12 weeks in Ireland

Day 65

2007-04-06T21:27:00.000Z

You'll probably be expecting me to tell you stories about the exam now. Well I can't. Because really annoyingly I was very very very sick on Thursday/Friday morning. More sick than I'd ever been before in fact. Now it was definitely food poisoning, but from where I've no idea (I didn't actually eat any of the food that I'd cooked).

So anyway, I didn't make it in for the exam. There was a final dinner too for all the students. And with my delicate tummy, i didn't fancy going for a rich meal. BUt I did manage to meet my fellow students in the pub later that evening, just to say goodbye (mineral water all the way). That was nice.

I have to go back n a few weeks and do the exam then, so I'm not getting away with anything.

I don't know what to say now, except I've just had the best 12 weeks of my life. Not once was I bored and thinking this wasn't for me. I won't be able to look at food in the same way ever again. For those of you that I'll be meeting up with over the next few weeks, I apologise in advance for boring you with my food stories.

I hope that I've inspired people to come and do something similar, I've been in London for about 10 years and this was just the break I needed and has totally re-ignited the passion inside of me.

But most importantly of all I have to thank Therese for putting up with me for the past 3 months. She's a legend and they'll be singing songs about her in years to come.
Thanks Tiny. x x x

Day 63

2007-03-31T14:26:00.000Z

So it came. You could feel the tension in the air. Actually i wasn't like that at all. It was quite a laugh. It was good to actually do the final meal and put all we'd learned in to practice.

I shan't boe you with all the details, but it could have gone a little bit better, the prok that they gave me wasn't really the best cut at all, it was very very fatty. But hey that's not my fault. Blame the pig.

I thought of making a surprise edition to the meal though, an Irish Coffee. I'd never actually made one of these before. But I'd seen Therese making them hundreds of times before so I thought I'd give it a go. I spoke the Rachel at the end after the 3 judges had tasted my food, she said my scallops were delicious, and thanks for the coffee :)

So off it was to go home and revise for the exam on Friday.

See you in 2 days.

Day 61

2007-03-31T14:23:00.000Z

Penultimate day. And today really was a doss. I was making a Tagine of Chicken. And I have to be honest and say it was disgusting. Not because of the my cooking mind. It was just a really disgusting recipe. The colour of the thing can only be described as a watery green. The chicken, because it's hardly browned initially, looked aneamic. Not nice.

Here's some more pictures.

In my mind, I looked like James Bond, but with a Pollock instead of a PPK. I was obvously very wrong.

Me and Gillian my last partner, she's lovely.

An action shot

Day 60 - Week 12

2007-03-31T14:14:00.000Z

That's it. The last week. Only 2 days of cooking (not including the practical). And the sun really is shining. It's making it so hard to want to leave this place. When I think back to January 8th when I started, getting in to the car when it was still pitch black outside. Now the sun is pouring through. And being in the country next to the beach just makes it all the much better.

Basically I'm cooking on Monday/Tuesday. I have my practical exam on Wednesday (8:30am) and then Thursday off, while the other students do their practical. And then 4 hours of exams on Friday, followed by a leaving dinner at the restaurant on friday.

In preperation of the exam though, because sometimes I do prepare, I made my meal for Therese parents and a friend of theirs. And I have to say it was delicious. It couldn't have gone better. Things were looking good.

Day 54 - 55

2007-03-31T14:11:00.000Z

We got the exam results back today. I got a respectable 75%. It should have been better, but then if you only do 10 minutes revising. What do you expect? There's a lesson in there somewhere that I'm sure I'll learn one day.

Like I mentioned before, the pressure has been right off us now, and we're all just enjoying ourselves a lot more. So i'll let this week run out with some more pictures.

This is Yoko, she's cool.

Two of the teacher, Rose and Emma.

Day 53

2007-03-31T14:04:00.000Z

Okay obviously I'm writing all this in the future from this date, i've actually finished the course now and it's 3:05pm on 31st March, but i'm interupting this to say that Bobby Zamora has just scored for the Hammers. Can we stay up???? I hope so.

So the exam came and went, it wasn't too bad actually, started of being ridiculously easy. Got harder, then got easier. It was a multiple choice out of 100. The only real question that I had specific trouble on was "Peter Dontknowsurname said in his talk on french wine......." This was the lecture that I left and went to sleep in the car on. So I was pretty annoyed with that. It was a nice sleep though.

The rest of the day was filled with a lecture on cake decorating and something I really can't remember now. I do remember it was really interesting though.

Day 52

2007-03-31T13:53:00.000Z

Back to Skool. All though there's less than two weeks left, we've only got 4 days cooking left. The rest is made up of exams and lectures. So there's really an air of "we've finished the course now". And to all intents and purposes we have. There's not a great deal left that they can teach us. It's just all practising what we've learnt from here on.

The work in the kitchens is far more relaaxed now, loads of banter going on, people making scones when they feel like it. It's a shame really, it's starting to really hit home that it's actually ending. What at first seemed would never end. Really is.

It's our first exam tomorrow. A 1 hour multiple choice on wine. So you'd think the obvious thihng to do would be to revise all night. And I really wanted o. I sat down with all my notes and books ready to read through them. But just couldn't get into it. So i had a quick blast on Dr Kawashima's Brain training to kick the old fizz-ogg in to gear. Bad move. Turns out I know have a brain age of 60. I used to be 28. Not the boost i wanted.

And then I turned on the telly, and there was a really good documentary on the Pacific Archipelago. It went on for near 3 hours. It was fascininating and I learnt a lot. So realising that perhaps I'd not used my time to the best of my advantage, i quickly crammed in the noble grapes and what regions they come from and a certain fact like what sulpher dioxide is used for in wines etc etc.

Then I slept.

Day 51 - Week 11

2007-03-31T13:49:00.000Z

It was St Patricks day this weekend. I thankfully managed to avoid it all. I saw a bit of it on telly that evening, and basically they have a pareade in every town, very much like Notting Hill carnival, and anyone who's ever been to that will know that it's something to be avoided (you only go once). Followed by a lot of drinking. Kind of like most friday/saturday nghts then. I'll never understand these kind of drinking 'holidays'. Anyway, because it was paddys day, we had monday off.

Day 49

2007-03-15T21:38:00.000Z

Today was a very important day for everyone. It was the day that we had to submit our choices for our final menu. To be honest I'm pretty proud of it and think it's going to be a winner. But do let me know what you think!

The rules are simple. I've got 3 hours to make and serve this up. We're also given a random bread to make in that time. We're allowed 15 mins extra, but for every 5 mins after we're late, we lose 1%. I'm not worried about it in the slightest.

By the way, from what I've been told, only 20 out of the 55 people on the course tuned up yesterday.

Day 48

2007-03-15T20:33:00.000Z

I didn't make it in today. It was the staff and student party last night.

So here's some pictures of a bunch of drunk people you don't know.

Day 47

2007-03-15T20:32:00.003Z

I got caught in traffic today. A donkey was in the middle of the road. That's something I'll probably not see in London.

Day 41 to 45- Week 9

2007-03-05T19:30:00.000Z

I didn't manage to fill this week due to both
a) being busy
b) being lazy.

Highlights included the car breaking down and me missing a morning.

As a special treat though, and by way of an apology, I'll leave you with this little image, that I'm calling "Before and After". <<< Click that

Day 40

2007-03-03T14:59:00.000Z

What an absolutely fantastic day today was. Back in the kitchen for starters. I love the smell of chicken stock in the morning.^*

Unsheathing my knives ready for the day ahead, I pressed on making my Horseradish mayonaisse for my Filet of Beef Salad with French Fried Onion Rings. I'm strangely attracted to making Mayo now. I seem to have picked up that little technique really well, and where some people can't stand it, or use a food processor. I'll happily get the whisk and bowl out and whisk away.

