Cooking Catchups...

Due to our Internet, which has this week deteriorated to being super slow and sporadic, blogs have been sparse. But now our connection seems to have recovered, a catchup from last week. We made pasta for the first time in the form of rustic tagliatelle. Some sheets of it being dried in the dining room....

This, contrary to appearances is not a clothes rack, but a remarkably similar device made specifically for drying large quantities of pasta. Puff pastry was also on the agenda...

.....a fairly interesting exercise to say the least. To begin with you bash out a whole packet of Kerrygold butter which then has to find its way into a relatively/shockingly small quantity of pastry. This is where the fun really starts....rolling 1lb of ever softening butter into an impossibly small amount of pastry with the aim of creating approximately 700 layers of golden, flaky deliciousness! Far too stressful to consider ever making again. However, mine is in the freezer awaiting cooking, and so when said golden, flaky, delicious pastry dish emerges in a few days time I might change my mind. Until then.... a new ingredient in the form of myrtle berries, that were served with a warm pheasant salad and parnsip crisps....



We also made tuna steaks one day, although not before being given a lecture on just what a enviromental/conservational no-no this fish is. The bluefin variety of tuna has now been fished to the point of extinction (see film 'End of the Line', which predicts that in less than 50 years overfishing could cause all fishing stocks to collapse). However as a cookery school they feel that they have to show us. The resulting plate of of grilled yellowfin tuna steak with tapenade, red pepper stew and curly green kale.....





Finally, some painstakingly hand made chocolate cases filled with tangerine mousse....

Somewhat extravagantly decorated to mask the fact that an 'on the generous side' teaspoon of gelatin resulted in the mousse setting way too quickly. It didn't have lumps in it, but it looked on the lumpy side, if that makes sense. It still tasted good! Honest! Oh yes, and following on from sourdough with the 'life's too short' note......segmenting tangerines, torturous!

The Finished Product

So, from a bowl of bubbly liquid dough, to a beautiful loaf, on Friday I finally finished it! After a final addition of flour, it went into this industrial sized mixer to knead....

Then after two risings, I shaped it into tins....

...and tentatively watched it in the oven as it turned into this.....

It was really delicious, but one could be forgiven for deciding life is in fact too short to spend 10 days making two loaves of bread! Tim and Rachel Allen did a demo together a few weeks ago (on sourdough, coincidentally) and they started talking about the embarassment of going on holiday with Darina. She refuses to eat any form of airport/aeroplane food and instead packs the most enormous picnics you've ever seen, then dishes them out to everyone on the plane! With Darina off this weekend to the UK for a slow food event, the sourdough was specially selected for her picnic, a happy ending to its life, I think!

Canapé Day

For the first time, Wednesday's demo was a family affair with the combined culinary might of both Darina and Rory out in force! Darina talked, Rory styled, and Pam/Emer did most of the work...but it worked, and kept us all highly amused for the morning. Some miniature delights....

Shepherd's Pie

Sesame and Anchovy Straws

Quails' Eggs




Thai Green Chicken Curry



Miniature Smoked Salmon Sandwiches





Spiced Indian Meatballs with Coriander and Pomegranate Raiita





Lamb Fillet


Smoked Salmon Wheels

We also had a sushi demonstration with a lady called Shermin, and a Japanese lady on our course, Satoko, both of whom made it look super easy. Plus, sushi doesn't necessarily equate raw fish, it refers exclusively to the special 'sushi' rice which must be cooked in a specific way with vinegar then cooled quickly before being moulded into sushi. Good to know! A picture of them 'fanning the rice'....

and some of the end product....

Finally, in danger of pictorial overload, theory day's biscuit of the week, yummy biscottis...

....and a very cute, very ripe little Rocamadour on the cheese board. Really quite tiny, just 2 inches in diameter...

