day I found her…

Row row row your boat...

Having spent the summer on boats, I have now become a little tad obsessed, not in the sense of now my bathroom looks like a lighthouse montage kind of way, just in the majestic beauty of them…

Just for the fun of it

Summer time was full of work, 18hour days to be exact but also lots of fun. One of those aweseomely fun things we did was paddle boarding! Jolly good laugh and exercise! 

Be mine Bahrain

Oh sweet Lordy. I love this country. Take away the fact that it's piping hot and there's never a cloud in the sky. Take away the fact that the Arab world has a bad rep and what do you have? An awesomely awesome country. Now I hear a little yelling in the back there shouting about that it isn't a democracy, the women are forced to cover up blahdy blah blah. But hold on folks. Actually, what this means is that nobody is poor, everybody has the right to an education (including women and they get it), everybody has the right to health care and they get it, most of the women want to cover up as a respect to their bodies/husbands and there is no crime. Literally no crime!

Can I go on record and say that the sheik, however rich the dude is (and having seen his camels I can tell you, the dude is rich) loves, loves, loves his countrymen and his country. And this is THE important factor when it comes to non democratic lands.

For those of us who live in a democratic world I ask you this. Do you really feel like your rulers listen to your needs? I ain't talking about needs as in crackberries and designer clothing. I'm talking about your health needs, your educational needs....really, do they? In my heart of hearts I say no.
I'm not saying that democracy is bad, it's all gravy when, the rulers actually do right by their people and not squander the people's money or, only make laws when it benefits backers back pockets. What I'm saying is here, it works. Just because it's not like other 'western' countries you shouldn't just pass it off as wrong or bad.

Not only that but it's tan all year round, food is amazzzzinggggg and well, your surrounded by water (no one mention the word tsunami).




























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In the middle of somewhere

Yes, so I know I'm late and I know that I'm rubbish at making all my spaces into lovely beautiful areas but, I have not found one, not one tutorial that speaks human! So firstly a cry for help...I want to learn how to make my blog pretty, flowing and so my pictures don't appear blurry (click on them and they come up a beaut!). Help me please, I'm doing this from an iPad on blogpress.

Second off, I'm in Kyrgyzstan...have you heard of it? I certainly had not but don't be fooled people, this country (formerly Soviet owned) is stunning. Big sprawling mountains tempting you to walk up high to reach the snow peaks, amazing dessert land where floppy eared donkeys roam around together and salt water lakes that never freeze surrounded by sandy beaches. Somewhat Bavarian forests and Swiss chalets give the whole country a feeling of not knowing where it is itself.
Speak to the people and it's either in Russian or Kyrgys...like I speak those! But friendly and charming they are. Similar to Mexico in that there are no rules on the road, fresh produce can be bought on the sides of the road and things are cheap, it's literally a great place if your outdoorsy. Horseback trekking in the mountains (my bottom is rather sore!), camping under snowy peaks, swimming and skiing can all be done year round. And cheap. Get the chance to stay in a Yurt and hallelujah! Downfall is that the cooking is not great, they may have the produce but sure as hell don't know what to do with it!

All in all though it's been an amazing week and would seriously consider coming back for more...

































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It's Sunday!

Yay…I'm on time! It's Sunday and I'm not late…hurrah. It's been a pretty fun week, got back from my trip with my Mater and then had a couple of relaxing days in the country before heading into town today (hence the on time post!)
Massive rains this week and everything looking super duper in shape and growing..yippee. Preparing for all the fun things that I'm going to be doing once I get back to Europe for 2 months…oh, how I cannot wait!
So anyway, here is my colour..guesses please?