In a brief burst of beautiful wintry sunshine, I managed to capture this.
For all sorts of complicated (and uncomplicated) reasons we didn’t get to spend much time with family this past Christmas. This weekend we got to make up for that.
My brother and his family came to stay, so we had plenty of time to chat and catch up.
The nephew (13) has moved on to secondary school since we last got together, so we heard all about his favourite subjects – history, latin, maths, debating…. he’s a brainy one!
And the 2 nieces, 8 and 9 years old, have also had a term at their new school. They’ve been embracing all kinds of extra curricular activity! It all sounds pretty exhausting really! There’s ballroom dancing, gymnastics, horse-riding, gaa, hockey….. I bet their Mum is exhausted too!
A prepared a terrific dinner – starter of beetroot mouse with an orange and fennel dressing.
The main course a whole Rib of Beef on the bone done according to James Martins’ recipe from the Christmas edition of BBC Good Food Magazine.
It is always a joy to cook and serve food to people who enjoy it, but is particularly so to see children tuck in – and give you their thoughts on each item!
They loved the beetroot….. and I think the requests for second helpings was a big ‘thumbs up’ to the beef too! (And special thanks to Ray at Free Range Meats for a really, really gorgeous piece of beef)
There was lots of time over dinner and wine for the grown ups to catch up too!
Being ‘townies’ the girls love helping me with the hens and ducks – feeding and collecting eggs. We did the outside jobs while their Dad and A prepared breakfast…. but we were back in in time for the girls to be mesmerised watching A actually making sausages!
Whenever they stay over, we usually spend Sunday morning baking… but this time round the nephew decided he wanted to make soup! Part of his homework for the weekend was to make soup and smoothies – don’t you just have to love a school that sends 13 year old boys home to cook over the weekend!
And fair play to him, he went through recipe books and checked what we had available…. and made the most delicious Pea Soup. He even combined a bit of improvisation as we had no lettuce but we did have rocket and watercress!
He was rather disappointed with how the swirling of the cream didn’t quite work…. but I think he did an excellent job – not bad at all, eh?
Posted in Home | Tagged BBC Good Food, Beetroot Mousse, James Martin, Pea Soup, Rib of Beef | 6 Comments »
Spring has definitely sprung! My favourite flowers…
It is so nice to see these coming up… having spent hours on my hands and knees planting them the first year we moved here to Redwood! 
Posted in Friday Photo | Tagged snowdrops, snowdrops in redwood | 2 Comments »
or should I more accurately describe it in Twitter language – as what a Tweek?
Without going into the injuries and ailments that befell various members of the household, this was some week of activity!
I’ve often reported on how we use Twitter and Facebook to promote the business… but this week social media really proved itself!
It all started on Tuesday when we took Lucy off to the abattoir. When I wrote my blog post on Wednesday about the episode, the response on Twitter and Facebook was phenomenal. Over 500 people across the world read the post in 24 hours, and so many commented too.
Thank you to everyone for your support and encouragement.
And it was lovely to be able to report a ‘result’ after our complaints had been heard and listened to by the company in question.
It is good to know that we, the little people, can still influence!
And it was also wonderful to get such nice comments from people about how we raise our pigs. Thank you!
Then I am not sure whether it was on Thursday or Friday, I spotted a conversation on Twitter about the perfect poached egg. Of course, I had to get involved! There were a lot of people tweeting away on the subject.
The thing was – Heston Blumental was demonstrating how to cook the perfect poached egg. I had to follow up… so I read his instructions. Oh my goodness what a palaver (don’t you love that word?)… there was straining the egg, thermometers, plates in pots, slotted spoons, ramekins…. all sorts involved!
I will freely admit that up to about 18 months ago…. I never poached eggs…. I had a gadget that you popped your eggs into and then put that into a saucepan but the gadget was a nightmare to clean so I gave up using it.
A liked to poach eggs. He used to do them with the swirling water and the vinegar. I never could master this trick. And, anyway, felt there was a taste of vinegar from the eggs.
Then Chef John Whelan came to visit. And changed my life!
John gave me the simplest instructions and the ‘secret’ to making perfect poached eggs every time!
And I am going to share the ‘secret’ with you. The ‘secret’ comes in two parts – the freshest of eggs and the littlest amount of water. There you have it! No fuss, no nonsense, no special equipment.
I use a 3 inch deep frying pan that I have. Fill it with water up to approximately 1 to 1.5 inches. Bring to boil. Break your egg straight in and cook for 3 minutes for a runny egg – longer if you prefer your egg more solid.