The Shanagarry holiday village was lucky enough to have 4 beautiful Welsh girls staying for the weekend, although we were sadly bereft of one, the lovely Willo who tragically missed her flight due to all the flooding at home. Despite this set back the girls were promptly initiated into Irish life with a jaunt to the pub, where we sampled the local brew of choice here, Beamish (like Guinness, but stronger I think). There were also trips to several churches, more than several eateries and the odd bracing sea walk. We made our way along the cliffs down to where us Pink Cottage diehards went for a dip in the first few weeks we got here. Now, mid November, this previously peaceful little bay with glass-still water has been transformed into a frothy, swirling, incredibly unappealing swimming spot....

But with the sun shining, wind blowing and spray on our faces it was invigorating nonetheless! Some of us chose to enjoy the view from a distance....

Whilst others got a little closer, and a little wetter....

Back to the kitchens of Ballymaloe, and the second to last week of cooking! With Christmas trips to the southern hemisphere on the horizon I vowed to have a healthy week, plans meanly thwarted by being assigned sticky toffee pudding! Totally delicious, although the amount of butter, brown sugar,golden syrup, and castor sugar that goes into the hot toffee sauce alone is almost enough to put you off...

Almost.

On a more nutritious note, I also made curried parsnip soup and glazed some carrots to perfection, as well as managing unbeknown to colour co-ordinate them with my Le Creuset....

They have a nifty little way of doing carrots here although i think they might have borrowed it from France as its proper title is 'Carrots Vichy'....in which case I can tell you the recipe! You just take 450g carrots sliced at an angle (all the same thickness), a pinch of salt, a large pinch of sugar, 50g butter, 240 ml water all in a pot (colour coding optional). Then you cover and simmer them until all the liquid has been absorbed by the carrots/evaporated and you're magically left with a subtle sweet and buttery glaze. Although 'glazed' carrots can quickly turn to 'charred' carrots if your not keeping an eye out. Demonstration this afternoon with Rory had a distinctly Indian feel with currys, various accompaniments, lassis, poori bread, chapatis etc all being on the menu for tomorrow. We're also cooking squid for the first time, a sea creature that seemed to fascinate Rory, convinced as he is that the opened body sack with its scalloped shaped bottom it is the inspiration for Batman's cape and the tentacles for the design of the jester hat. They are also known as 'scribes of the sea', their transparent backbones being exactly the shape of a quill and their heads full of ink. Oh, and, aged 6 days old, the sourdough starter is bouncy, bubbly and full of life!

Sweet and Sour (Dough)

Meet my new pet......

Yesterday I began making the starter culture you need to make sourdough, which you have to feed every day for a week. Is like having a little pet underneath the workstation! Except instead of pedigree chum/whiskers she gets 50 delicious grams of plain white flour and 50 fl ozs of spring water. I will be quite sad to bake her. In other cookings, I made some little chocolate cases for petit fours and also a passion fruit mousse with strawberry coulis, seen at the forefront of this landscape of pretty pink desserts...

There was also a delicious dessert of yogurt and cardammon cream with rosewater and pomegranate which was the pinkest and prettiest of them all....a picture of Clara's....

Finally, kitchen 3's much appreciated mid morning snack, made by my own fair hand, warm brioche dipped in Valrona chocolate.....

Week 8

A blog to encompass the major events of a busy week/weekend! On Wednesday Darina's sister, the wonderfully named Blathnaid Bergin, came to talk to us about the setting up and running of businesses in the catering industry. Her approach to restaurants, as is to be expected, is to get them running as machines, completely unemotional, but it works. She (controversially) recommended a book called 'Behind the Golden Arches', by a man called John Love, who set up McDonalds! ...a semi-illegal word in Ballymaloe! Was on the whole a very interesting day, although just about enough to put anyone off ever running such a business! Especially in Ireland where rules and regulations seem to be suffocating a huge number of small businesses. Anyway, forward to Thursday and back to foodie offerings, my apricot and frangipine tart....

Thursday was also steak day, we learned how to cut our own steaks and, along with other accompaniments etc, how to make Bearnaise sauce. One of my absolute favourite things....

