FOOD FILE:The Euro-toques National Food Forum and Fair is taking place at Brooklodge, Macreddin, Co Wicklow tomorrow, and this year pork is on the menu. It's too late to register for the forum, but a dedicated pig village is being set up alongside the usual farmers' market (11am-4pm), and there will be organic pigs on view in the woods.
Slow Food Limerick and Region also has a porcine party planned, and will be roasting a pig on a spit at Caroline and Joe Rigney’s Rare Breed Farm in Kilcornan on Sunday, September 27th. The pig will be filled with apples from Rachel O’Grady’s orchard in Askeaton, slow-cooked over aged beechwood and turf, and dressed with Nature’s Bounty relish. Apart from the roast pork sandwiches that will be on offer, the event will feature demonstrations on pig husbandry, beekeeping, horse-shoeing, soad-bread baking and apple jelly making. Admission is €5, and non-members as well as Slow Food members are welcome. Rigney’s, Kilcornan, Co Limerick, noon-5pm.
Pork is flavour of the month
The Euro-toques National Food Forum and Fair is taking place at Brooklodge, Macreddin, Co Wicklow tomorrow, and this year pork is on the menu. It's too late to register for the forum, but a dedicated pig village is being set up alongside the usual farmers' market (11am-4pm), and there will be organic pigs on view in the woods.
Slow Food Limerick and Region also has a porcine party planned, and will be roasting a pig on a spit at Caroline and Joe Rigney's Rare Breed Farm in Kilcornan on Sunday, September 27th. The pig will be filled with apples from Rachel O'Grady's orchard in Askeaton, slow-cooked over aged beechwood and turf, and dressed with Nature's Bounty relish. Apart from the roast pork sandwiches that will be on offer, the event will feature demonstrations on pig husbandry, beekeeping, horse-shoeing, soad-bread baking and apple jelly making. Admission is €5, and non-members as well as Slow Food members are welcome. Rigney's, Kilcornan, Co Limerick, noon-5pm.
A life lived large
She has been imprisoned twice; she admits to having cheated on her beloved husband, and, worst crime of all, she was once a self-confessed "finicky eater". She is also credited with perhaps the best risotto recipe ever – Risotto al Limone (you'll find the recipe online, if you can't wait to get the book). Italian food writer Anna Del Conte has lived in Britain since 1949 and now, at the age of 84, lives in a barn conversion in Dorset. Her "memoir with food", Risotto with Nettles (Chatto and Windus, £12.99), is a rollercoaster read that is surprisingly frank and thought-provoking. Del Conte has lived life to the full, through good times and bad, and there's plenty here to keep you turning the pages.mcdigby@irishtimes.com
No need to pack a picnic for this festival
Good food is an intrinsic part of this weekend's Electric Picnic festival in Stradbally, Co Laois, where Michelin-starred chef Dylan McGrath has the tough job of catering to the whims – last year Grace Jones apparently requested 50 oysters – of the performers in the backstage area. Punters also eat well at the Picnic, with more than 50 food stalls – selling everything from sushi to "super sprout salads" – at which to refuel. There's even a stall offering: "mashed potatoes, teas and beverages". And the food police from the Bridgestone Guides will be on patrol, seeking out tasty, healthy, well-presented food for consideration for the Bridgestone Guide Electric Picnic awards. Last year's festivalgoers included TV chef Rachel Allen (left), who managed to track down a plate of something tasty after her cookery demo.
DIARY DATE
An excuse is never needed to vist Farmleigh House in Castleknock, Dublin 15, but next weekend's SeptemberFest independent drinks festival looks too good to miss. In addition to sampling artisan beers, ciders, whiskeys, liqueurs and juices, you can meet the people who make them, and attend talks given by experts in the fields of brewing and distilling. There will be a food market, too, and the festival will run on Saturday and Sunday, from 11am to 6.30pm. Admission is free. For more details see www.bordbia.ie.