That’s it.
And what could be nicer with a poached egg but a nice piece of Oldfarm bacon?
Go on, give it a try – you will never look back!
Posted in All things food | Tagged Chef John Whelan, Heston Blumental, Oldfarm BLT, poached egg, poached eggs | 12 Comments »
Looking forward to tucking into this little beaut one of the days! Just discovered it earlier in the week!
Just goes to show just how mild the winter has been here in Redwood!
Posted in Friday Photo | Tagged Globe Artichoke, redwood | 4 Comments »
Is there such a thing as a good death?
I know a dismal question to be asking at the start of the new year, but after our experience yesterday I think it is an important one.
Yesterday, we had determined to take our oldest sow to the abattoir. She has been with us for over 5 years and has had a really good life here in Redwood.
We know we treat all our animals – both domestic and farm – well. (Sometimes I wonder if we treat them too well – especially when you are trying to tempt them into a trailer with a bucket of food and they are ignoring you cos they just aren’t hungry!)
So yesterday Lucy was loaded onto the trailer. As she was older and much, much bigger than our normal delivery, our local small abattoir could not take her. (We later learnt that she weighed 280 kgs!)
We don’t like to send the pigs on a long arduous journey in a trailer so thought we were doing her a favour by taking her on a short trip to Roscrea. How wrong we were!!
Alfie arrived at the factory, and was told that he had to go to a ‘special’ area as he was delivering a sow and they (sows) don’t go into the main area. We weren’t told this on the phone when booking. He was, however, in the main delivery area long enough to witness a dead pig in the yard being carted into the butchery area on a forklift. And worse still a semi-alive/semi-dead pig lying in a bin in the yard. He also saw factory staff washing out a double height trailer – with the pigs still in it. They started hosing at the top level, washing all the effluent down on top of the pigs on the lower level.
These were factory reared pigs – so they had had a horrible life, and were now being treated equally badly in death.
Alfie left and went to the ‘special’ area – which was basically a 20 ft open topped trailer – where farmers were backing up their trailers and offloading sows.
The trailer was already full of sows (obviously from differing herds which causes its own difficulties), and who it appeared had been in this trailer for a number of days – they were lying 2 deep in their own excrement and had no access to water.
This did not stop people from beating pigs into the trailer with wheel braces.
Bear in mind there was no more room in the trailer, in fact the trailer was already overloaded.
So what was now happening was that the new sows were walking in on top of those already on board.
All pigs were stressed and shocked and some were wounded.
How long they were going to be in this trailer for we do not know.
We cannot say that the factory were outwardly condoning this, but they were not supervising the offloading, trying to stop the behaviour or providing a second trailer.
We know there are strict Department of Agriculture guidelines – but why were they not being applied in this instance.
We have contacted both the ISPCA and the Department of Agriculture to report this appalling treatment of animals.
And another thought for everyone out there. These pigs were very very stressed which of course does effect the meat and not in a good way – this is what goes out into the food chain!
Beware where you buy your pork from!
Lucy came home and went to a more humane place. She had a good life and a good death.
An Update:
I am delighted to report that late yesterday evening we had a call from a senior representative of the company who asked to come and talk to us about what had happened.
Early this morning 2 representatives called and have been here for the past couple of hours. They have assured us that changes have been put in place already. They explained the reasoning – EU regulations – for some of what Alfie witnessed. The sows cannot be offloaded to existing holding pens within the factory area – hence the offloading directly onto a holding trailer outside the factory perimeter.
The good news is that
- The hosing down of the trailers with pigs on board, as described above, has been stopped with immediate effect.
- There will be a company representative supervising the loading of sows and more trailers will be provided.
- And they are looking at an alternative way whereby the sows from each herd can be segregated within the trailers.
So, overall a good result.
It is particularly good, don’t you think, that a company reacts and deals with a complaint openly and honestly. Well done to them.
Posted in Pigs | Tagged abattoir, Department of Agriculture guidelines, good death | 49 Comments »
Between Christmas and New Year – that time of year when we all make resolutions of some sort or other – we managed to get out for a couple of walks. Despite the best efforts of the weather to spoil the opportunities!
We are lucky here in Redwood to have some lovely walks within a short distance from us, and one of my favourite winter places is Lough Boora Parklands. It is a stark, bleak place which is especially beautiful on a cold, crisp, winters day.
However the day we visited recently it rained. What’s new? But the rain did ease very very slightly for some of the photos. (It really is a challenge to take photographs when all about you is GREY!)
