The Menu: Have a pornstar martini or strawberry mojito delivered to your door
The Strawberry Mojito cocktail from Electric Bar in Cork city
If you’re anything like The Menu you are by now up to your elbows in muck and manure out in the garden, readying it for growing season and already planting for the months ahead. Any novice or prodigal gardeners returning to the soil and in need of a kickstart would do well to check out the GROWBox from GIY, enabling you to grow the veg from the first season of the GIY TV series on RTÉ. Containing all you need to get started, you can be up and running within minutes of opening up the pack as it provides all the seeds, pots and compost required. Contents include seeds (beetroot, oriental greens, tomato, carrot, and peas), the Gourmand World Cookbook Award-winning book, to the TV series, written by Michael Kelly of GIY, valued at €20; a Grow Your Own guide; pots, trays, compost discs; seaweed dust to feed the soil and plants; notebook, pencil and plant labels. €44.99
While The Menu has been spending far too much time of late in the cocktail lab, those more indolent types preferring to have their martinis shaken or stirred for them would do well to check out the innovative new crowd-fundraising campaign launched by Cork’s Electric Bar & Restaurant, who are raising money via a crowdfunding campaign to deliver some delicious bottled cocktails to your doorstep. The range created by Electric mixologists Carl D’Alton and Traford Murphy includes their own Pornstar Punch, a variation on the immensely popular Pornstar Martini, Strawberry Mojito, Garden Collins and a Peanut Butter Jelly, their take on an Old Fashioned.
indiegogo.com/projects/electric-cocktails
There is a distinct frisson of nervous excitement in the Irish hospitality air as the industry gears itself up for some sort of re-opening, whatever form that might take and The Menu is delighted to be one of the guest speakers for an online Zoom discussion on the future of Irish restaurants (April 27, 6pm), hosted by his great comrade, Keith Bohanna, erstwhile spiritual leader of Real Bread Ireland and Bia Beag food activist, as part of a series for the Future Kinsale organisation.
Speakers include three Kinsale restaurateurs: Tracy Keoghan (Lemon Leaf), Kinsale; Paul McDonald (Michelin-starred Bastion); and Barbara Nealon (St Francis Provisions).
The wide-ranging 75-minute discussion will roam far, covering challenges and changes facing the industry, how the restaurateurs have adapted or plan to adapt for the future, and what obstacles and opportunities lie ahead.
https://ti.to/future-kinsale/our_restaurants_cafes
From their perfectly positioned perch high above the city, The Montenotte Hotel has conjured up a May Day special, botanical-themed afternoon tea available for click/call&collect. It features light, fresh and herbal dainty finger sandwiches, fluffy scones and a range of sweet treats, served on a bespoke three-tiered carryout box. Treats include Lavender & White Chocolate Posset, Rosemary Infused French Chocolate Tart and a throwback Montenotte Battenberg, while savouries include Lemon Balm Chicken, Coronation Prawn and Creamy Hen’s Egg sandwiches. (€55, serves two. Louis Picamelot, Blanc de Blancs Brut NV +€40. Available April 30 to May 3. tel 021 453 0050
White Gables restaurant in Moycullen, County Galway, has taken to online trading with some aplomb since lockdown began and their Hero Hamper is designed as a tasty little thank you gift for the hero in your life, whether it be family member, friend or neighbour of anyone who is deserving of some edible gratitude, all starting from €55, delivered nationwide.
To continue just producing their extraordinary range of Irish-grown exotic mushrooms — the very best available in the country — would be more than enough for most people. But what makes the output of recovering food scientists Lucy Deegan and Mark Cribben of Ballyhoura Mushrooms enterprise so truly compelling, is their never-ending compulsion to continue experimenting in the lab to create new award-winning products and the very latest is their range of freeze-dried fruit.
They have developed their expertise to produce a complete range including Blackberries, Wild Bilberries, Blueberries, Raspberries, Cherries, Blackcurrants, Strawberries, Redcurrants and have even managed to produce freeze-dried Blood Oranges. What’s more, the process leaves structure and vitamin content intact, ensuring they remain as nutritious as the day they were picked.
Packaged in glass jars to protect from moisture reabsorption after opening and for easy recycling, The Menu has been up to all manner of high jinks with his initial consignment, from baking to confectionery to the creation of all manner of tasty breakfast cereals and even as delicious little solo nibbles but of late he has found his own metaphorical ‘lab coat’ to experiment with their use in cocktail making with some quite magnificent results, not least infused in fine Irish gins or added to syrups and cordials and he recently created a quite exquisite Blackwater Distillery Blood Orange Gin cocktail that he crowned with a generous pinch of crushed Ballyhoura Mushrooms Freeze Dried Berries for a finishing touch elevating already excellent into the realm of ethereal.
