The return to college has produced lots of nightmare stories, as students scramble to find affordable accommodation in a scarce and challenging market.

THE Scots have spoken loud and clear, they will remain in the union but nothing will ever be quite the same again.

Every year when Leaving Cert results are released there’s a flurry of excitement and weeks of stress and nail biting until students eventually manage to get onto the courses they have their hearts set on (or their parents have!)

APPLES apples everywhere, ripening faster than we can cook or eat them. So beautiful that we can’t bear to waste even the windfalls, so what to do?

I’m just back from the MAD Food Symposium in Copenhagen, one of the craziest and most influential food events on the planet.

Back to school is a busy and expensive time for so many families around the country and now there’s the challenge of school lunches. This week I’ll concentrate on packed lunches and in future columns I’ll have suggestions for college students.

THE hottest restaurant ticket this summer wasn’t in Dublin, Cork or even Galway. 

WOW, there’s going to be the biggest crop of blackberries this year, so I am gearing myself up for lots of picking expeditions. 

FOR gardeners who grow vegetables and fruit, this is the time of abundance, a period of joy and frustration in equal measure. At last the opportunity to enjoy the fruits of all that digging and hoeing but often there are not enough meal times to use up every last scrap. 

EVERY year we have a thanksgiving feast in the greenhouses towards the end of July — A Long Table dinner for 100 people in the midst of the tomato vines and scarlet runner beans.