Can't say the same about Hollandaise. I had made this twice before, and only once had this come out sucessfully, and then it was under heavy teacher guidance. He who dares wins though, and off I set whisking the butter in, and hey presto! Messed it up again. But none the less, I dusted myself down, and set to it again with another load of eggs and butter. With a tasty little tip from my teacher, I pressed on. And you kind of know from an early stage whether something is going right, and this did. From beginning to end it went well. No longer am I standing in the valley of death.

That wasn't the exciting stuff obviously though. The good news was that I 'd put myself down to work in the Ballymaloe House Restaurant that evening. Now it had been a long time since I'd worked in a commercial restaurant, from the days in Pizza Land (RIP) and on Burgh Island. As soon as I walked in there, it felt great though, the noise of pans banging, people hurridly peeling carrots in prepartaion for service.

So in I stepped. And after the inital rush, I realised I looked like a complete tool. There's me in my baseball cap and apron, both emblazoned with "Ballymaloe Cookery School" beaming smile "Hi I'm here to help you tonight". If I was them, I'd have sent me down the shop to buy some tartan paint. After standing around waiting for someone to giv eme something to do, I stepped in and begged for them to let me prepare the scallops, and they let me. Perhaps in my naievity, I was quite chuffed, as Scallops aren't cheap as you well know, so I really didn't want to wipe out their profits by screwing this up. Obviously it's impossible to screw it up. But i'll take a win wherever I can find one thanks very much. To cut a long story short, peeling potoes, making cheese croquettes and mayo eggs followed.

Certainly the highlight of the evening for me though was the tongue. I watched as one of the chefs showed me how to prepare a cows tongue. I've never been so grossed and engrossed at the same time before. I mean this thing is weird. Until you've got one in your hand you'll never know what I mean. Amazingly cheap (4 euros). And apparently taste like corned beef. I'm going to make it one day.

^*A very poor Apocalypse Now referenece

Day 39

2007-03-01T20:00:00.000Z

I didn't go in today. My jaw was in pain still, although I could close it more, I wasn't really up for it. I'm going in tomorrow.

There was good news though, Therese passed her ADR, which lets her drive chemicals around. Next up is her license to drive explosives and nuclear weapons. Seriously.

Day 38

2007-03-01T19:45:00.000Z

Well as excting as yesterday wasn't. Today had adventure all the way.

We were off on our school trip! Alas it was a 6am start for me, and I wasn't really in to that at all. But like mummy's little soldier, I still got up and stumbled in to the car to meet the others at the school for 7.30 for the 2 hour drive to watch some cheese being made.

I'm pretty ashamed at what happened next. I really am. So I'm driving along the N25 listening to the radio (they've played Footloose a lot recently) and I'm thinking "Do I really want to spend 4 hours in a coach today?". The answer was no so I turned the car around and went back to sleep. I'm going to see cheese being made one weekend soon anyway.

But all was not lost for the day, I knew they were going to see a guy called Frank Hederman, an artisan smoker of fish. And that was at 2pm and only about 30mins drive away, so I caught up with them then. And glad I was too. This guy has a very small operation, just 1 shed as his smoker. Personality the size of a house though. This guy was a real life Willy Wonker. Amazing. As a little plug, you can buy his stuff in Selfridges. I can recommend it. The smoked salmon was stunning. Apparently the smoked mussels are better.

So that brought me up to about 3:30. And I followed the rest of the school to the Market in Cork and had a little look around with them, picked up a couple of presents for Therese, as she passed her driving test today, and headed back of home. Just as I was giving her the presents. OUCH!. I'm doubled up on the floor screaming in agony holding my jaw. A few minutes later, once I can feel through the pain, I realise that I can't close my jaw anymore. There's about a 5mm gap between closing. And then, one of the dogs, Maggie, decides to say hello by scratching her paw in my eye. Talk about kicking a man when he's down.

I wasn't particularly happy now. Eating a sandwich later was pretty much impossible. My eye was red and watering. My jaw hurting and not closing still. I went to be. Was this because I didn't go to watch the cheese? Karma.

Day 37

2007-03-01T19:34:00.000Z

It was very much an Italian day today. Loads of tomatoe sauces, pasta, lasagne and such like were being made. I was down to make Tira Misu (or Tiramisu if you prefer) and Pasta, another pretty easy day, the only annoying thing was the creaming of the Mascarpone in to the egg mixture (picture that!), swiftly followed by the whicking of the egg whites. My arms were sore.

Again I was done pretty quickly so I helped other people out and made a couple of loafs of bread.

Not an exciting day at all.

Day 36 - Week 8

2007-03-01T19:12:00.000Z

It's getting close to the end now. I've already got my final menu pretty much thought out, although depending on the weather, I expect I'll be changing it.

So we start this week in a new kitchen, or "Demo Kitchen" to give it its full name. There's only 6 people here so that makes for a very concentrated kitchen opposed to the mayhem of loads of people running around. I had a pretty easy day today (i'm sure I say that all the time). Spicy Roast Aubergine Soup, Cheese Biscuits and Lime and Mint Cream. So I finished those pretty quickly and helped anyone else that was around out for a bit.

For the first time ever though, I tasted my soup, and thought, "My god that is delicious". I'd got the seasoning spot on. Seasoning is what cooking is all about. You can follow any recipe that you want, but as the raw ingredients differ in quality from store to store, a pinch of salt could mean a teaspoon of salt if the ingrendients aren't up to much. This time, I got it spot on. I think my pallette is starting to learn. The teacher agreed with me.

So a good start to the week.

Meanwhile, me at play with one of Therese's dogs, Derek in this instance. It was cold.

Day 29

2007-02-23T20:01:00.001Z

Just saw that I forget to put an entry in for day 29, but I can't remember what I did now. Probably cooked something.

Day 35

2007-02-23T19:49:00.000Z

Well again it wa a roller coaster of a day. We were all called in to the office to get our exam results, and to be honest. I wasn't happy with mine. 71% Herbs and 79% technique. This really did put quite a dampner on my day. None the less I ploughed on with it all.

It really was like working in a chipper (Irish for Fish and Chip shop). There were queues for the fryers, people filliting fish and chopping up potatoes all over the place. Every one had to be industrious. All my dishes came out pretty well actually though. So overall very pleased.

The whole exam thing had been playing on my mind though, so I went back to ask them where I went wrong. The first thing they told me was that they were wrong, they gave me another Mark's results. I actually got 75% and 85% respectively. Better I thought, although I really was hoping for 90% on the technique. They broke it down for me. On one of my dishes on the exam, it was slightly underseasoned, so i got half a mark knocked off for that. And when I was poring the wine, I forgot to present it to the teacher. So not really gutted about that too much. I knew the eggs were underseasoned, I just should have done something about it.

Not surprised on the herbs, as like I mentioned before, I had missed 5 of the questions out (the ones where you had to match herbs with dishes we had made), I should have stayed and filled them out with anything. I was surprised I got 4 of the actual herbs wrong. I'm pretty sure I actually got them right, but just filled in the wrong boxes. Perhaps that's more stupid though.

Weekend is upon us. Everyone here is talking about the Ireland - England game. Personally, I'm just hoping that West Ham win, and Wigan lose. Otherwise it'll be another shitty weekend.

Slaén.

Day 34

2007-02-22T20:09:00.000Z

I was terrible today. No excuses, I was bad. I had a really easy day, so I came in thinking I had all the time in the world. And I screwed up.

White Bread
Parmesan and Gruyere Souffle
Pancakes with Orange Butter
Aubergine and Rocket Salad

EASY. So why the hell was I still working at 12:45. Because I was rubbish. That's why. I must thank my teacher today, as she really bailed me out when I was so fed up I just wanted to throw everything in the bin.

