The Menu: New marketing fellowship from Bord Bia
Bord Bia, in association with the UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School, has announced the organisation’s latest round of recruitment to select 20 graduates with up to two to three years work experience (and, in some cases, fluency in a second language) for the Bord Bia Marketing Fellowship. This allows participants to obtain an MSc International Marketing Practice masters while also working on behalf of Irish food and beverage companies in one of the 12 key overseas markets. The Menu has personally encountered these fine industrious young Gaels in action at various food-related shindigs abroad and can testify to their efficacy and enthusiasm. A bursary of €22,800 is offered in addition to all tuition fees being paid. ( www.smurfitschool.ie/bordbia) Now on a roll, The Menu notes that InterTradeIreland, a body designed to foster trade between North and South of the island, is offering assistance to food SMEs to export cross-border with up to €18K available through the Acumen programme ( www.intertradeireland.com/acumen).
The Bia Sasta Critics’ Club heads off to the very charming Longueville House in Mallow for another of session of dining and dissecting on Feb 2, at 1pm, though The Menu suspects it will be more dining and delirium after a sampling of William O’Callaghan’s wonderful cooking, even more so as a tour of the Longueville Apple Brandy Distillery precedes the meal. (Bookings via Biasasta@hotmail.com) The Menu very much fancies some splendid Kiwi pinot noir available at the next Wine Dinner Series (Jan 27) at the luxurious Galway hotel, The Twelve, featuring the produce of NZ winery Lawson’s Hills meeting fine Connemara Lamb in the form of a simple accompanying supper with Barbara Lawson herself hosting, www.thetwelvehotel.ie
The Menu’s recent heralding of Deep South, a new venture in Cork from the Opera House Café team, became rather mangled in translation but subsequent further investigation reveals the Grand Parade pub to be doing a very fine line in lunches. Well worth checking out ( www.deepsouth.ie). Congrats to Margaret O’Farrell whose blog, A Year on Redwood Farm, was chosen as one of the best Irish/British food blogs of the year in UK publication Fine Food Digest, also responsible for the Great Taste Awards. ( www.ayearinredwood.com)
To The Menu, Keogh’s gluten-free Dubliner Irish Cheese & Onion crisps are nothing more than hearty slices of deep-fried honest Irish spud sporting an umami-packed cheesy crunch with a lingering onion afterglow, everything he expects from these wonderful ‘Farm-to-Fryer’ producers of top-quality Irish crisps. But to one of his dear friends who is also coeliac, they are a gratefully-received concession on an extensive list of otherwise prohibited foodstuffs. www.keoghs.ie
Send Irish food news/events/products to themenu@examiner.ie
Wells Waggle Dance Honey Beer, 5.0%, 500ml — €2.99-3.49
O’Donovans, Bradleys, Next Door Raheen and Sundrive Road, McHughs Named after the dance that bees perform to alert their hive to nectar sources and brewed using South American Fair Trade Honey and crystal malts. Wells (now Wells & Young) bought the brand in the 1990s. Despite being called “honey beer” this is not at all sweet but a refreshing golden ale with a lightly malted flavour. There are nuances of honey on the nose and palate but with any sweetness nicely countered with fuggle and Goulding hops. — Leslie Williams