Lough Boora Parklands are managed by Bord na Mona who for years harvested the peat, but now are trying to give the area a new lease of life.
Can you imagine how busy this place must have been at one point?
There is an amazing diversity of birds to be seen in the area – and some wonderful bird watching stations.
This guy was very very curious…. and followed me all along the way looking for food!
Once when we were there we were also amazed and mesmerized watching people with their model airplanes – now that’s a hobby I think I’d love!
But what Lough Boora really excels at are the sculptures! I think it is every second year an artist from somewhere around the world is invited to come and create. The only stipulation is that they use materials that are available within the area and reflect its history. Over the years there have been some terrific pieces created from stone, old railway sleepers and even the old rails themselves.
The Sky Train is my favourite – there is something really surreal about it, isn’t there? I am sure this is not the correct name – but the ‘triangles’ are wonderful too – especially when the light is right and the sun catches them.
I was disappointed to note that the Willow Sculpture which is only a few years old has been allowed to deteriorate so much – it was built almost like a willow maze and was a beautiful piece.
But don’t let that deter you – if you are in the area stop by, it is a really wonderful place to walk and enjoy the peace and quiet – the noisiest thing there are the birds!
What’s your favourite spot of all to enjoy peace and quiet?
Posted in Home | Tagged Bord na Mona, Lough Boora, redwood, Sculpture in the Parklands | 4 Comments »
This came about as a result of using up left-overs! And it tasted just as good as it looks
The filling was a mix of cream and left over frosted icing from the Frosted Yogurt Orange Cake – yum!
Posted in All things food, Friday Photo | Tagged Pavlova with orange | Leave a Comment »
Another year over, and we are another year older and wiser? Well the latter two are definitely questionable!
2011 was a year of mixed fortunes. There were some lows (very lows) but these overall were outweighed by the highs.
Some highlights for us here in Redwood were…..
I was lucky enough to be invited to lunch in Chapter One – totally memorable and enjoyable! We both got to have lunch in Cava in Galway – I am still trying to replicate the Sweet Potato and Chorizo soup – it was so so delicious.
There were many blogger meet ups – but I guess the outstanding one was the Inishfood trip in March! Looking forward to what the team at Harry’s have in store for Inishfood 2012 – not to be missed.
It is always such a pleasure to meet up with food bloggers – there is lots of chat (about food, of course), lots of photographing (again, of food!) and lots and lots of eating of wonderful food. Some other meet ups this past year was a trip to Dublin to eat totally Danish food cooked in her home by Joanna of Smorgasblog, a Mexican cookery demonstration by Lily (again in her home) from A Mexican Cook in Ireland. And we even had some bloggers come here on visits too!
We have also made so many new friends through the world of blogging! It is so good to meet such nice people.
Major ‘thank yous’ go to so many food bloggers and journalists who gave us such wonderful coverage in various media throughout 2011. I even got to go on TV for the first time ever. (I am not counting my briefest appearance on The Restaurant as a TV appearance!)
This year was the year when I finally succumbed to having a polytunnel installed. I was sceptical… but we have had an amazing array of vegetables this year…. and best of all tons and tons of our own tomatoes! The joy! And the even greater joy of home-grown sweet corn – so incredibly delicious!
We had some wonderful visits from friends and family throughout the year…. many of whom got stuck in to helping out with the many projects that need doing around the place… you know who you are – thank you!
Personal stand-out moments from 2011 – I volunteered with Age Action Ireland and had lots of fun teaching computer skills to some wonderful people. I finally also got to take a photography class! Still a lot of work to do in that area! I mastered the art of making cappuccino truffles thanks to Gillian from Chocolate Here – they were very very successful Christmas presents to friends and family.
And, yes, we finally got our diningroom finished – just in time for Christmas (the joys of an old house!)
And plans for 2012…….
well,
the usual ones of course – be thinner, healthier, wiser, happier!
Also, I would like to continue with my photography classes… and sort through the thousands of photographs I have taken!
We hope to welcome many more bloggers here – schemes and plans are afoot already!
Happy New Year to you…. and thank you so much for stopping by and reading and commenting! It has been fun to meet (even virtually)!
Posted in Home | Tagged reflections on 2011 | 5 Comments »
A few images from our quiet Christmas here in Redwood. We haven’t been up to a whole lot. Got to do quite a few crosswords, eat good food, enjoy the company of friends and generally just relax. Hope your Christmas was as good!
Posted in Friday Photo | Tagged Christmas 2011, crosswords, quiet christmas | 1 Comment »
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