Tag: naisc/ links

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A menu that should have been on holidays :(

Camping was fun.

I haven’t written up a weekly menu in ages. I got bored doing it and wondered if you all got bored reading them? (Comments below!) However I also started using a new app to write my weekly menus which made it difficult to copy and paste as I previously did. I am totally in love with this app, AnyList, and it has saved time and trouble a-plenty in our gaff. I have tried numerous grocery/ meal planning apps and this is the only one that has worked well for this household. The app is called AnyList and I’m sorry to report Androids that it is only available for iOS.

These are the reasons I love it:

  1. Both of the adults in our household can see shared lists, add to them and striking things off. Fingers crossed they will bring out an Android app soon so we can include younger family members in the listmaking fun.
  2. Also works beautifully on the iPad. And importantly for my battered old iPad, works really well without Wifi.
  3. In a recent-ish update the ability to import or add recipes and organise them into a weekly calendar was added. This has made this app indispensable to me.
  4. You can then scroll through the ingredients, marking which ones you want to add to your grocery list.
  5. It then goes out and does the shopping for you.

Guess which of those reasons is total wishful thinking? Sigh.

Camping was fun.

So just over a week ago I posted my recipe for Campfire Cones. They didn’t get much of a look in on our holiday which we should still be enjoying. Thanks to the torrential rain in the North West of Ireland, we gave up and came home last Friday. We have one nice day on Keem Beach in Achill which is truly one of the most lovely beaches in Ireland. There are many lovely beaches in Ireland; it’s only a pity there aren’t as many lovely days…

So we are home and trying to maintain the holiday vibe. We’ve had family staying with us for the last couple of days which helped keep up the pretence and the fun factor. A trip to the market in Bushy Park on a fine sunny afternoon helped a lot. I would recommend a wander up there some Saturday: I had a most excellent coffee from the Saltpeter Coffee Truck, I shared a pizza with Nipper 2.0 and 3.0 and Nipper 1.0 and cousins had delicious burgers. There was also a Twink sighting but we were all too shy to talk to her. My sister in law also bought some Brie from the Little Milk Company which I am looking forward to trying out.

One meal taken care of, then I shopped for the following with the much appreciated help of my sister in law – I wish I could have a sister in law along to relieve the boredom of every shop.

I suppose one advantage to being at home is that we could go all out on recipes for holidays, no more one-pot wonders on the Trangia! However we knew we were going to get out and about so we needed some dishes that would be easy to put together. The only new one on the menu is the Chipotle Bean Chilli and it went down a treat with all.

  • Baked Sausages in a Spicy Tomato Sauce from Nessa’s Family Kitchen by Nessa Robbins. This is a great recipe when having a family  with small kids to visit: there is something for everyone in it. Keep your eyes peeled for Nessa’s book – it’s a good family all rounder with some added home nurse tips.
  • Chicken Tikka from VinnieMeyler.com, spices by Green Saffron (highly recommended). Chicken curry when our French family are visiting has become a bit of a running joke. We accidentally served it to them two visits in a row, only realising when we got a strong sense of deja vu when someone objected to a particular aspect of the meal. As we had them for two meals this time we served this up for old time’s sake.
  • Chipotle Bean Chilli with Baked Eggs. This was added to the menu so I could have a go of my new chipotle paste which I picked up from Picado Mexican on South Richmond St. here in Dublin. I’ve been eyeing this shop up for some time, but always from the bus or car so I snatched a moment to pop in (when I was buying Tilda Basmati rice in bulk in a nearby Asian market!) I have since been adding the paste to lots of different sauces – it is delicious. I also picked up a pack of these corn tortillas which had a great flavour and the novelty of their smallness was appreciated by the kids.
  • 25 Minute Cod with Lentils This looks a little disconcerting but tastes AMAZING because, well, bacon.
  • Spaghetti Bolognese by Rachel Allen. I have started making this half and half beef and pork mince as per an option in her recipe. Not only is it more cost effective it adds an extra dimension to the flavour.
  • Pizza Friday!
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Busy fingers

My projects on Ravelry

It’s practically impossible to blog and crochet at the same time. Crochet one, blog two. There just aren’t enough hours in the day. Thanks to Ravelry though I do have an online repository for my uber crochet geekery.

