Cathy Fitzgibbon, aka the Culinary Celt, is a keen promoter of the best of local and seasonal Irish produce and foodstuffs. Today The Menu wishes to give a warm nod to a production of her own, a lovely book/workbook, Eat With the Seasons, which is designed to foster a more mindful and healthy relationship with food and eating, by tuning in to the natural rhythms of the growing seasons. Anyone struggling with emotional eating patterns will find it to be a canny little tool when it comes to reappraising and understanding better their relationships with food and eating. It is full of practical and meaningful ways to self-reflect and recognise personal eating patterns, allowing the reader to develop a more positive relationship with food.
theculinarycelt.com/product/eat-with-the-seasons-2/
Whenever The Menu goes up to the Big Smoke, he very often stays with a doughty comrade in Terenure whose home comes with the additional allure of being just around the corner from David Gallagher’s very splendid Green Man Wines, which The Menu reviewed in August. What began as a retail wine outlet has now evolved into one of The Menu’s most favourite places to put on the nosebag and fill his glass, all the more so since new chef Dan Smith came on board.
Dan has a penchant for hale and hearty fare, and there is no greater pleasure than simply getting up from the table at GMW to select a bottle from the retail shelves and, with a small and fair corkage, instead open it there and then for consumption on the premises with your meal. Gallagher also hosts regular wine dinners and the next should be well worth the trip, an evening of very special Portuguese wines of Luis Seabra (Sept 27).
greenmanwines.ie
The Menu doesn’t get overly bogged down in listing awards doled out in the world of food and hospitality for they are many and very varied, ranging from the select few with any real credibility to a staggering amount of bottom feeders simply in the business to hoover up shekels from unsuspecting hospitality practitioners.
The Menu, however, is more than prepared to take the Irish Bar of the Year awards at face value and that is based alone on the list of very fine winners in 2023, including many in Cork and Munster which would easily crop up on his own list of personal favourites.
In this Rugby World Cup season, Best Bar To Watch The Match Gold Winner went to the Woolshed Baa & Grill, in Cork, while The Montenotte Hotel picked up gold for Best Designed Bar. The Locke, in Limerick, got the People’s Choice Award, while The Shelbourne on MacCurtain St thoroughly deserved its gold for Whiskey Bar of the Year. However, it was their near neighbour, Paladar, just around the corner on Bridge St, that truly triumphed on the night, with the new cocktail bar picking up Best Newcomer and crowning that achievement with the overall prize of Bar of the Year.
baroftheyear.ie
One of The Menu’s most favourite venues in Dublin is Overends Kitchen, sited as it is in the splendid Airfield Estate, a 38-acre working farm and gardens in Dublin City, so the prospect of an autumn/winter supper club hosted by Gather & Gather in the same venue has him sliding around in a puddle of his own drool.
Each evening sees a guest chef showcase their menu in collaboration with the team from Overends Kitchen and Airfield Estate where much of the produce on each evening will be sourced, and the lineup for 2023 includes Jordan Bailey with Majken Bech-Bailey, Surya Davies with Isobel Farrelly, and Jess Murphy.
The Menu was extremely privileged to host the wonderful husband and wife pairing of Jordan Bailey and Majken Bech-Bailey at his Grub Circus extravaganza, at All Together Now, in Co Waterford this August.
The duo, most recently of Aimsir, where they earned the restaurant a staggering two Michelin stars within six months of opening, now operate their own hospitality and events consultancy, Bech-Bailey, and will stage a five-course feast menu for a special two-night residency (September 29 & 30) at Overends.
airfield.ie/overends-kitchen/
The Menu’s diet ebbs and flows with the seasons and a recent drop in the temperature has him once more dipping his toes into the hot bath of comfort that comes with more wintery fare.
So the fresh produce of his summer breakfast went by the wayside on an especially wild and blustery morning when he wrapped his paws around a big bowl-sized mug of café au lait and chomped on hot sourdough toast, dripping with melting butter and smeared with marmalade. An especially fine classic Seville Orange Marmalade, from JamShack, in Wicklow, was his choice; they do a very nice line of preserves. Set to perfection, still retaining a wobble on the spoon but never likely to split or run, and sublimely sugared someway south of excess so that bittersweet citric orange flavour combo dances divinely across the palate, this marmalade is perfection indeed!
facebook.com/jamshackpreserves/
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