Picked by Sue on her walk around the village this morning.
Certainly a sign of summer.

In the summer of 2006 when we started to clear the garden in Le Presbytere we discovered that an old pile of rusty metal and wood was actually the vestiges of two garden seats. We decided we would , at some stage in the future, try and restore them.

Their hour finally arrived this week

Having removed the last raggy slats Síle and I wire brushed and scraped any of the old paint off the frames.

We then painted the metal frame a bright shocking orange which is the colour of a rust primer here.

On special offer in M. Bricolage we found the perfect paint, just the right shade of turn of the century green and very aptly named for us.

Clive had transported from Ireland 20 measured and cut Iroko slats which I massaged with Danish Oil before he screwed them on the newly painted frames.

La Voila !

There follows my dessert from last weeks St Patrick’s Day meal.

There is absolutely nothing traditional about it.

Brown Bread Ice Cream
(with Caramel Whiskey Sauce)

Made with an icecream machine

Sauce
80g Caster Sugar
125ml Water
A small glass of Irish Whiskey

Ice Cream

200g. Wholemeal Brown Bread
3 tbs. Dark Brown Sugar
200g. Sugar
250 ml Whole Milk
6 Egg Yolks
250 ml Cream or Crème Fraiche

First make the sauce;
Melt the sugar in a small heavy based pan and then continue to cook until it turns nut brown.
Carefully pour in the water and stir together until blended.
Let it cool before adding the whiskey.
Cut the bread into rough chunks (but don’t make crumbs out of it).
Put the pieces on a baking tin and sprinkle over the 3 tbs. brown sugar.
Put this into a moderately hot oven (Gas 4/175C/350F) and cook them together until the bread beomes crisp and lightly browned and the sugar has started to caramelize.
Take out and let it cool completely.
When cool, bash it either in a pestle and mortar or in a plastic bag with a wooden rolling pin.
(You don’t want this too fine as you want the crunch to add texture to the ice cream).

Bring the milk to the boil in a small pot.
Beat the egg yolks with the 200g sugar.
Pour the hot milk on the egg yolks and beat together well.
Pour this mixture back into the pot and then put it back on the heat.
Stir continuously with a wooden spoon until it thickens.
It should not boil.

Let this mixture cool completely, stirring from time to time.
Stir the cream into this mixture and then churn in an icecream machine.
Once churned fold in the brown crumbs.
Store in the freezer but remove for about 15 mts before serving.

Serve in individual glasses with the sauce poured over.

As I promised last week I intend to give out the recipes for the dishes I cooked for my Irish night in Le Presbytere last week.
I’ll start with Irish Stew.

This must be the simplest dish ever and certainly was originally cooked in a pot over the fire in a cottage.
It is in essence lamb- originally mutton- with onions and potatoes cooked simply in water until the meat is tender.

In her Ballymaloe Cookbook Myrtle Allen describes how the recipe can become a serious cause of dissention as people argue over which is the authentic version.
The addition of carrots, common in Munster, and pearl barley in Connaught are all perfectly acceptable but I think it is such a simple dish that I prefer it without either.
On the other hand I always throw in some thyme, as we always did at home and I have recently taken to browning the top (as in Lancashire Hotpot) which they could not have done over a turf fire.

Irish Stew
(for 4)

1kg (2.2lbs) Lamb Gigot Chops
1½ kg (3 lbs) Potatoes
450g (1lb.) Onions
1 large bunch Parsley
1 bunch Thyme
450ml (¾ pt.) Water
Salt and Black Pepper

Peel the potatoes and slice them thickly.
Peel and slice the onions.

Chop the herbs and mix together.

In the bottom of an ovenproof casserole put first a layer of the onion, then the chops, season with salt and pepper, sprinkle over the herbs then put a layer of potato. Repeat until all the ingredients are used up finishing with a layer of potato.
Bring the water to the boil and pour over.
Have the oven pre heated to Gas 6, 200C 400F.

Cover the stew well and put the stew into the oven.
Leave it at that temperature until it starts to simmer (10 mts)
Then reduce the temperature to Gas 2,150 C, 300 F (125 C in a fan oven)

Check from time to time, it should be simmering gently.
Top up with a little water if it looks dry.
It should be cooked in 2 ½ hours.
(It also reheats perfectly)

(If the potatoes on the top are not too floury and gone to pieces you could put the casserole under the grill for a couple of minutes to brown them, a heresy but a nice one)

Acquired this interesting abstract a couple of weeks ago.
Tentatively called Snakes I somehow see it as a study in blue and yellow.
The artist ?