I've got an even easier day tomorrow.

Scampi and Chips
Cold Jerusalem Artichoke Soup
Lemonade

I'm hoping to pad it out with Pecan Caramel Squares and another loaf of bread. I've promised my teacher i'll not be rubbish tomorrow, and I won't be. Also, we get our exam results then instead of today. So a good result will set me off in good spirits.

Me, 8am, on Salad duty, before it hit the fan.

One of the teachers, Rory O'Connel, a fantastic Chef in my opinion, very knowledgable.

Day 33

2007-02-21T20:51:00.000Z

Yep, boring Wednesdays again. A full day dedicated to "Making Money in Restaurants". As we all know. VERY HARD. But having it put to you is difficult to take, and most of us, although grateful for the info, really did look at ourselves and have second thoughts.

Obviously I can't go in to too much detail, but this lovely woman came in, and gave us a very interactive, engaging talk about all the different aspects. What's also weird, and it's one of those horrible things that you know you know, but never actually acknowledge it. For instance, whatever industry you work in, you might pinch a few pens, a nnotepad to take home or something (or in one instance I know of, an actual PC). But in the restaurant trade, it's almost a given that staff will help themselves to a little bit of food. It's not food, it's money. And we heard about so many little scams that are rife in the restaurant trade. And this can be the main reason that a lot of restaurants actually go under. The excellent book Kitchen Confidential ecplains some of these.

They played Love Will Tear Us Apart on the radio today. Cool. Mika (again). Not cool.

Exam result day tomorrow. Very nervous.

Day 32

2007-02-21T20:45:00.000Z

Going to keep it simple, as I'm in shock. As I said yesterday, I'm a big lover of pies. But today I was properly blown away. Beef and Oyster pie is surely the best thing I've ever tasted. Undescribable.If any of you come over for dinner (or I cook at your place) then you'd better hope that I make this.

On a slightly more negative note, I started panicking about my exam results. They mentioned today that they were "Generally very pleased". Generally??? What does that mean? To me it means someone messed up. What if it was me? Only 2 days till I find out. If I get 80% i'll be happy enough though. Or is that too high? God damn exams.

They played Mmmmmmm by the Crash Test Dummies on the way home. I nearly drove off the road in desperation.

Day 31 - Week 7

2007-02-19T21:35:00.000Z

Well that's it. We've tipped over the half way point and on the home stretch now. It's all going to fly from here on. Kind of like Wednesday's if you know what I mean.

Well I'll tell you one thing. Fridays exam has been a real fillip to the mind and body. To this end the start of the week has set me off in a pretty enthusiastic mood. Although I also found out that we get the results on Thursday, so there's still time for it to turn out to be a bit of a shocker.

My partner was away today, so I knew that I had a choice of doing whatever I wanted. I decided to go all out and do the Chili Con Carne (the best I've ever tasted - truse me), Plaice Goujons, Garlic and Roast Pepper Mayonaisse and a Flaky Pastry, ready for my Steak and Oyster pie tomorrow. I'm a BIG lover of pies, so how this one tastes I can't wait to find out.

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before, but my whole shopping routine is completely different now. There's an excellent market in Cork called the English Market, they sell almost everything food related there and have some great butchers, grocery stall and fish mongers. I can't just go in and buy something. If there's a particular cut of meat I want, I'll ask for it how I want it (usually untouched so I can fillet it or whatever myself), for fish I'll ask how long it's been since it was landed. For the vegetables, I'll only choose what's in season. It really makes shopping for food far more interesting. And I hope that when I get back, I'll be able to build up some rapport with some of my local shop keepers. Admitedly that probably won't happen in Hackney, but in Angel, probably.

Day 30

2007-02-19T19:14:00.000Z

Well it was bitter sweet today. On the one hand we had the exam, on the other, it was Pizza day! Truely bitter/sweet.

I got myself in nice and eatly to help was the salad, with the pri,e intention of learning them asap. And I pretty well got them all done. Salad Burnette, Edibile Chrysanthemum, Mizuna, Mibuna, Rocket, Green Mustard Greens, Red Mustard Greens, Tat-Soi, Pak-choi, Butterleaf were all there, amongst others.

So after i was comfortable with them, it was in to the deomonstration on Pizza. They've got a really cool wood fired oven here, and they've had to have it burning now for 3 days. But it looks amazing, and for anyone that's ever had a pizza from a wood ovem you'll know it's worth it. There was also demonstrations on Stromboli and other Italian breads like Forcachia.

Unfortunately for me, I stayed up til about 1am the precious night watching Lost and 24, not the best preparation for an exam I know, but it had to be done none the less.
I say unfortunately because straight after the demo, and after at least 4 moments of "closed eyeness", I was knackered. So i turned round to the girl I sit next to in Demo's (we've all settled in to our own little seats now) and asked if I could have a sleep in her car. She gladly obliged and I went in to her people carrier, and there I spent the next 2 hours. I MISSED THE PIZZA! Bollocks.

Anyway it left me reasonably prepared for the exam, and off I walked in there to do my herb/salad part. There was a station set up for me with 15 herbs and 5 salad leaves. And I'll be very surprised if I didn't get them all right, even with my fool-proof learning technique. We also had to name 2 dishes that we could serve with each herb. Some, like Fennel, I had only ever used once before so I couldn't name both. But I had about 90% of them, so I was reasonably happy. And after a quick test on place setting, I walked out a pretty happy man. Walked out in to the next part of the exam that is.......

So onwards it was to the technique part. Again you walk in the room and there was 2 random techniques that they would ask you to perfom. I was given scrambled egg and mayonaisse. 2 things I hadn't made before here. I aced them both though. Can't say I agree about their method of cooking eggs, I prefer the one i've read in Nigel Slaters excellent Real Fast Food.

You should have seen my face when I walked out of there. Chuffed.

Day 28

2007-02-15T20:57:00.000Z

There are some very tired eyes about today, mostly due to the fact that a lot pf people went out in the piss last night.

For those that haven't realised it ny now, I'm not staying with the majority of the students, they're all staying in lodgings just next to the school, so there's obviously a slight camaraderie that I'm not privvy too, it doesn't bother me really though as I'm now pushing 30 something and I've paid a fair chunk of money to come here, so I'm here to work (*remember this sentance, as it's a complete contradiction to what's coming later). But with this in mind, and the fact that it's half way through the course, why do people keep asking me what cottage I'm staying in? I mean for gods sake it's been 6+ weeks!. What do they think I do? Go back to my room and lock myself in there until day light breaks? Aside from that though, i've got a pretty good rapport with most of them, but I'm definitely suffering from Mature Student-itis a little bit. FIrst think on Saturday, I'll go to town and buy a Ramones t-shirt, that should do the trick.

We did have a really rather inspirational talk by a producer of Goats cheese who came in to talk to us about the process, and what she personally gets out of it. I'm not kidding, it was really fascinating. I'm hoping to go up there next week and watch them make it.

*We've got exams on Friday, and I've not learnt any of the lettuce leaves or herbs yet. The herbs I reckon I should be okay with, but there is about 15 of them. It's the leaves I'm more worried about. Still got 3 days though, it should be okay.

I was going to go on about some of the crazy things that I've seen/heard in Ireland, but I'll leave that till next week as I've rambled on a bit here.

MARK'S TIP OF THE DAY
Okay this is another really simple one, but really useful.
Imagine this scenario, you've making an omelette or scrambled egg. You've cracked the eggs into a bowl, but goddamn, there's a bit of shell gone in to it. What do you do? Leave it in there? Scrape it out with a knive or your fingers? No!. You get half of the shell, and use that to get it out. It's like magic, the two shells just seem to attract each other.

