FOR YEARS the “inner hippy” in me has longed to go to a rock festival but I’ve always chickened out at the last minute for a variety of reasons — those huge crowds seemed scary and would I not look and feel completely ridiculous in the midst of all those be-bopping young people.

PEOPLE are flocking to food fairs around the country.

EVERYWHERE I go, every dinner party, every pub, every chance meeting, the topic of conversation is always the same — recessionary chit-chat and endless whinging about the hopeless ineffectual politicians.

WE HAD a lovely invitation to spend a few days in the Bordeaux area with some French friends whose family have been making wine in the Pessac-Leognan, St Emilion, Margaux and Entre-deux-mers area since 1880.

LAST week I brought a beautiful basket of new seasons Swiss chard into the Midleton farmers market. Juicy white stalks and lots of green with leaf. It’s two beautiful vegetables in one.

Thrifty Tip: Place sprigs of thyme into the pockets of clothes to protect them from moths.

Jean Pierre is head chef at Chez Panisse in Berkley, California, for six months of the year. During the summer months he lives in Bordeaux and teaches cooking classes.

ARTO DER HAROUTUNIAN’S name may not be familiar to many but for those with a penchant for North African food, it’s a name worth noting. Arto was born in Aleppo, Syria in 1940 and grew up in the Levant but came to Britain with his parents as a child and remained there for most of his life.

OH MY goodness, the weather would drive you to the drink. I am often at a loss to know what to cook for supper, one minute there is thunder and lightning and flash floods, within half an hour one could be searching for a deck chair to enjoy the scorching sun.

IN JANUARY 2002 a tall gangly irrepressible girl with thick dark curly hair and a wonderful gappy smile arrived at Ballymaloe Cookery School in a cute little Renault Deux CV.