This week’s post doesn’t really qualify as a recipe . Instead, we’ve let some of our wonderful suppliers do all the work for us. As Spring develops ambitions of Summer, we thought that we’d compile a limited edition burger kit  available to order online here from our New Antrim street cafe .

Andarl farm’s PORK and APPLE Burgers have always been a Rua deli staple and well loved by our customers. However,  the addition of one of our favourite new products , Builín Blasta’s SMOKED ONION MAYO,  pushes this sandwich to another level.

From the kitchen of Heather Flaherty and her Spiddal Café of the same name, this mayo is an utterly delicious accompaniment for burgers, sandwiches, as well as a base for an egg mayo, potato salad or coleslaw. We absolutely love it, and think you will as well.

Our Kit also features our own sweet pickled red  onions as well as some Irish baby gem lettuce and brioche buns, and Colm and crew have also made some delicious polenta chips to go with the kit. Numbers are limited , but even if you miss out this week, we’ll be stocking the burgers, mayo as well as another new addition, a pack of Walsh’s Blaas. 

Here comes the summer.

Put together by Colm in our New Antrim St. cafe, this salad was a starter option for our Mother’s day menu. He used the wonderful St Tola original log for this recipe. Siobhan and the team at St Tola make a wonderful range of Goat’s cheese from their farm in Inagh, County Clare. If you’d rather avoid the process of whipping the cheese, you could also use a lighter variety such as their tubs of St Tola ‘DIVINE’ which is a much lighter, curd-style variety. Of course, feel free to use other Irish Goat’s cheese such as the cheese from Galway Goat’s farm. We stock all these varieties in our shop on Spencer St.

You’ll be spoilt for choice with greens in the coming weeks, and we managed to get some lovely purple sprouting broccoli from the crew at Glasraí, but a stem broccoli would also work as well. Good quality asparagus will be available around May, and also works well for the salad.

Chargrilled  Greens and ‘whipped’ St Tola Goat’s Cheese salad with Romesco
Serves 2 as a main, or 4 for a starter

Ingredients 
For the Romesco sauce

• 100g roasted walnuts
• 4 red peppers roasted, skins removed
• ½ teaspoon of chopped garlic
• 1 dessert spoon sherry vinegar
• Olive oil to loosen
• Salt
• Whipped goats
• 200g Irish goat’s cheese
• 70 ml cream
• Greens (Stem Brocolli, PSB or asparagus all work well)

Method

1. Roast and skin your peppers.
2. Reserve the oil, and blitz all other ingredients in a food processor or with a mortar and pestle. With the blade running, add some olive oil to loosen the mix. The sauce will keep well in your fridge covered for up to a week.
3. Whip the goat’s cheese and cream in a processor on high speed until smooth (30-45 seconds). Do not over whip it will become grainy
4. Blanch or steam your greens for 2 minutes and then chill immediately by placing in a bowl of iced or cold water.Drain and reserve
5. Get your chargrill up to temp
6. Put a small amount of olive oil onto your vegetables and toss to coat them( it’s very important not to oil the grill pan as it will end up frying the veg rather than charring them)
7. Place your vegetables on the hot chargrill for 1 minute on either side
8. Remove the vegetables and lightly season with salt

Assemble your salad and serve with some nice bread and something lovely to drink.

It’s wild garlic time of the year again and we always try and post a few recipes to celebrate one our of favourite wild ingredients.

We were very flattered that the mighty Jess Murphy from KAI featured a reworking of our Wild Garlic Soda bread in last week’s ‘Food and Wine’ magazine in the Sunday Business Post and, frankly, made it better. Jess recommends the inclusion of a good Irish farmhouse cheese and recommended Mayo’s own ‘Barr Rua’ (no relation) from Dozio cheese makers or over the border for some deliciously nutty ‘Kylemore’.

Jess also brought to our attention the wonderful ‘Little Mill’ flour from Co Kilkenny, which we hope to be getting in stock at the shop real soon. Getting out there in the lashing rain and finding some wild garlic is all part of the buzz, but if you can’t arsed, we’ve also got some in the shop. Spread with lots of Irish butter and as Jess says, ‘It’s heaven on a plate’.

Wild Garlic Soda Bread

• 450 g plain white flour, preferably from The Little Mill, plus a little extra for dusting
• 5 g Achill Island Sea salt
• 5 g bread soda, sieved into flour
• 400 ml of (Cuinneog) buttermilk
• A handful of wild garlic leaves, washed
• 150g Dozio Barr Rua cheese, Kylemore or Cooolatin cheddar , gratedButter to serve

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 220C
2. Sieve all dry ingredients into the bowl.
3. Lightly chop the wild garlic and add into the buttermilk
4. Add the cheese to the dry ingredients, then pour in the buttermilk.
5. Use your hand to lightly mix the ingredients until they just come together, then dust your counter with flour and tip out the dough.
6. Shape into one ball, cut a cross on top and then place on a floured tray and place into the oven.
7. Reduce the temperature to 190C and bake for around 30 minutes. You can also make several savoury scones with the dough, instead of one large one and cook in the same way.