Pasta frescaIt's great when a good deli doesn't rest on its laurels and continues to expand and update its offering, and Fallon & Byrne on Dublin's Exchequer Street is doing just that.
I didn't expect to find pickled garlic, a pre-dinner snack beloved of the Spanish, in an Irish shop, but there it was on the shelves in F&B (which means I don't have to smuggle it home in my suitcase any more). Try it blitzed with green olives (three parts olives to one part garlic), some salt, a squeeze of lemon juice and a drizzle of olive oil, for tapenade with a difference. The Coquet brand of pickled garlic costs €2.75. Use the plain variety for this tapenade.
F&B has also introduced a range of fresh, filled pasta, made with organic eggs, which it is bringing in from Italy. Sold by weight at the cheese and charcuterie counter, the range includes butternut squash and sage tortelli, venison tortelloni, wild mushroom ravioli and asparagus and pecorino tortelli. Try the wild mushroom variety with a drizzle of good olive oil, some chopped flatleaf parsley and a little finely grated lemon rind, or the butternut squash and sage with some finely chopped sage and orange rind in melted butter. A dusting of grated Parmesan is the final touch.
The pasta works out at about €4/€5 per portion, and takes only 90 seconds to cook in gently boiling water. Fast food indeed.
Dark and delicious
Throw one of these in your shopping trolley when you see one, and you're in for a treat. It's one of a select bunch of Lindt bars available here that are made at the company's headquarters in Kilchberg, Switzerland, and it's top-notch. A square or two, if you haven't eaten it all, would add a spicy sweet kick to a chili con carne or a dark wine-rich sauce. Lindt Excellence Dark Chilli 100g bar, €2.29, from Dunnes; Donnybrook Fair; Morton's, Ranelagh; and independents nationwide.
Dish it up
These bright enamel serving dishes would look fantastic filled with relishes and chutneys as part of an ethnic meal, or piled high with different summer berries for a healthy dessert. They come from Kilkenny Design in Kilkenny and Dublin and are part of a range called Azeti that also includes platters, serving plates and bowls in a range of juicy, jewel-like colours. They cost €54.95, tel: 01-6777066.
WEB WATCH
[ www.letscookfrench.comOpens in new window ]
The French-inspired recipes in this website are useful, but it's the "Art of Dining" feature that makes it worth logging on, to read such gems as: "There are three ways to eat bread: cutting it with a knife (tartines, toasts), crunching (buttered rye bread coming with smoked salmon, toasts for foie gras or aperitif settees), or cutting it in small pieces before eating (all other types of bread)". So now you know. However, we're still trying to work out what an aperitif settee is . . . any ideas?