Although having made it and seen with my very own eyes the amount of butter that goes into it, the level of enjoyment was sadly not what it has been! Friday I made a pork, herb and spinach terrine...

Which was very delicious in spite of the very unappetizing pigs livers that went into it. It was also 'souffle day', and I excelled myself with this gasp inducing masterpiece...



It was much marvelled over in the kitchen, whilst it lasted anyway.....almost as soon as I cut into it to serve it just deflated :-( Before demo on Friday we were treated to another little musical diversion by two Belgian men called Roland and Stefan, friends of one of our teachers, Mike...

The older man plays guitar, the younger the harmonica and they both sing, were really great! We'd actually already seen them once before as on Wednesday night they had supported teacher Mike and his band at a gig The Grainstore at Ballymaloe House. Mike used to be in a band called Stockton's Wing, which was really big in Ireland back in the day, so about half our class went to cheer him on. One of his band mates, a guy called Tommy, was responsible for the setting up of the Irish seed saver's association, much esteemed by Darina. More importantly, he can play not only the bodhran (weird drum), but silver spoons and goat bones! Not together, separately, and brilliantly!! It was amazing. Friday night we then packed up for the weekend and headed out into the pouring rain to drive to Kilkenny. Despite torrential rain and several hilarious detours into some random parts of the Irish countryside, we finally made it to Cathy's beautiful house on the Mount Juliet golf course... apparently in the golf world it is pretty famous. With a raging river running by their backyard and a friendly Labrador I felt quite at home. Cathy's Dad enthusiastically embraced the occasion of having 6 in house cookery students, giving us a lecture on fine French Burgundys in his wine cellar and taking us all shopping for food on Saturday morning. We went to this fantastic country butchers where they slaughter, hang and butcher all their meat, including some of the cows from Cathy's farm. After some gentle persuasion from her Dad, these nice butchers gave us a behind the scenes tour!...

We saw the cold room, whole cows and pigs and all sorts hanging in this cavernous room! The photos don't really give the full measure (or the smell) of it, but I've never seen so much meat in my life....

In risk of going into too much detail, this is the little alley they take the cows down off the main street of Thomastown...

...and the girls walking tentatively into the slaughter bit....

After buying a huge rib of beef, lamb and chickens, we went back to get cooking! It was not a case of too many chefs spoiling the broth, but, unfortunately, an unco-operative Aga spoiling the yorkshire puddings! Other than that, it turned out to be pretty good. Sunday we went to Kilkenny, a really beautiful little medieval town, built around this castle which dates from the 13th century.....

In which we promptly located our favourite room, the KITCHEN!....


Then after warm roast chicken salad back at Cathy's, we headed home to the Pink Cottage for the weeks' traditional potato wedges and xfactor evening! Et voila, a week of foodie fun and Irish culture! Speaking of, I saw this bus outside Kilkenny castle, worthy of inclusion......

Ice Cream Ice Cream....

A busy day in the kitchen kicking off with some granary bread then Ballymaloe’s ‘very rich and very delicious’ egg mousse based ice cream. Whisked up yolks, then added a boiling sugar syrup, and some vanilla essence until it becomes a thick, white mousse. Finally a pint of softly whipped cream is folded in. The milk and cream from this morning's milking going through the seperator outside the kitchen....

Paired the ice cream with poached pears and chocolate sauce for ‘Poires Belle Helene’, which I was fully intending on taking a picture of, but it got eaten fairly quickly, camera forgotten in pocket. But I do have a picture of the still-delicious surplus we’re using for pear and frangipine tart on Thursday…



Was volunteered up by my teacher to do the pickled beetroot, which wasn’t the most exciting thing on the menu and resulted in a pair of pink hands for the day, but glad I did in the end…

Actually pretty good, and the pickle not as overpowering as I thought it'd be. The secret to pickling is apparently white wine vinegar, malt is a major no-no! Lastly, I've been meaning to take a picture of this romanesco broccoli for weeks, how clever is nature for creating such a beautiful, edible 'logarithmic spiral'?!

:-)