I know it's simple, and I know most people know it already. But if it improves just one persons life, then it will all be worth it.

Day 27

2007-02-13T18:32:00.000Z

Okay I messed up the recipe ever so slightly, I forgot to tell you what to do with the sugar and basil. I've updated the recipe now.

Also, hot-waterbottle gate keeps rolling on. Seems that there's quite a few of you out there with some. Remember, I know who you are.

So what happened today? Hmm. Well I was working with my new partner, and just as I was starting to think it was me that was the arse, I get someone with teamwork and quality. It's just a shame that we;ll only be in the kitchen with each other twice this week. I'm missing him already.

We decided to do all the dishes together as we didn't think it was stretching us enough just to do half of them. So it was Pork Belly today ( a really lovely tasting cut, and very cheap, i'd recommend you all try it). There was another goats cheese salad, some Braised Jueruslam Artichoke and a Caramelized Apple Tart, this gave me another opportunity with the blow torch. I stopped half-way through as I didn't feel at all happy with it. It wasn't so much as a blow torch, more of a welder. Again, I'm sure it's not me and the equipment. I still got a 6 for it though. Haha!

Tomorrow is going to be another long lecture day. Wine in the morning, Tapas in the afternoon.

Day 26 - Week 6

2007-02-12T19:20:00.000Z

Well, here we are entering the mid-way point. And this week promises to be the toughest, as we've only got 2 days of cooking, 2 are filled with lectures, and the last we have our mid-term exam. I need to learn about 20 herbs and 19 different salad leaves. Trickier than it sounds. Some of the leaves/herbs look exactly alike.

But thats enough of that. The moment you've all been waiting for has arrived. Pictures. Hooray!

In this first one, I must admit it does look as though my arms have grown way out of proportion of the rest of me, but trust me they haven't.

In this second one, you'll find me putting the finishing touches to my Creme Brulee. Pictured with me is Pip, one of the teachers and a fellow student, Jonathan. Both really nice people. But are they laughing at me? Probably not, but I bet you lot are now.

Many thanks to Karen for taking the pictures.

Day 25

2007-02-10T19:00:00.000Z

Well it seems that I wasn't the only one ill. There must have been about 15 people off sick today. God I hope it wasn't food poisoning.

After missing out yesterday by not making my Chocolate and Pear tart, I came in today and found out that I was to make a Salmon and Fennel Pate, Irish Stew, Cucumber Pickle and Buttered Cabbage. So a pretty full day, but nothing there that really was going to break me in to a sweat.

Irish Stew is lovely, the Pate was loveley, although certainly very rich, so not something I was going to be eating too much of, and the cucmber pickle, well my god, it was nice, but I never realised how much cusgar went in to it. And I've finally found out how to cook cabbage properly. It so easy and not too far removed from cooking spinach, just use the barest minumum of water and chuck some butter in there and stir for a bit.

Right it's Recipe time now....

MARK'S RECIPE OF THE WEEK
Piperonata

I love this dish, it's a really basic tomatoe sauce that really can be used with loads of food. Fish, Chicken or just with pasta. I'd say it's probably not robust enough for red meats though. But hey, try it and have a go.

About 20ml of Extra Virgin Oilve Oil
2 Red Peppers
2 Yellow Peppers
2 Medium sized Onions
Basil
1 tin of tomoatoes (or the equivalent of fresh, but for the love of god don't use them at this time of year as they taste like dog food)
Salt and Pepper

Right, this is what you need to do. And you really must follow this exactly to get the very best results.

Slice the onions. That's SLICE, not dice. Cut the onion in half first though, we're not using onion rings here.

Heat the oil on the lowest heat in a heavy saucepan, or a Le Creuseut if you have one, and add the onions. Cover the onions with grease proof paper, and put the lid on And leave to sweat for about 10 mins. Check them every few minutes to make sure they're not burning. And stir them too. After about 10 minutes, they should be really soft and really clear. If you're not sure they're clear, have a look at a stray piece of onion that maybe didn't make it in to the pan so you can compare.

While this is happening, you can slice the peppers, try to cut them at an angle, it just makes the final product a little bit more interesting. When you're happy that the onions have fully sweated, add the pepppers to the pan, and then do the same as you did with the onions. It should take about 10 - 15 minutes for them to get very soft.

When the peppers are soft, add the tomoatoes, with the juice. Turn the heat up a little, and allow them to simmer for about 20 minutes. Leave the lid on the pan. Then remove the lid for about 10 minutes, you should have a stew with a nice consitstency now.

Hopefully if my method is good, you'll have a weet fruity tasting dish, if it's not, post a comment and I'll see where I can help.

Day 24

2007-02-10T13:46:00.000Z

Nothing happened, I was in bed, ill.

Day 23

2007-02-07T19:21:00.000Z

By now you've should know that Wednesday's are not good days. It's lecture day where we sit in the demo room and learn 'stuff'.

Walking in the room at 9am was an interesting picture, it was half empty. Some people had been up all night playing poker. And it was obvious to see who they were. Some people had thoght "sod it, they'd stay in bed". And the rest were thinking, "I wish I'd stayed in bed". I was firmly in the latter. In fact, and this is doesn't shame me, at 10 O'clock. I faked going out to the toilet, and went to the car and had some sleep till 12. It was great. Kind of took me back to the days when in one of my jobs, I'm not saying which one now, when I was hungover I used to go to the disabled toilets and grab a little snooze. Except in that particular place I had a little pillow I used to take with me. Nice.

But anyway. The teachers knew that we'd all be flagging at this point, as apparently it happens to every course. So it was confirmed they are going easy on us. Tomorrow, all I have to make are biscuits and a Chocolate and Pear tart, so all pretty simple stuff.

Today was also kind of special as it is my birthday....yes, getting older. Got to say it was kind of weird having it away from home, but the nice clutch of cards that awaited me were very gratefully received, so thanks you all, and thanks for the messages that everyone else sent. The teachers knew and made me a cake and gave a rendition of Happy Birthday. Embarassing yes, but not as embarassing as last years dancing on a table that I had to do in a greek restaurant with my brother and my friend Hannah. Talk about dancing like your dad.

Tonight i'm going to celebrate by having an early nights sleep.

Rock and Roll. Bobbie would be proud.

Day 22

2007-02-07T19:16:00.000Z

They're definitely going easy on us this week as today was "Breakfast Day", where all we had to do was make a traditional Irish Breakfast, or fry as they call it. It's basically the same as an English Breakfast but with both Black and White pudding.

I got a bit annoyed when it took my partner 5 minutes to cut the rind of 2 rashers of Bacon. She's a bit slow, but she's really nice.

We finished the morning session at 11 which was nice so it meant that we could all chill out a bit longer.

Very tired though.

Day 21 - Week 5

2007-02-05T23:56:00.000Z

Only 7 Weeks to go! For those that still think that the hot water bottle is g.a.y. And just a reminder t those that might have missed it, this house has no central heating. I was just listening to the news, and it's going to get down -5 tonight. THAT'S COLD! And I have no shame in admitting I've just flled it up. God damn it i deserve a medal!

Day 20

2007-02-03T22:31:00.000Z

Okay, I go up at 6:30 fine. Got to the school at 7:50 ready to go to the greenhouse and pick the herbs. And bloody hell, I get there and there's loads of students queuing up outside the kitchens ready to start!

Apparently this has been going on for a few weeks now. Obviously I live off-campus so I've no idea whats going on, except by looking at the face of the obviously hung over every day,. But good god. Starting at 8??? I'm not sure if they're keen or just slow.

Had another easy day today, but was really looking forward to it. I was down to cook scallops, and anyone that hass cooked scallops before that they really needed to only be cooked for 20-30 seconds each side. Over cook them, and they're rubber. But you only have to blink and they're overcooked, so I had to be careful. The boy did good though.

