You may have noticed that The Glutton’s Kitchen has a new fancy header – a brilliant paper cut artwork made by the very lovely and super talented Jane Steger-Lewis of www.ilovemayo.com.  In addition to amazing paintings of her roosters, Jane produces a  Love Ireland range of gorgeous contemporary prints inspired by Irish blessings and culture which I am huge fan of.  I particularly love this big bright quirky print, which looks fab in a white frame and is guaranteed to bring out the Mrs Doyle in anyone. To celebrate my brilliant new blog header I am giving one of Jane’s Aw Go On prints to one of you lovely readers. To enter simply leave a comment below. Post to Irish or UK addresses only. Closing date Friday 27th January 2012. Winner will be selected by random number generator thingy.

UPDATE!!!!!  So sorry for the delay in finalising this comp.  Using random.org the winner is 3!!  

There are magical goings on in the blogosphere at the moment thanks to the rather wonderful Fairy Hobmother – an emissary of Appliances Online, retailers of all manner of kitchen appliances and white goods – who flutters around the internet granting wishes throughout the whole of blog-land.  Imagine what a great job that must be?!

I had seen the Fairy Hobmother visit a some of my favourite blogs, like English Mum and Cake in the Country and much to my excitement I recently received a visit of my own after I had left a comment over on Dinner du Jour’s fantastic blog.  I wished for a camera tripod and some baking tins and low and behold the Fairy Hobmother very kindly bestowed upon me a voucher for Amazon, which I duly used to purchase a camera bag and some loose bottom individual tart tins – thank you Fairy Hobmother, your visit really did make my day!

And that’s not all… the Fairy Hobmother tells me that anyone who makes a wish by posting it in a comment below may get a visit of their own just like I did.  So tell me what you would like if a little fairy dust was sprinkled your way?

I first became aware of Mark Hix in 2007 when he appeared on season two of The Great British Menu.  He stood out to me as he seemed so quietly confident in the simplicity of his food whilst some of his competitors faffed furiously with elaborate creations – he was obviously very passionate about using superb local produce and happy to let it speak for itself.  Mark won his round with a rather fantastic, and most delightful sounding, Rabbit and Crayfish Stargazy Pie – well how could a pie with a name like that fail to impress? [Read more…]

I was most pleased to receive the excellent Bridgestone Guides to 100 Best Restaurants and 100 Best Places to Stay in Ireland for 2011.  I am looking forward to having a nice hot bath this evening and a good look through – especially the Best Places to Stay as I would really like to get in a weekend away (or two) this year. I am delighted to see Knockranny House Hotel representing Mayo in both Guides, in fact KHH is Mayo’s only entry in the restaurant guide.  These comprehensive county-by-county guides are invaluable for anyone who wants to try out somewhere new or take a break here at home in Ireland.

This week also saw the launch of Eat Magazine, a new free Irish monthly publication containing lots of food and drink news, reviews, features and guides – I particularly like the Food Stuff gadget/ingredient news section.  I understand from Mikey Maguire, the man behind Eat, that the magazine will be distributed in the Dublin region but it is available nationwide online and the first edition features an excellent pull-out Dublin restaurant guide and what’s more iPhone and iPad apps are due to launch in February.

Firstly I must apologise for the lack of posts lately – I had great intentions for December but then the untimely demise of my camera coupled with year-end preparations got the better of me.  I hope you all had a wonderful break and 2011 brings you peace and happiness.

In October last year the fabulous English Mum put together a very lovely Around the web in 20 clicks – in praise of bloggers post setting out some of the blogs she likes to read.  The baton was swiftly passed to Tara at Sticky Fingers and then on to Like Mam Used To Bake.  Seeing as it is the start of a new year I thought that this might be a good time to pick up the baton and put together my own ‘top 20’ list of blogs that I like to read – and here it is. [Read more…]

When I worked in Dublin I considered myself quite lucky to be located a quick stroll away from Itsa Bagel as it was one of my favourite places to pick up lunch.  Apart from their very tasty bagels they always had at least two tasty and wholesome soups on offer (the lentil and vegetable appears to be one of their best sellers) and a really lovely selection of salads such as chickpea, pumpkin and feta, a very moreish couscous and my most favourite of all, a robust Caesar salad with chunky toasted bagel croutons, lashings of parmesan and  dressed in the nicest, creamiest Caesar dressing I have ever tasted (which is probably due to the fact that it contains no anchovies!).   So when the very kind people at Gill & Macmillan sent me a copy of the new Itsa Cookbook I was delighted to finally get my hands on that Caesar dressing recipe, which I have since made to accompany some lovely pollack goujons and chips and it was just as delicious as I remember.  [Read more…]