Attention Mushroom Haters! – Now they’re good for you. Study finds 5 great benefits of mushrooms.
Americans love their Irish whiskey – It’s no surprise that during the week of St. Patrick’s day, Irish whiskey sales skyrocketed, but what’s newsworthy is that sales in America have gone up 20% in the past year.
Women benefit from daily tea consumption – Three cups a day will help keep the heart attacks and strokes away (if you’re a woman).  Continue reading »

I blogged back in December about a dinner involving fine wines that was conducted in Killarney. Another of these events is on the cards this Sunday. Unlike the previous event this one was conjured up only a few days ago and there will only be two and a half (one doesn’t eat meat and isn’t big into wine so only counts as half) attendees. Regardless of the lack of preparation we have managed quite.  Continue reading »

Today is Good Friday, which traditionally is a day associated with fasting and sobriety, in commemoration of the death of Jesus Christ by crucifxion. Although a Church Holiday, in Ireland today has always been a source of confusion. This is largely due to the fact that in the past Church Holidays have often coincided with Bank Holidays.  Continue reading »

 Easter is early this year – we’ve hardly finished celebrating St. Patrick’s Day! In fact, Easter can only ever fall on one day earlier, and that hasn’t happened since 1818. The lastest day it can fall upon is April 24th, and that isn’t due to happen until 2038. In any case, it’s definitely March here with a forecast of a cold and blustery weekend.  Continue reading »

More on Marsanne?
From the wineaustralia website,
Tahbilk’s history with Marsanne can be traced back to the 1860s with the sourcing of White Hermitage cuttings from the St Hubert vineyard. The grape in fact was Marsanne and although none of these plantings have survived, Tahbilk still produces Marsanne from plantings dating back to 1927, some of the oldest in the world. Marsanne has immense individuality of flavour, good body and well worth trying if you want something different.  Continue reading »

So, it’s not a a Chardonnay. Rather, it’s made from the Aligoté grape which I’d never heard of before. It’s a native of Burgundy.

Smells like: an intense eucalyptus, toast and yeast – sounds strange but somehow combines well
Tastes like: apricot, peach with some aniseed, again working perfect together. A long finish and very distinctive.
Verdict: I was very impressed with this one, but the price means I’d probably not buy it.  Continue reading »

Back at eno again for a Chardonnay rematch, this time with four.
Previously, a Chablis from Hervé Azo faced off against the Delaire from Stellenbosch (along with one from California).
This time, I spotted the Chablis and the Delaire and thought a retaste would be a good idea to see if the wines or my taste had changed.  Continue reading »

We’re currently experiencing some technical difficulties so we had to revert back to an old theme, but don’t worry we’ll be back to the regular Chew on That you all know and love in no time!
In the meantime, scroll down for our regularly updated content. Thanks for bearing with us!  Continue reading »

Top Chef always finds the best of the best. Highlighting Chicago with some of its finest offerings this episode, we got to peer into the likes of Chicago’s own Green City Market, and the Lincoln Park Zoo.
Wylie Dufresne, owner of WD-50 and a highly renowned molecular gastronomist, guest judged both the quickfire and elimination challenges.
For the quickfire, chefs were brought to Green City market, a highly sustainable farmer’s market in downtown Chicago.  Continue reading »

Austria, Germany, France and Australia provide the latest Battle Royal fodder.
Weingut Bründlmayer Riesling Steinmassel, Langenlois, Austria (€22)

Schmells: Apricot, peach and orange marmalade
Schmeckt: A dry and intense bitter orange marmalade with an über-long finish
Das verdikt: Sehr, sehr gut

Neagle’s Rock, Clare Valley, Australia, 2006 (€14)
The first stage in tasting a wine is evaluating the appearance. This was cloudy, not clear, reason enough not to take it any further.  Continue reading »

Another Marks & Spencer wine that punches well above its weight and price level. This one’s a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Malbec and Cabernet Franc The first two are the standard Bordeaux grapes, the later traditionally blended in Bordeaux along with Carménère and Petit Verdot – grapes we don’t hear a lot about these days, but all six are often referred to as Bordeaux’s noble grapes.  Continue reading »

What is a hamantaschen, you ask? Aside from being a long, confusing-when-unfamiliar Hebrew word, it’s actually a triangular cookie filled with jelly.The word is haman-taschen which translates to “Haman’s pockets,” and Haman is the villain of the story of Purim: the Jewish holiday when we eat these cookies.
(more…).  Continue reading »

 
A celebratory dinner in my family rarely stretches beyond its boundaries of Wildfire, Cheesecake Factory or the like. But this time was different. This time we tried something new (well, I did anyway.)
It was my parents’ anniversary and my dad had always wanted to try a Brazilian steakhouse. You know…the glorious kind of place where they walk around with half-mutilated pieces of cow, lamb (or pig) and continually replenish your plate.  Continue reading »

You have all seen the video recipes on the web that are designed to be practical and for everyday use at home but I have been asked by a couple of people in the last month to share the food that I would cook for clients. Its been a while since I have written any menus and I must say it is something that I miss. I find it the most exciting part of being a chef, letting your imagination run wild and created dishes on paper that will be brought to life at a later stage.  Continue reading »

                                    
There seems to be a bit of a competition going on in the Italian foodie house at the moment as to who is the sickest, the princess is definitely winning in the moaning section followed closely by me and then a little bit behind surprisingly is Bru!!  Continue reading »

These are old photos of a cake I did for an 80’s birthday party. Not sure if the colours are right, but it’s all I had in the cupboard.
Its two madeira cakes on top of each other. they’re actually round ones cut into squares. A bit of a mad way of doing it I know, but I didn’t have the deep enough square tins. We got to eat the excess bits though.  Continue reading »

Tastes are constantly changing and evolving, things come into fashion and fall out of favour and then back into fashion again in a flash. There is clear evidence of this in clothes shops all over the country, currently sporting some strangly 80s style fashions.
Paul made reference to his days as a Sauvignon Blanc Tart and I must admit that I too was once a Sauvignon Blanc ‘tart’… SB is a.  Continue reading »

After my attempt at sugar roses, I invested in some rose petal and blossum cutters, and this is what I came up with:
They’re supposed to be daisies, but I think I need more practise!
The others are roses and rosebuds. The cutters were great for this, but they’re so fiddly to do! Even still, i couldn’t persuade everyone to eat them, they didn’t want to ruin them, but I ate mine.  Continue reading »

In what will surely be a major boon for the organic sector in Ireland, one of the countries’ largest farms has decided to begin the process of converting to organic. When conversion is complete, it will also be one of the biggest organic farms in Europe.
An Grianan, is a farm in a region of Donegal with the same name. Along with being massive, at almost 3,000 acres, it is also one of the most northerly farms in Ireland.  Continue reading »

I imagine lots of people will have an opinion on the new Delia smith series and fan or not, it certainly has raised an interesting debate on cookery. I can understand some people’s point of view that it isn’t using fresh ingredients, so you don’t know what you are eating and it won’t necessarily be free range or as good for you as cooking from scratch.  Continue reading »