The Hollandaise Sauce was better today, although I must say I don't like it at all. For those that don't know, it's made out of egg yolks, butter (lots of it) and a small squeeze of lemon. Obviously a great combination for fish, but myself I like fish thats really fresh, and lightly seasoned. And obviously a bit of lemon on the side that I won't use.

Now the Creme Brulee was interesting (that's the dessert you see chefs using a blow torch with). I sparked up the blow torch and nearly set my partner on fire. Evidently you don't need to turn the gas up as much as I did. And after that I wasn't too confident to be honest. I'm not sure if everyone is like me, but say you're walking around a shop in the flower pressing department, and then you find yourself in the glass/china department instead. Well I usually freak out and have to get out of there pretty damn quick as I think I'm going to trip over and smash everything in sight. Well that was like this. I was bricking it.

I burnt the Creme Brulee.

Day 19

2007-02-03T22:19:00.000Z

So today I was making a Hollandaise Sauce, Pan-Fried Haddock and something esle that fails me. Either way it was a pretty easy day. So easy in fact that I gave myself a few other jobs to do. Apparently I've become a bit famous (nerdy perhaps) about this. So I decided to do a Creme Brulee and make some more Marmalade and some yeast bread. All in 3 hours, but it took four hours. But I'm nt bothered, all the main courses were sent out to the table on time. And goddamit, I paid a lot of money to come here, there's no way that I'm going to get lazy. I want to get as much out if this as possible.

The Creme Brulee and Marmalade are a 24 hour thing, so I'll let you know how I get on with those tomorrow.

But the Pan-Fried Haddock was delicious, the less said about the Hollandaise Sauce the better. Basically it split. And the teacher was right next to me when it happened and she had no idea why it went, but we're going to make it again first thing tomorrow morning to make amends. I'm also one step closer to being able to fillet a fish effectively. There are 2 skills that I think everyone should know how to do:- bone a chicken and fillet a fish. As doing these will open everyone up to cheaper and fresher food. When I get back if anyone wants to know ow to do it, I'll gladly show them.

Talking of tomorrow morning, I've got to be up at 6:30 again to pick the herbs. Going to be a very long day.

Day 18

2007-01-31T18:51:00.000Z

Okay, a few people have quite rightly called me gay with regards to the hot water bottle story, but just to make clear, there's no central heating in this house, so although typically a hot water bottle would be gay, trust me, it was needed.

Yep, we really don't like Wednesday's lecture day. After squeezing every ounze out of the snooze button, I left late and managed to get there in a record breaking 30 mins. I really did drive like a lunatic.

MARK'S RECIPE OF THE WEEK - a potential new section

Was going to put a recipe up, didn't have time though. Soon I promise.

MARK'S TIP OF THE DAY
If you're using a deep fat fryer, then after you filter out the oil, fry a lettuce leaf in there, it will help clean up the oil. TRUE!

Day 17

2007-01-30T23:20:00.000Z

Therese gave me a hot water bottle over the weekend. SHE ROCKS! So now I never go in to bed without it. Trust me it's been cold over here. And this is a pretty old house so when you're not being all nice and toasty in front of the fire, you're god damn freezing your nuts off (sorry Mother).

I'm not sure what happened today, it was one of those collective cock ups when 30 odd people seemed to have missed that they were all supposed to be making Mushroom Soup. Cue much chaos everywhere. Aside from that I had an absolute doddle of a day! Tomoatoe and Basil salad and French Omelette (harder to get right than you think, it really does only take 30 seconds). So I took the opportunity to brush up on some of my techniques that Darina told us we're going to be tested on, I'll scan in the stuff we need to learn later tomorrow, I decided to segment a fruit and make Scones. Honestly you've never seen Scones go so quickly, teachers and staff go mad for them. Out of the 20 odd that I baked, I managed to just grab the last two to bring home for Therese.

I did realise that the course is getting harder, slowly they're upping the ante on what we're cooking. It's gone away from the "you certainly can't mess this up" to the
"if you even slightly over-cook this we'll be able to tell". A case in point being the pan fried fish I've got to fillet and cook. Certainly at home this could be done easy enough, but you've not got the figures of Darina and her team hanging over you pointing out every little fault in what you've done. Stressed? Moi? Nah.

I promise I'll have a recipe for you tomorrow.

Day 16 - Week 4

2007-01-30T23:07:00.000Z

I think I mentioned in an earlier post that I was dreaming about food, well that reeched new heights this weekend with me actually having a pretty lucid talk with Therese about butter icing just after a little snooze. She was amused, I didn't really know what to say.

Anyway, the weekend came and went, and at first it looked like 2 days was going to be long, but then blink and you missed it. But then Mondays don't actually feel that bad, its good to get back in the kitchen and hear the clanking of pots and the sharpening of knives. On the menu for me today was a Brown Soda Bread, Spinach and Rosemary Soup and a Cullohill Apple Pie. And it all went pretty seamlessly, except I burnt my soup base when the teacher was explaining to me the finer point of Soda Bread, but panic not, I just got another one going and problem solved. I'd like to tell you what the Apple Pie tasted like, it looked good, the texture seemed good. But I won't know till Wednesday when it gets served up with our lunch. SO WATCH THIS SPACE.

Day 15

2007-01-28T13:34:00.000Z

The end of the third week, and 1/4 of the way through the course, it really has flown by. There was definitely an air of "thank god it's friday" going around the place today. Everyone was talking about plans for the weekend, most were planning on sleeping. That was kind of my plan too, work commitments aside of course.

Today was supposed to be a pretty easy day, I was down to make marmalade, a simple vietnamese salad, brown bread, and help with a coffee cake. No problem you'd think. Well somehow it turned out to be and one by one the dishes fell by the wayside like dominos collapsing. And one thing for sure is that whatever had happened to me, had happened to everyone else around me. Person to person, 45 people had had a bad day. I myself didn't finish till 12:45 and a lot of people didn't finish until 1:30 (lectures start at 1:45). Why today had been an unmitigated disaster I shall never understand. But it can't happen again.

On Monday I've got what "should" be another easy day. White Bread, Spinach and Rosemary Soup and Cullohill Apple Pie.

Thank god there's not another jam or something though. Currently sitting in the fridge I've got 3 jars of Marmalade, 1 jar of Spicy Apple Chutney, 1 Rasberry Jam and 1 Red Currant Jelly. I don't really like Jam so Therese is having to do over time with the eating.

I really will try and get some pictures of work in the kitchen this week, it's just always very very busy and finding someone with some free time is hard.

Day 14

2007-01-25T21:50:00.000Z

It's great to be back in the kitchen again. It was Summer Pudding, Marmalade and French Peasant Soup (delicious and certainly something that i'll be making more of) that I made today, although the soup was the only one I could be marked on, the others will be finished tomorrow after they've done their magic in the fridge overnight.

Thats probably enough about the cooking stuff, i'm sure it doesn't make particulary good reading day after day. So i'll change tack and let you know some very interesting and probably very surprising little facts about daily life in Ballymaloe.

As I'm sure you've worked out now, this place loves food and the welfare of its livestock and vegetables etc (yes plants have feeling too). But that extends further than just the food, it's bred into the whole ethos of the place. For instance, there's a very small bucket in every kitchen where non recyclable rubbish goes, and at the end of every day, it's only half full. Food waste is split up in to two types, Stock (as in chicken stock) and Hens. The food that cannot be used again, goes in to feeding the 500 odd hens that roam around the farm. They have huge skips which they eat out of, and at the end of the week, whats left, goes to the composting area, and then obviously when that's done, it goes back on the plants.

