20 bliain ag fás – apparently.
This week was quiet hectic, kicking off with my 20 year school reunion on Friday. Yes I know I don’t think so either 😉 Although I did stay out until 4am I was sensible with the demon drink and felt fine for the next big do on Saturday. My father in law turned 80 last week so we all got together for food, drink, music and song. It was fabulous! But I really felt all the excesses for the rest of the week. Hmmm maybe it is 20 years since I was in school… Still haven’t learnt a thing about being sensible. Hurrah! Many of my in-laws are amazing musicians. Some of my readers will have heard them at our wedding no doubt. I think between my family, my in-laws and the Outlaws we probably cover the whole gamut of musical styles. So on Saturday, I sang my version of this amazing song, The Book of Love by the Magnetic Fields. It has a strong resonance for me because I first heard it on Valentine’s Day last year. This was an especially difficult time for my in-laws but I knew they would appreciate this song with its down-to-earth romanticism. It’s bitter sweet for me. Here is Peter Gabriel singing it live and lovely.
Music may be the food of love but we’re here to talk actual food so excuse the slight diversion but I like to share many things.
Friday
Lunch: Gnocchi with pesto – I needed a good carbie lunch that I knew they would eat as Fridays are shaping up to be a super busy afternoon too. Nipper 1.0 had his first choir practice in the city centre so I had to keep everyone going for that. To keep crankiness at bay I also brought along Babaduck’s Amazing Star bars (kind of swanky rocky road) and Wellington Splats (my squares that had gotten battered on their travels.)
Dinner: Pizza as usual. Well I went out for dinner with my old school chums. I had a delicious but very garlicky broccoli pasta dish in Marios in Ranelagh. I probably hadn’t been there for about 20 years either!
Saturday
Lunch: Bagels with choice of filling on the hoof before hitting the road.
Dinnner: Pops’ bash with goodies galore.
Sunday
Lunch: We weren’t 100% sure where we’d end up for lunch but due to certain so-called being incapacitated we left early-ish. We stopped en route to Dublin at The Tap, a place, I’ve been watching develop over the years driving up and down. The drive is too short to justify a stop but I was starving so we stopped off and had a lovely lunch. An unusual spot where the kids found much to amuse themselves. Apart from the too-tall glasses that restaurants seem to always give to kids and which they always then spill they were also very kid-friendly.
Dinner: Bolognese from the freezer. I love my freezer as I was now officially exhausted.
Monday
Lunch: Hot dogs which are one of the nippers’ absolute favourite lunch options. Why do I bother…?
Dinner: Chicken and couscous – this title doesn’t really do this amazing dish justice. I absolutely will post this recipe as it is a favourite with the family.
Tuesday
Lunch: Leftover chicken and couscous for some and I honestly can’t remember what the others had.
Dinner: Pasta with roasted brocolli – this was only grand. It was a bit dry so I ended up larruping olive oil on the finished dish thus over-riding any “skinniness”.
Wednesday
Lunch: Whole wheat pasta with oven dried and garlic sauce
Dinner: Candied pork with sweet potato wedges and green beans
Thursday
Lunch: I had soup from the freezer. PB &J on the hoof for everyone else as we dashed about.
Dinner: Roast trout & little taters with carrots. This fish dish was a hit. I’m getting there!
Friday Pizza
Rhythm and roots
I’m sure you’ve been following my adventures with beetroot with interest. No? I haven’t been going on as much about them lately. We had a sad enough crop this year so all we had was one beetroot salad and, of course, Chocolate Beetroot Brownies.
Next year I’m doing this though.
BeetBox from Scott Garner on Vimeo.
Huckle the curious & Nippers go nuts
The whole family bar Himself gets a mention on this month’s Curious Wines Wine Blog.
I first became aware of Curious Wines on Twitter and partly because of my work I am very interested to watch how Irish companies are using new web technologies to promote their businesses. I also like wine. Then I got lost in Bandon and like a big purple and green sentinel what did I see before me but the Curious Wines warehouse. I was still lost but at least I knew there were people like me out there!
Then I decided I was going to buy some of their wine so I went for their Curious Old World Mixed Case at the bargain price of EUR89.00 for 12 bottles (which included a voucher I picked up on Twitter – see it does work!). While the actual drop-off proved a little difficult* I got my wine in time for the weekend and we have been thoroughly enjoying it since.
So I can’t describe wine but so far I have liked all of them but particularly loved the Mirabello Pinot Grigio and we are currently drinking the V Pinot Noir from Translyvania. Yum! Himself enjoyed the La Revolution Grenache but I’m a relative newcomer to Red so my palette is probably to immature to appreciate it 🙂
All the family got something out of this online purchase as you can see from the following meeja:
*The delivery of anything that one buys online is always a bit of a saga isn’t it? I work full time. So does Himself (kinda). It’s not always possible to be there for deliveries. It must also be a pain for delivery companies to arrive and not be able to deliver.
Knit for the fainthearted
Last Tuesday I was very lucky to have been invited to the screening of the Tisch Film School/ Hot Press music videos. There were 13 videos in all and while one or two of them were a little unoriginal and one or two were a little unfocused or under-edited, you could not fault their production. They were so professional looking I was amazed. The students as I understood it were in second year and they spend a term in Dublin. These particular videos are shot over a weekend, I think. (Sorry I’m a little ropey on the facts but the students were enjoying their last big Irish night out before heading back to the States so you can imagine, facts weren’t at the forefront of their minds!)
It’s such a great opportunity for the musicians chosen as well because they end up with fresh, professional and original videos. The students also sometimes make videos for music that they like and their take on Digifucker by Fight Like Apes is hilarious. I also
Here below is Abigail’s video which was directed by Adena Rice, a very talented lady who knit nearly everything that you see in this video. Amazing.
I hear as well from my friends in the book club tonight that there are even some knitted leaves in Vienna in Austria that didn’t make it home in time for the video. I myself crocheted one leaf that ended up looking like a sperm and so was abandoned…
Enjoy the vid!