Ravelry is a superb resource and a fascinating database. It must be one of the most successful niche community fora in the world. Consumers, suppliers, hobbyists and professionals discuss all manner of yarnie issues and news in a very well developed and developing site. Personally I don’t have a huge amount of time for the discussions but a huge number of my recent creations have begun as (nearly all free!) patterns found on Ravelry.

Apart from finding challenging and beautiful patterns on Ravelry I have also managed to sell some of my recently inherited stash to a fellow yarnie in the US!

Another amazing resource for burgeoning hookers is YouTube where you will find a gazillion videos to explain any stitch.

 

I’ve been planning a post for ages about the yarns I was introduced to at a recent “yarn tasting” at This is Knit. It will come… One of these days 🙂

 

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Dahlinks! Week 23 2010

Lazy blogger that I am here is the first in a new series entitled Dahlinks! Yes you guessed it’s all about the links I like. I hope that I will post at least twice as much in order to avoid having two sets of Dahlinks in a row! I apologise in advance for this here first one which will include a certain amount of self-reference but once I get that out of the way, my navel will no longer hold much fascination for me and I will look elsewhere.

  1. The first link in this series is to some Irish Language material so excuse me while I continue briefly in Irish! An chéad nasc ná m’altanna ar fad atá scríofa agam do Bheo! go dáta. Tá an bailiúchán ar fad anois cartaithe anseo ar mo bhlag féin. Os rud é go bhfuil an-jab eagarthóireachta déanta ag mo chomhghleacaí Seosamh i mBeo! is féidir liom rá leat go cinnte nach bhféadfá an Ghaeilge a lochtadh iontu. (Ní fhéadfainn sin a rá roimh a chur mé chuige iad, mo náire mé!) Mar sin más múinteoir Gaeilge thú cuirim fáilte is fichead romhat iad a úsáid mar ábhar ranga a fhad is, mar chuid den ceacht, go gcuireann tú iachall ar do dhaltaí, tráchtaireacht a fhágáil leis an mblagmhír chuí. Tá sibhse ag iarraidh Gaeilge a mhúineadh, tá mise ag iarraidh blagadóireacht a mhúineadh agus is cuid lárnach é tráchtaireacht ann.
  2. Is ag scríobh as Gaeilge dom and now that I have the teachers’ attention tabhair cuairt ar blagmhír Tommy ina nochtann sé a thuairim i leith na curaclaim Gaeilge. Ag am na scríbhinne bhí 120 tráchtaireacht aige ar an mír seo.
  3. My sister Abigail had some great news.
  4. I love photos of flowers and plants and you can see these and much more under the Bloom2010 tag on Pix.ie. There are some really beautiful pictures from a variety of Dublin based photographers to see there so have a root round. *groan*
  5. Puddleducks have launched a range of Sun and Beachwear. They very kindly offered us a sneak preview at cost price. I’m only dying to try them out and share my thoughts on them. Sadly when we got to the beach it was the Puddleducks raingear the kids were wearing 🙁 Keep your eyes peeled for a dedicated post soon. Hopefully!
  6. More navel gazing! I’ve been blogging a little over on Dublinblog.ie and hope you will enjoy my posts there which includes the first post in a planned series on Dublin Playgrounds. Dublinblog.ie is a group blog and we are always looking for more writers so please email me at roseanne ag roseannesmith punc com if you would like to get involved.
  7. Rosemary and I finally managed to record a new episode of our podcast about what’s on the telly box, The Rosie View. Hear it and weep as we display our total ignorance of Irish history…
  8. …which I am attempting to rectify by watching the excellent Limits of Liberty which you can catch on the RTÉ Player. (If you are in Ireland and don’t even get me started on that…)
  9. Can’t wait to see Arcade Fire live again. Thanks to schlafshane for the dahlink!
    Arcade Fire at the Notman House from POP Montréal on Vimeo.
  10. @mattyipa and @declancashin tweeted about The Twenty Science Fiction Novels that will change your life. I am mortified to admit that I have read exactly one of them (Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks) but I’m sorry to see that Margaret Atwood did not get a mention there for any of her brilliant science fiction. I have €40 worth of book tokens: this year’s holiers are taking a decidedly science fictional turn!
  11. If you have nowt better to do with the next two hours you could sit at your monitor going “Aw I loooove that!” “Oooh it’s been too long….” “Meh.” “Robbed!” “No way!” at 125 Best Albums of the Past 25 Years according to the editors at Spin magazine. Thanks to Pat O’Mahony for tweeting.

125 Best Albums of the Past 25 Years