The only detergent used here is the environmently friendly Ecover, and we're encouraged to use that sparingly (1 drop per sink, and the sinks are big). Bacterial detergents like Mr Muscle are never used in the kitchen, it's simply not needed, the place is kept spotlessly clean, and the theory being that the reliance of detergents actually breed laziness, which actually promotes germs to grow. And you only have to look at the MRSA bug to see where they're coming from, which incidentaly they do have in hospitals over here. The floors are obviously mopped every day, but again with envronmentally friendly products. Darina's fan that she uses to go to the farmers market is run using biofuel.

I thought that stainless steel kitchens were needed in a commercial environment. Not true. The only specification is that the kitchen has to be easy to clean, and although stainless steel is easy to clean, it's not needed at all. A well designed kitchen is all that's needed.

The same goes for chopping boards, I was under the impression that we'vd be using the colou coded boards (red=meat, blue=fish etc). But studies have actually proved that wooden chopping boards are cleaner than the plastic variety, and the least plastic that touches food the better.

MARK'S TIP OF THE DAY
I realise that some of these tips are a little bit lightweight, but some of them I want to keep to myself so I can surprise you all, the others are really down to simple techniques that I'd really need to show. For instance it's quite hard to explain how to properly line a flan tin. Or the secret to a great Soda Bread.

So here it is then. When boiling green vegetables, keep the lid off the pan, and your vegetables will retain their colour a lot better than if the lid was on.

Day 13

2007-01-24T22:14:00.000Z

It was geerally agreed that we don't like Wednesday's as it's a theory day. All day stuck in a room watching a demo and then a lecture on something else. Although actually turned out to be good. We had a quarter of a cow today brought in and that was butchered in front of us, definitely not as exciting as the lamb, but still very interesting none the less. I'm going to ask Phillip, the resident butcher who teaches at the school, if I can come along with him next time that he does one so I can get a proper hands on experience.

The afternoon was filled with the first of 6 wine lectures, wine is a huge thing. And something that has always daunted me and something I'm not particularly interested in if the truth be told. For those that are, here are the books we've been recommended
Oz Clarke's Introducing Wine and Jancis Robinson's Wine Course. The latter part of the session was wine tasting. Great I here you cry, except I was driving so definitely only sipping for me. Nice wines though. To sum up what I learnt. New World wines are fruitier and have more body, but the old world wines are perhaps more subtle. The "ribena for adults" of wine is a Merlot, and a jolly nice Merlot we tasted too. It was a Lyeth Merlot, 2005 I think.

The students that are staying on campus obviously enjoyed the tasting, and it looked like they were going to get hammered tonight, so tomorrow should be quite funny.

Day 12

2007-01-23T22:57:00.000Z

Right what on earth happened today....I remember cooking something. Can't remember what though. It was errrr. Broccoli. Errr....Banananananas in a lime syrup. Oh yes, Spicy Apple Chutney (currently sitting in the kitchen waiting to mature) and a loaf of bread.

Brocolli was good, left the chutney unattended for 5 mins, and it burnt, but I managed to rescue it and it actually turned out delicious, only got 5/6 for that one though because i messed up the bottling of it all.

Darina is back this week after a trip to Madrid to a "molecular gastronomy" conference , you know the type of stuff that Heston Blumenthal from the Fat Duck churns out. To be honest that kind of thing is not my idea of food, it lacks the comfort factor. ANd as she quite rightly said, it really is boys and their toys kind of stuff. Give me a pinny any day :s

Oh just remembered that I plucked a Guinea Fowl today too, it has to be one of the weirdest things, because you start of with a fully feathered bird, which isn't weird in itself. And slowly start pulling the feathers out, and thats the weird part, and you end up with what basically looks like a chicken that you'd buy in a supermarket.
It just kind of filled in the missing blanks between what you buy, and how it got to you in the first place. And that can only be a good thing.

MARK'S TIP OF THE DAY

Right, after much pestering by sections of the public. I was asked "What's happened to Tip of the day?". So it's back again. This one isn't really a tip but something that you can all try at home if you want. All you need is a jam jar, and some double cream.

Pour the cream into the jam jar, but make sure it's clean and sterilised if I was you (boil the lid for 5 mins and put the jar into an oven at 100 degrees for 5-10 mins), and then shake the jar. It should only take 5 mins and you'll see the cream seperate into buttermilk and the start of the butter. When this happens, pour the buttermilk away into a container if you want and use it for something else, and then shake again to remove more buttermilk. Once you're sure that you've got all the buttermilk, grab your butterball and rinse the butter 2-3 times in cold water to get rid of any remaining butter milk.

And what you now have in your hands is butter! Easy. And obviously, if you used organic cream, you have organic butter. Pukka.

Day 11 - Week 3

2007-01-22T19:47:00.001Z

The weekends really fly don't they? I think everyone today was looking forward to cooking though. Roast Lamb (leg and shoulder) was on the menu today. So for most of us it was a nice roast dinner that we've not had in a while now. And I've never seen the dining room so packed.

I cut myself 7 times today. SEVEN! every one of the slashes was more stupid than the previous. It all started when i was putting my knives IN to my bag. My hands looked totally mauled by the time I went home.

I was aiming for my Lamb to be rare, but due to a last minute "can we cut yours in half for another student", I forgot to reduce my cooking time accordingly. Today was very very cold.

We were also put into a new kitchen today, all of my fellow "Kitchen 3" colleagues agreed, the change was not liked. But there aint nuffing we can do about it now though, just have to get used to it. Sigh.

Day 10

2007-01-20T13:25:00.000Z

Today was cool. After the mornings cooking wchich was pretty uneventful, Almond Tarts. Check. Tomatoe Fondue. Check. It was time to start the afternoon demo.

There had been a big chunk of meat in the fridge the last couple of days, and I was really hoping that we were going to be eating it at some point, but it was better than that. They lugged in half a Lamb, placed it on the table and said that we were going to see how we can butcher a lamb. Nice.

You might think that this kind of thing is a bit grotesque, and it is a shame to see a dead animal, but you must remember that this lamb has been lovingly cared for and protected from its natural predators. The main reason for this course is that when we cook, we cook to the ingredients maximum potential and enjoyment for others, and so not wasting a life.

It's obviously pretty hard to describe how to remove the parts of a Lamb with words, but it doesn't look very difficult. And over the next few weeks, we'll be learning how to do part of it. From a financial point of view, as with chickens, it's far far cheaper to buy meat this way and "process" the food yourself, than buy it in a little plastic tray covered with plastic wrapping with a barcode printed, and just pop it in the freezer for consumption later. I think I might do a short butchery course after this, as it really does strip food down to a basic level, the next step down being only rearing the food yourself. Which I hope find myself a little plot of land to do some day too! Yes Margo, it is the Good Life.

Darina has been in India this week on a fact finding mission so we've had Rory O'Connel (Darina's brother) and Rachel Allen cooking for us. I think everyone knows who Rachel, she's very nice actually, and it should be fun working with her over the next few weeks. Rory is an absolutely fantastic chef, and I'm going to see if I can get some work experience over the remaning 10 weeks in his kitchen at Cork.

That's all till Monday now, and a rest is really needed. I'm going sit myself in front of the fire and chill out for the next few days and wait for next weeks onslught again. You really get to appreciate the weekends I can tell you.

On a sad note i'll be leaving Kitchen 3, and moving to Kitchen 1 next week. Kitchen 3, although small, was a lot of fun.

May the great West Ham fightback begin.

Day 9

2007-01-18T19:48:00.000Z

So, a funny thing happened to me last night when I was doing my order of work. I realised that I had suddenly become a very organised person.

My post yesterday was exactly like an OOW. I've never been an organised person, more a hundreds of piles of paper lying around waiting till one rises to the top and it gets done.

