Category Archives: Dublin Cookery School
Day Sixteen (or, sweeten up toots)
I’ve never had a massively sweet tooth. An incident involving me turning eight and a too-large slice of chocolate cake sent me spiralling into years of confusion at birthday parties where my eyes, heart and soul spilled over with desire … Read the rest of this entry
Day Thirteen (or, by the skin of your fish)
Do you eat the skin off your fish? The answer probably depends on what visual that question cues up for you. If the words ‘fish skin’ bring to mind a slithery, wobbly layer of grey chewiness insulated by another layer … Read the rest of this entry
Day Twelve (or, bathing with butter)
I started cycling to Blackrock this week, and home again. Which is just as well. Yesterday I ate not one bird for lunch but two (or at least two halves): roast breast of quail with confit legs, carmelised onion tatin … Read the rest of this entry
Day Eleven (or, the thinking man’s chef)
Ever wondered why your home-cooked steak never tastes quite like one ordered in your favourite steak restaurant?
Or why your grannie’s trick for perfectly poached eggs doesn’t seem to work anymore?
Or how certain restaurants know how to cook your poultry to a perfect temperature without having to stab it with a knife to see if the juices run clear? Read the rest of this entry
Day Ten (or, the craic with coconuts)
We had been in the Asian Market to pick up some last-minute ingredients for Friday’s feast of green papaya salad with griddled poussin; stir-fried mussels with chilli jam and Thai basil; stir-fried beef with cumin, onions and chillies; green curry of halibut with pea aubergines; and southern grilled prawn curry. It turns out that Thursday is the day the delivery arrives from Thailand, and so the best day to pick up fresh produce. Read the rest of this entry
Day Nine (or, one degree from melting)
We’ve been whipping up some mighty fine ice-creams these last two weeks at Dublin Cookery School. Yesterday’s apple and cinnamon ice-cream (served with apple cake and caramel sauce) was particularly delicious. Read the rest of this entry
Day Eight (or, don’t sweat the sauté)
I worked in a restaurant once and a very successful restaurant it became too. But in the opening months the head chef was a man who had clearly been trained in the kinds of restaurants where mayonnaise was not made from egg yolks slowly whisked with olive oil and mustard, but instead (a) came from catering vats so enormous you could happily use them as spare seating at a busy barbecue, and (b) was called salad cream. Read the rest of this entry
Day Seven (or, in defence of offal)
Supper tonight: Chicken liver patè loaded onto brown yeast bread which had been warmed under the grill and moistened with clarified butter, served with a dollop of Crossogue rhubarb relish and a salad of shaved fennel, apple and spring onion tossed in lemon juice and a pepper olive oil. Read the rest of this entry
Day Six (or, on the meatiness of monkfish)
“You came in this morning and handled me like a piece of meat,
You have to be a man to know how good that feels.”
A line that, it turns out, could easily have been spoken by a monkfish… Read the rest of this entry
Day Five (or, the solace of risotto)
I was fairly wiped on Day Five of the Cooking for Life course, having been exposed to so much during the week. I suspect it was no coincidence that risotto featured as our main course on the menu: this one was made as a basic recipe flavoured just with onion and garlic, and then with Jerusalem artichoke purée stirred through toward the end, Gabriel cheese grated in and a girolles vinaigrette spooned into each bowl. Just the food needed to reboot spirits on a Friday afternoon! Read the rest of this entry
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