Recipes
This is my Grandmother's recipe for Soda Cake.
The only changes I have made to it in the last 50 years are to add Donal Creedons Macroom Oatmeal and cream of Tartar.
SODA BREAD
1000g Coarse Brown Flour(howards one way or odlums)
360g White Flour
25g Soda
25g Cream of Tartar
20g Salt
75g Macroom oat meal
1.5L Butter Milk
50ml Sour Cream
50ml Sunflower Oil
1 Egg
Roll in extra coarse flour, shape into a flat cake, cut a cross on top . Bake at 240C
Next Baking Course
Starting Date: 13 January 2010 at 6.30p.m.
4 nights over 4 weeks
Cost: €250 per person
For more details call 086 2513919
For booking E-mail to arbutus@iol.ie
Travelling
May 2008.
I got an invitation from Pierre Nury, a Mellieur Ouvrier De France award winner, to bake Irish bread at his “Fete de Pain” i.e. his bread festival, always held on the feast day
of the patron saint of bread. Pierre's bakery is in a magnificently restored building on the side of a hill in the tiny village of loubeyrat in the Auvergne.
My wife Patsy and I arrived late in the evening from the car ferry after a disastrous time with a car not 24 hours out of the garage.
Pierre sat us down to dinner in the back room of the bakery and started off by cutting chunks of bread off a huge loaf of his multiseed bread which he called his health loaf.
He then produced a superb leg of lamb roasted in his wood fired bread oven. This he served with a wonderful Crozes Hermitage, I was in heaven.
While Pierre got on with his preparations for the following day's Fete I explored the bakery and envied him his Artiflex mixer which makes wonderful dough but which is much slower than my spiral mixer.
After setting my alarm for 5a.m, I fell into a dreamless sleep. I woke in a panic at 5.30 having slept through my alarm and rushed up to the bakery to bake the bread.
The French bakers could not believe just how quickly the soda bread was made or just how coarse our Irish brown flour was, though they all admired Donal Creedon's wonderful roasted Macroom oatmeal.
By 8a.m the customers were queued up outside the door and from then till 12.30 the queue never diminished. Most of the customers were not familiar with our soda bread but all tasted and many vowed to come to Ireland to experience it again. Porter cakes made by Frances who has a stall in Midleton market got a great reception.
Local children were taught to make their own bread and it was then baked for them. The pride on their faces as each took their loaf from the oven was heart warming. To watch the loaves disappear from the shelves was an education as customers from all over the region flocked to partake of the best bread the area has to offer.
One lifetime memory for me was the hams Pierre had prepared for the day, something I had only read about in Elizabeth David's books. These were the famous Jambon au Foin or ham baked in hay. Pierre took whole cooked hams, skinned them, wrapped them in hay then in tinfoil and finally wrapped them in bread dough and baked them for 3 hours in the wood fired bread oven. We sat outside under the trees and gorged ourselves on this wonderful ham served with a gratin of potatoes also cooked in the bread oven.
One result of our visit will, I hope, be some extra visitors to Ireland, including I hope Pierre and his wife so we can return his hospitality.
============================================================
October 08.
TERRE MADRE AT SLOW FOOD IN TURIN .
Bord Bia invited me to help on their stand in the Salon di Gusto. They had shipped over to Italy 1 1/2 tonnes of my Granny Ryan's soda bread mix. This was a huge opportunity to showcase Irish food to Italian and international food lovers and we relished the chance to have thousands taste our produce.
I was thrilled with the very positive response to the soda bread. Lots of VIP's visited the stand, the Irish ambassador to Italy Sean O'hUiginn, , Brid Rogers, Ex Minister from Northern Ireland , Trevor Sargent, Minister of State among others.
Many well known Irish food personalities attended.
Darina Allen who told us where to find the most wonderful
chocolate and olive oil, Clodagh McKenna who entertained us, Monica Murphy and charcutier Frank Kravceck, Canice Sharkey, Rory O'Connell, Peter Ward who found the best places to eat.
Ceol agus craic was there in spades with Rupert Hugh Jones and friends entertaining the the thousands of visitors to the Irish stand.
The Slow Food festival at Turin is held every second year and is the biggest event of its type in the world. A not to be missed occasion for anyone with a an interest in food.
============================================================
November 08
AMSTERDAM WITH GOOD FOOD IRELAND
Good Food Ireland were commisioned by Failte Ireland to cater for their reception
============================================================
BOSTON WITH THE GREEN DRAGON
Good Food Ireland were commissioned to cater for the reception for v.i.p. of the media and travel trade in
Association with the arrival in Boston of the Volvo Round the World Yacht Race and also to provide a taste of Ireland to the
public visiting the sailing village. Ireland is joint sponsor of the Green Dragon yacht along with China, hence the
most appropriate name for the boat.
I arrived in on the Friday afternoon, we were staying at the superb Renaissance hotel in South Boston near Fan Pier
where the yachts were moored. Saturday morning straight into the superbly equipped kitchen of the hotel, where within a few hours
I had, thanks to Granny Ryan's mix sufficient soda bread baked to last two days. I was then able to do a little
backsliding and spend the rest of the weekend with my daughter Fiona and her family who live in Northampton Mass.
South Boston appeared to me to be in the midst of a huge urban renewal programme, all new apartments, offices and hotels
all spotlessly clean. Even the harbour seemed clear and clean.
The offshore racing day was supported by an enormous fleet of sightseeing boats, though at times it was difficult
to see what was happening as fog obscured the entire racing fleet. The following day the racing was in Boston
harbour and was competed in very strong winds which made for a wonderful spectacle for onlookers.
The only disappointment was that there was practically no media coverage of the event. I looked in vain for
any mention on any television channel or any mention in the newspapers, I got the impression that Boston was
ashamed of the event, such a contrast with the tumultuous reception they received in Galway. Ireland's reputation
as the best people to party was confirmed again.
But our Reception from the public makes me hope that our efforts on behalf of Irish tourism will, once again
not be in vain.
============================================================
JANUARY 2009
NORWAY WITH GOOD FOOD IRELAND
A big team of G.F,I. members flew to Oslo for a travel convention near Oslo. The team consisted of the ever urbane Maurice Keller,Peter Ward who has such enthusiasm that we are all in the shade, my neighbour and friend, Kay Harte from the Farmgate Cafe in the English Market and Eamonn and Mary Gleeson from Roscommon.
Our first function was to cater a dinner hosted by the Irish ambassador for the travel trade v.i.p.s of Oslo. This we did in the hugely impressive Shipowners Club at the top of an big building overlooking the harbour. We got great hospitality from the kitchen brigade who made us feel quite at home.
I baked all the soda bread for three days looking out over an ice filled harbour whilst beside me one of the club chefs struggled with the biggest cod I hace ever seen. The dinner was announced in Irish and English by Peter Ward, who astonished our guests with his eloquence, all without notes. The main dish was roast fillet of beef with an Irish Whiskey sauce which went down a treat.
A delicous apple crumble followed an amazing selection of Irish farmhouse cheeses. Maurice gave a stirring rendition of The Fields of Athenry to tremendous applause. I was very flattered by the number of people who came into the kitchen afterwards begging for Soda Bread to take home, another potential export market!
Overall impression of Oslo is of a very quiet, well behaved, and hospitable people much quieter than the Irish. A visit to an Irish pub yielded quite a surprise when the first man I talked to was from Mayfield where my bakery is located.
Baking Courses
We run a baking courses on a regular basis.
If you are interested please phone or e-mail to us.