Food Binge

England’s selectors are a mysterious bunch. In this age of democracy, accountability and transparency they remain a backroom cabal, whose deliberations can only be inferred from gossip, body language, rumour, and over-interpretation of pronouncements that a player is ‘in good nick for his county’, or is the ‘next cab off the rank’. Fans wait on [...]

It’s very nice of them to give away the best 100 recipes ever (or whatever), but it’s not much use in one long document. And I’m beyond paper, so I’ll use this space to list the recipes that catch my eye. One day I might even eat them.
2. Slow Roasted Tomatoes
Heat the oven to the [...]

For a long time I’ve avoided ratatouille for a number of reasons. Firstly, I was never sure how to spell it, and I don’t like to eat things I can’t spell – you could call me a lexivore. More importantly, I thought of it as a rather wet vegetable stew, a mushy, tomatoey concoction. Only [...]

A few years back England had the makings of a great side. Then it all went wrong.
There were injuries, selectorial confusion, and since then England have been unbalanced and weak. But I’m not talking about 2005, and the subsequent loss of Jones, Vaughan and Flintoff. I’m talking about the destruction of team of the summer [...]

We just had the best pizza in the world. It was the same old dough recipe. Just flour water, yeast and salt, made up into a dough and refrigerated for twenty four hours. The tomato sauce had no frills, tomato and garlic. Mozarella on top, plus a little left over goat’s cheese. And an unlikely [...]

An Hessen führt kein Weg vorbei!
Hessen: There’s no way around us! The slogan at Frankfurt airport, translated into the languages of the world and painted across the outside of the main terminal building, is defiant. This has consistently been one of Germany’s wealthiest and most productive regions. Aware that everybody would like to pass through, [...]

Cranes stand motionless over an abandoned building site. What was to have been a major branch of major international retailer is now a
monument to the brief period in which Limerick looked as if it might reach the promised land of consumerist modernity and leave behind a seeming eternity of poverty, social deprivation and urban decay. [...]

Cork’s not exactly a rough place, in my experience. Maybe I move in the wrong circles. None of my professor buddies get into fist fights and bleed all over the pavement. But clearly somebody does, because this isn’t the first time I’ve seen the telltale drops of claret leaving a trail down North Main Street, [...]

I was watching Grand Designs last night. Before the start of the project the featured couple owned two properties, and they mortgaged themselves up the ass to build a huge glass-walled mansion. The man suffered a heart attack, the housing market went south, and their dream of living mortgage free crashed on the rocks. The [...]