Good Things still to come
It was a greatly disappointed Menu who learned earlier this year that Carmel Somers was to shut up shop on her long-running Good Things Café. Having built a highly deserved national reputation for deceptively simple yet splendidly sophisticated cooking in her Durrus Café, she made the move just a few years ago to the Skibbereen location.
All is not lost, however: An equally gifted teacher, Carmel will continue to host her culinary classes (honouring all outstanding gift vouchers) and the restaurant itself will continue, under new management, as Glebe at Good Things, under the aegis of the mighty Perry sisters, of Glebe Gardens, in nearby Baltimore. Chef Bob Cairns, another who subscribes to Carmel’s own preferred culinary code of doing little or nothing to finest local produce, allowing its own inherent qualities to do the heavy lifting, will take over as head chef. The Menu can think of few other operators more suited to carrying on the Good Things torch and wishes Carmel well in the next stage of her career.
Grape times ahead
Cork’s Great Temple of the Grape, L’Atitude 51, has several upcoming events of note for wine lovers: Cinecafe presents Wine, The Green Revolution (La Clef de Terroir) (May 30), a documentary on biodynamic wines with a few bottles of same busted open on the night for tasting; The Beautiful South-West (May 24) is an evening with Luc de Conti (Tour de Gendres, Bergerac) and Jules Verhaeghe (Chateau du Cedre, Cahors) winemakers from the lesser-hymned yet nonetheless exalted ‘Sud-Ouest’, an area of France whose glorious scenery also furnishes some fine if lesser known wines.
Butter me up
The Old Butter Roads Food Trail festival continues and while readers will have to look sharpish to make today’s Longueville House Orchard Tour, there’s a bit more time to prepare for the following, later in the week: Taste of the Old Butter Roads at The Square Table (tapas tasting); Cork City Food Trail covering local food history; and a bus food tour to the Butter Museum and Lee Valley farmers and producers;
Today’s special
The once-monthly Kilavullen Farmers’ Market, in the Nano Nagle Centre, near Fermoy, began some years before the aforementioned Old Butter Roads Food Trail was ever conceived but is very much a shining little star in this recently launched north Cork culinary constellation and comes highly recommended as a pleasant Saturday sojourn (including today for the early birds). It is a source of excellent local, seasonal Irish produce. A recent hamper procured by The Menu was chockfull of goodies including: Yoghurt, jams, pickles, and delicious Maura’s Kitchen Elderflower & Blackberry cordial, wild garlic pesto, Lyreen Smokehouse Salmon, and, wonder of wonders, the first raw asparagus of the season to enter the Menu’s great gob. Stalls are small yet each is laden with treasures, not least some very fine organic and chemical-free fruit and vegetables, along with some equally splendid ‘non-edibles’ including woodwork and crafts, natural soaps, essential oils, and plants.
Spirit of the Week
The Dead Rabbit Irish Bar on Water Street in Southern Manhattan was founded in 2013 and quickly won World’s Best Bar and Cocktail List in Drinks International magazine. It was founded by two Belfast natives who are also responsible for the excellent cocktail bar in the Merchant Hotel in Belfast.
Their whiskey wascreated with Darryl McNally of The Dublin Liberties Distillerypresumably from oldCooley or Bushmills stock and is aBourbon cask-aged blend of Single Malt and Grain whiskies finished in virgin US Oak.
Warm spicy vanilla aromas, smooth and sweet on the palate with freshness and tannin from the new oak and lingering toffee and chocolate tones.