FOR this week’s survey we looked at chunky bars for school and work and found plenty, unearthing gluten-free products along the way.

For best results, children need to refuel with carbohydrates, proteins, and fruit and vegetables during school breaks.

Core values: Valerie O’Connor enjoys the fruits of nature’s bounty, with apples at the very top of her foraged and found food pile. 

Valerie O’Connor has a Proustian moment when a simple question prompts a trip to the land of dinner in the middle of the day and a time when tea was had at teatime.

Metalman Heat Sink Smoked Chilli Porter , 5.0% ABV; 330ml — €2.80

“Each of us lives only one life: make sure that it really is the best life it can be.”

Galway Hooker’s Irish Pale Ale began production in 2006 and was the first of the second wave of Irish craft beers (Franciscan Well and Carlow were the previous decade). 

IN Ireland we drink about three kilos of tea each year, most of it made using teabags. Tea is big business, worth over €130m.

Macivors cider orchards were first planted in 1855 and are still in the same family. 

CAN coffee make you bulletproof? Well, not exactly, but Dave Asprey, the man who pioneered bulletproof or buttered coffee, has thought about that question more than most.

IT CAN be hard to get through the day without a snack or two, and all too often those snacks come in the unhealthy form of biscuits, cakes or crisps.

 

John Relihan, former head chef at Jamie Oliver’s Barbecoa BBQ restaurant, shows Joe McNamee how to fire up the perfect barbie.

A limited release Poitín from Teelings Whiskey Distillery in Dublin which opened in March last year in Dublin’s Liberties. 

Baby carrots are beginning to pop their orange tops through the soil. They are tender and sweet this time of year and look great kept whole in salads and other dishes.

A chef’s domain is his or her restaurant. But what happens at home when it’s the spouse who’s wielding the spatula, asks Arlene Harris.

THERE are many reasons that you may have more vegetables than you need, left-over bits and bobs after a big family occasion, a glut from the garden or a good offer at a local shop or farm.

Seaweed, sea algae, call them what you will. Put them in a smoothie, pop them into the bath for silky smooth skin, sprinkle some into a healthy spelt bread, seaweeds are just really good for you. 

AT first, it seems wrong to mention a sweet tooth to Stephen and David Flynn, the Wicklow twins who make up the phenomenally successful Happy Pear, but here’s the thing: kick-starting a health food revolution is not about denial, it’s all about making nutritious food lip-smackingly good.

BAGS of lettuce — bags of flavour, bags of crispness. At least that’s what we should find when we pay anything from 89c to €3.99. 

Valerie O’Connor extols the virtues of the yellow root.    

WHEN Uncle Ben’s asked us to be a guinea pig for its healthy plate campaign here at Feelgood, muggins put up her hand.

This weekend all eyes are on the Ballymaloe Litfest of Food & Wine. Joe McNamee meets the chefs – and discovers their favourite meals

THE king of Italian cheese, Parmigiano Reggiano is also known as Parmesan, which it was called until 1951 when a small number of artisan producers worked to protect their product.