Today was tricky though, I ended up making a creme caramel as well as the things I was down to do, which was fine, but I threw out all my planning. And although it was really nice (6/6), I wasn't happy with how I got to the end result and I know I can do better.

That's all for now, I have other work to do. But for continuity's sake, tomorrow I'm make Almond Tart and a Pasta and Tomatoe Fondu.

But have a look at tomorrows demo that we'll be cooking on Monday..... Monday is going to be hard day I think.

Day 8

2007-01-17T13:40:00.000Z

Very tired today.

The picture on the left is that of the demo room where we get shown what we're cooking the next day.

The days morning lecture was all about Cheese, Butter and Yoghurt and how to make them all, they made 4 or 5 cheeses in front of us today, it was quite impressive. The easiest being Paneer cheese. Which I'll certainly post up the recipe.

In the afternoon the lecture was Afternoon Tea - A huge selection of cakes that were made in front of our very eyes.

This is my schedule tomorrow, pretty much a typical day.

6:30 Get up
6:45 Let dogs out (Therese is away at the minute)
7:00 Wash etc, get stuff together
7:10 Drive to Ballymaloe
7:50 Arrive at Ballymaloe
8:00 Meet Eileen to pick the salad for lunch
9:00 Arrive in Kitchen to cook
12.00 Have food tasted
12:30 Lunch
13:45 Evening demonstration for tomorrows cooking
17:10 Drive back to Cork
18:00 Walk dogs (there's 3 of them, all little treasures)
18.30 Cook dinner
19.00 Do website freelance type stuff (intermingled with the mutts playing up)
22.00 Prepare order of work for tomorrows cooking
22:30 Shower etc
23:30 Sleep

Don't get me wrong, I'm loving every second of it, but it's not easy!

PANEER CHEESE
1.8 litres of full cream milk
3-4 tablespoons of lemon juice or white wine vinegar

Bring the milk to the boil in a large saucepan. As soon as it starts to rise, add 3 tablespoons of the lemon/vinegar. Stir and remove from the heat. The milk should now curdle. If it hasn't, return to the boil and add the remaining lemon/vinegar, and then remove from the heat again.

Place a sieve over a deep bowl, and insert either a cheese cloth or 2 layers of muslin into the sieve and pour the curds and whey into the strainer and allow to drain until the whey has completely drained.

Now place the curds into a mould with holes in and press down or improvise by just weighting the curds like you would if you were pressing flowers.

And just wait for 5-10 mins and there you have it. Paneer cheese. Easy. Most cheeses really are this easy to make.

Day 7

2007-01-16T18:22:00.000Z

Not happy today. Not happy at all. My new partner, because he didn't give himself enough to do, decided to "help" me with my Jerusalam Artichoke soup. This involved him chopping 4 onions, and stirring occasionaly. You don't need to stir soup, it just cooks, you taste it, season it, taste again, season if need. And when it's done, you blend and add milk. SIMPLE. So he basically took a credit for my work (we're marked out of 6 for every dish we do), and whilst I was getting a plate and a spoon for the croutons to serve, he'd gone over to the teacher and asked her to mark it. WITHOUT ME. So he delivered, in my opinion, a lack lustre dish. Idiot.

I just read that back to myself. Computers used to wind me up, how things have changed.

As predicted, my Fluffly Lemon Pudding was a bit of a flop too. All though it turns out it wasn't my fault. Apparently the recipe they had given us was being tested with various pie dishes as the size they used to use wasn't available anymore. So they'd not actually managed to get it working themselves. I guess you had to be there.

But if anyone wants to contemplate life and what they're doing with it, I'd suggest they go and buy a Jerusalem Artichoke and peel it. It's a total pain in the arse and took a about 40 mins to peel 1.150 kg (thats 2.5lbs in old money) and a scraped knuckle to get to the end. Jeruslame Artichoke will certainly never be on the menu.

IRISH TV
On the whole, Irish TV is pretty bad. They've only get the four channels (no freeview or similar here, but they do have SKY) and one of them is broadcast in Gaelic, and even if I understood what they were talking about, its usually a bunch of old blokes in a pub talking about a field. But I have found a pretty decent show, Dan and Becks. You might be able to watch it here if they've not blocked it to UK and beyond. http://www.rte.ie/tv/danandbecs/episodes.html

Day 6 - Week 2

2007-01-15T18:47:00.000Z

Poor Therese, all I did all weekend was talk about Ballymaloe and what they do there, I think she's interested. I hope so, because she's got another 11 weeks of it.

So after a weekend of working on freelance projects, I was suitably knackered to start another days cooking. But to be honest I felt pretty confident about the day. For my Chicken in Tarragon, we had to bone the chicken, and I've boned a few chickens in my time so that was like second nature. In fact, I'm damn good at boning.

Then it was just down to cooking the damn thing, which was pretty succesful actually, except I was using a new cooker so I had to get used to the different temperature so mine was slightly browned, but only slightly it didn't really detract from anything. The sauce was "excellent" (the teachers words not mine), but then mains dishes have always been my thing, it's the desserts that I don't really enjoy. I'm sure tomorrow that will start to be rectfied as I'm making a Fluffy Lemon Pudding I was hoping for the Chocolate Fudge as I'd have the ladies all over me if I could master that one, but lucky for Therese, but unluckily for me, that wasn't on my rota. For those that are interested (hopefully no-one), the brussel sprouts came out just perfect too, and I have to say they were pretty nice.

I also had to make the lemonade for lunch, and then after that I "volunteered" to make the spicy marinade for the chicken pieces tomorrow. I'll put the lemonade recipe up later today as it's so simply but really nice and refreshing. I've been having a bit of dilemma as to whether I'm allowed to put any of the recipes up. I should probably ask permission, but asking permission will be alerting this blog to them, and I'm not sure if that's a good idea. Answers on a postcard to No 73, PO Box 73, Maidstone, Kent.

Tomorrow I'm making Jeruslam Artichoke Soup with Crispy Croutons, Lemon Pudding and Boiled Rice. I'm sure rice comes out in microwave packets now. I'll point that out to them.

One final note, the stat I mentioned the other day about the oats that the farmers sell, I asked her again today and I was wrong, it actually gets sold on for £1800/ton not £1100 after they've processed it i.e. just rolled them......Shocking.

MARK'S TIP OF THE DAY
Coming soon.....

Day 5

2007-01-12T18:45:00.000Z

Well, I can hardly believe it. But the first week is over and although it's been a long hard week, it's flown by and i'm already thinking about the 12th week and how I'm going to miss the place. Everyone here, from the gardeners, the office staff ,the teachers to the suppliers are so enthusiastic about what they're doing, it's impossible to not embrace it too. And I don't think that I've ever experienced anything like it before. Absolutely everyone has a smile on their face.

But anyway, today as predicted was a good day, the bread was easy, I've made quite a lot of bread before, but this was the first bread that I've made that wasn't a yeast bread. And it was strange at first as the dough is more like a porridge than the elastic spring product that I've been used to dealing with. But 60 mins later, there it was, a lovely healthy wholemeal loaf. And it was perfect.

The jam making was good, but just towards the end, I realised that perhaps I should have stopped 5 mins beforehand, it still very tasty though, but just a bit thicker than I'd like and we also got to keep it . So I think Therese is going to make the bread tonight and we're going to have the jam tomorrow for brekkie.

The goats cheese starter, to give it's full title, A Salad of Rocket Leaves with Ardsallagh Goats Cheese with Llasanly Honey, was so ridulously easy, but it was all about presentation, and I think I got it just about right. Rosie (my teacher, lovely lady) seemed pleased.