Two year old Fionn Butler, the grandson.

Nice little piece in the Irish Times Magazine by Marie-Claire Digby this morning.

This sunny terrace (pictured) in a village in the Languedoc region of France is where you’ll be put to work, as well as enjoy delicious meals that you’ve helped prepare, on former Dwyer’s of Waterford chef/proprietor Martin Dwyer’s first Taste of Languedoc cookery courses (June 22nd-27th and September 28th-October 3rd). Dwyer and his wife Síle run a chambre d’hôte in Thézan Lès Béziers, and the four-day/five-night residential courses will cost €675 per person, including tuition in cooking regional specialities such as cassoulet, duck confit and pissaladière. Full details at lepresbytere.net.

At the moment I am reading When you are engilfed in Flames by David Sedaris.
It is wonderful.
He joins that very select bunch of authors- Bill Bryson, Woody Allen, among their ranks, who actually make me laugh out loud.

Buy it.

(And thanks to daughter Eileen for the birthday present.)

This was what I gave my guests for dinner last night.
Not all traditional I confess , but mostly fairly Irish.
I will give out the various recipes over the next few days.

First I greeted them with some Black Velvet.
This is meant to be a cocktail of 50/50 Champagne and Guinness but I find that too bitter.
Canned draught Guinness mixed with a demi-sec sparkling wine worked very well.

For the Apero cum Starter we gave them Smoked Salmon on Brown soda bread (which Síle made with some smuggled in Howards Oneway Wholemeal Flour)
To give them a little bite I “buttered ” the bread with some entirely non-Irish Olive and Anchovy Mayonnaise- home made of course.

We were blessed with Clive’s recent arrival in the van as he brought with him some excellent joints of back bacon.
These I boiled for an hour, then smathered them in a mixture of honey and coarse seedy mustard before glazing them in a hot oven for another thirty minutes.
As a choice (in fact everyone had both ) I offered a large pot of Irish Stew made with sliced shoulder of lamb , potatoes, onions and carrots.

I made up a small mountain of Colcannon and also very untraditionally fried a head of sliced cabbage in butter.

Dessert is always a problem , I don’t think that we were much concerned with them in traditional Irish cookery.

As Clive had also brought over several kilo of Seville Oranges I decided to do a variation of Madhur Jaffrey’s Orange and Almond cake and make it with these.
To give it that “traditional” appearance I called it marmalade cake- which pleased one of my guests who came originally from Dundee.

I served this with an old classic of mine- Brown Bread Ice Cream , made in my new wonderful ice cream machine which I further gilded by serving with it a dark caramel sauce to which I had added a fair dollop of Irish Whiskey.

To finish ?
Irish Coffees of course.

And so Clive Nunn came to Languedoc from Ballyduff carrying wonderful things in his van.

Six nut-brown eggs laid by the new ladies in his life.
(He claims that these hens move around their house in Ballyduff , peering in windows ,always making sure that they can see him. )

A new long console table for my long narrow hall, designed to carry tourist leaflets and the visitors book and to echo the cherry framed family tree on the wall.
(NB the bowl of shamrock awaiting our guests for the St. Patrick’s Day Festivities)

Twenty two years ago Clive designed and made the cherry sideboard for the restaurant in Mary Street.

Now he has made a set of shelves to hang over it , also in cherry but needing a few years to acquire the patina of its bottom half.
At last we have a place to stash the old French coffee bowls and absinthe and liqueur glasses.

Its all go here at the moment, we had a full week with friends Donal and Petra here- Languedoc laid on the wettest week we have had since we came here in their honour.
However we did manage a trip to Avignon between showers, and rain did not curtail our appetites in any way so the dinner became the highlight of the day.
(And there is no harm in that )

They departed on Tuesday morning only just missing Clive Nunn who arrived from the ferry in his van on Tuesday afternoon bearing various pieces of furniture which he had made especially for the house and a staggering 18 large cardboard boxes with last of the the Dwyer Library.
He has been busy since hammering and sawing and I will show you the results as soon as they are done.
In the meantime I took it on myself to host a party in honour of St Patrick tomorrow night so I have been busy all day preparing French interpretations of national dishes to feed about 14 people of assorted nationalities tomorrow.
My shopping in Super U today included a bottle of Paddy and a fair amount of the black stuff, Clive came from Kilkenny bearing Marmalade Oranges, boiling bacon and shamrock so I will tell you shortly how I put all these together.

In the meantime don’t expect to hear from me until the day after the feast.