Monday we change partners and stations just to mix it all up, My new patner and I decided that I'll be doing the Chicken with Marjoram and brussel sprouts. You might think it's funny just making brussel sprouts, but really, it's one of those things that if you screw up, there's no hope.

That's all for week 1. And although it's only the first week, .
I have absolutely no hesitation in recommending any of you to come over here and do the course or they do short week long courses, it really is amazing.

MARK'S TIP OF THE DAY
Not so much a cooking tip, but something interesting a student who is a farmer pointed out yesterday. On the farm she runs with her husband, they make oats and sell them on to Jordans, the muesli people, for £80/ton. They then sell them on for the equivalent at £1100/ton. So my tip is....Wherever possible, buy from farmers market, although they might be slightly more expensive, the quality of produce is infinitely better, and the money is going direct to the farmer, rather than the bloated corporations,

Day 4

2007-01-11T18:33:00.000Z

Nothing much happened today, we had our first wine lecture, then one on Irish farm house cheeses, specifically one made by a crazy sounding old woman in Kerry, who calls her cheese her children. Then a talk on health and safety in the kitchen and finishing the day off with a 3 hour lecture on government guidelines in cooking. Yes the latter part was as boring as it sounded.

In all honestly though, listening to Darina Allen talking is not a chore, she is one of those people you meet and leave an indelible mark on your life. She want's the idea of a natural lifestyle to be defended on all costs and is appalled at the globalisation, desctuction and nannying of the world we live in. If there's a fight against civil liberties, whatever they are, she'll fight them. There's actually a whole lot I could say regarding regarding Darina and the school, I'll leave that for another slow day though, maybe next Wednesday when we have another lecture.

My confidence in tomorrows Jam and Goats cheese dishes was perhaps slightly misplaced though, as I found out that I'm on the rota to make bread in the morning. 4 loaves I think it is.

On the plus side, they played 99 red balloons on the way home in the car tonight, that was pretty cool. By the way, the roads in Ireland are the worst, it's also interesting to know that a large proportion of drivers on the roadshere don't have driving licenses as it takes on average 37 weeks for them to get a driving test from the moment they apply. And it shows.

MARK'S TIP OF THE DAY
When making any bread, pastry or pretty much anything that starts off as a dough, always use your oven on the convection setting and not the fan assisted, as this will dry your dough out too quickly. FACT.

Day 3

2007-01-10T18:19:00.000Z

On the plus side "Mark, your knife skills are excellent".
On the minus side, my French Onion Tart was pathetic.

Okay so I knew I had the short straw with the tart, but I really didn't give myself much of a chance. You see I followed the recipe to the letter. But unfortunately I didn't hear that part where they said, use the beginners pastry. So you could say that I followed the wrong recipe. Hmm deja vu, did that happen to me this week already?

Whilst Rosie (the teacher) was telling me how I had to handle my fantasticly light but very delicate mixture differently to the other students and their industrial strength pastry, my onions burnt. And then it kind of all went downhill everywhere. Even down to the handle falling of the oven. Luckily mine took longer to cook than everyone elses, so they'd all eaten by the time a begrudgingly put it out on the table.

My salad was okay though, but needed more salt and sugar. You might think that hey it's only a sald, but honestly the bar here is really high, it has to stand up to anything you'd pay at a fine restaurant. They're very heavy on salt here. You certainly wouldn't eat like this every day, in fact they recommend you don't. This all strictly restaurant food only.

Tomorrow is different though, we've got a full day of lectures to sit through, now thats going to be tough! However I predict glory on Friday, I'm down to make Rasberry Jam and a Goats Cheese and Rocket salad. Score! My partner has got the Mushroom a la creme that i made on Tuesday, so we've both got a pretty easy deal there I think.

Can't wait to sleep in on the weekend.

MARK'S TIP OF THE DAY
When making shortcrust pastry, shake the bowl and the larger pieces come to the top. Then crumble those up from a reasonable height. Always keep the pastry cold.

Day 2 - The awakening

2007-01-09T18:13:00.002Z

"Tomorrow we're making, amongst other things, wholemeal bread, lemonade and candied peel. Easy!" I said.

How wrong could a person be. Not only did we not make the above, but what we did make, certainly wasn't easy. Now on paper, what we did have to make was easy (Mushroom a la Creme, Carrot and Mint soup, Apple Crumble amongst other things), but i promose you, if you mix 8 anxious students, at least 1 with cigarette withdrawl, and a dash of where the feck do I start. And you get me, a dazed and confused trainee chef slowly messing up something as simple as frying some mushrooms with seasoning and a small squeeze of lemon. Okay although I didn't actually mess it up, I wasn't exactly assured.

It's worth pointng out that when we actually cook in the morning, we're actually cooking for at least 20 of our fellow students to eat at lunch. So it really has to be edible, or else you have to listen to such insults as too much salt, too soggy, no flavour. And I can imagine that doesn't feel too good.

Okay so when that was finished and we'd all eaten lunch, I had a cigarette, then another one and then put a patch on. I'll be wearing a patch all day tomorrow. I felt like having a kip in the car, until I looked at the watch and saw that it was only 20 minutes to the evening demonstration where we are shown how and what to cook in the morning for lunch. With my partner this week, we tried to decide on what to cook. So typically this was done by heads or tails ( I might suggest scissor, paper, stone tomorrow), i flicked the coin, and then realised I didn't actually know what was heads or tails on a Euro. He didn't look amused by my lack of knowledge on the Euro so I think i might have put Anglo - Irish relations back a good few days, so sorry about that guys. Anyway, the result being that I'm making a French Onion Tart and a Mediteranean Salad, he's doing Poached Plums and and Potato Soup. I think he got the easiest one there.

Mark's Tip of the Day
Potato is used as a base in soups to act as a thickening agent.

Day 1 - Week 1

2007-01-08T18:28:00.002Z

Well after the shock of actually having to get up to go somewhere for the first time in a few weeks, I made it the school on time. And it's definitely what you'd call "in the sticks". Hackney it aint. Innit.

So first of all, we had a meet and greet session where we all stood up and said why we wanted to do the course, to my surprise there wasn't too many IT people, in fact only me and 2 others. But the common glue was certainly that we were all fed up with our work and looking for a career break. Apart from a few tax dodging parisites on society (students) who felt they needed a break from their exertions at college.

After a walk around the farm we planted some seeds, met the cows, pigs, chickens, ducks etc. Everything on the farm is freerange and organic, and it really is a joy to see, the pigs actually looked really happy, I couldn't help but think I can't wait till they're slaughtered and I get to taste them though.

Then it was lunch, a delicious Tomato and Basil soup, followed by a really amazing main course of simple stuffs from local producers, smoked Salmon, smoked Eel, smoked Mackerel, Chicken liver pate, smoked sausage and Shrimps that had only come of the boat just 3 hours before. Absolutely stunning, and all because of the quality of the ingredients.

I can tell right now that i'm going to enjoy the next 3 months.

Tomorrow we're making, amongst other things, wholemeal bread, lemonade and candied peel. Easy!

The big idea

2006-12-07T17:21:00.000Z

A warm welcome to you all, and thanks for making it this far.

So what the heck am I doing in Ireland? Well it's simple. I've had enough of sitting behind a desk moping and moaning about the pains of advertising and IT, so I decided to do something about it. So I'm off to the famous (well for some) Ballymaloe Cookery School in Midleton, Co Cork, Ireland for 12 weeks of slaving behind a stove stirring, searing, braising, grilling and roasting

The outcome of this being that I will have total respect for the preparation and cooking food and a respect for the land that we feed off. And that can only be a good thing.

No doubt I'll be posting a few recipes up for people to try along with me, I'll even dish out some tips.

School starts on the 8th January, so see you then, but in the meantime, have a great Christmas and New Year.