Foodie Fridays - Shamrock Shakes

Well, to be sure, tis the season for everything Oirish again. Begorrah.

(The US seems to relish Paddywhackery far more than was ever evident in Dublin, be Jaysus...)

However, nothing at all says St. Patrick's Day to me like the reappearance of commercials and posters for Shamrock Shakes at McDonalds. Can there be anything better than a mint-flavoured sugary milkshake to wash down your burger and fries?

What I didn't know - and I must thank the ever-brilliant Michael K of dListed for this - is that the Shamrock Shake actually has a MASCOT. His name is Uncle O'Grimacey. Apparently he even had his own commercials, in the dim-and-distant past. Thanks to the glorious interweb, I can share this with you...

March 17th is actually my father's birthday. So it tends to be more about him than about greenery, snake-banishing and hardcore drinking at my house!

Foodie Friday - Anne Burrell

I LOVE the way Anne Burrell cooks. Although I fear she uses too much salt. Like, WAY too much. But her Italian recipes are so delicious-looking, and her attention to detail and flavour are so enthusiastic, I'm a fan. Flavour action! Garlic destiny! Thank you for coming bowl! Etc.

30 Before 30 #3 - Soda

I went to see a play at the end of the summer holidays last year and spent the entire first half craving a Diet Coke. I felt like Elaine Stritch having an attack. (But without the vodka stingers and the lifetime of Sondheim and hooch.) Having ascertained that I wasn't diabetic, and having sated myself with a 7 Up during the intermission of the play, I spent the second half still craving more soda. After the show I had dinner with some great people, and probably drank enough Diet Coke to fill a hip-bath. And this was at DENNYS. Shame squared.

The following day, feeling unwell after so much carbonated sugar, I pronounced (to myself) that I was going to go cold turkey. Mainly just to see if I could. Boy has it been rough. It's only when you stop acquiescing to the constantly-available nectars that you realise just how omni-present they are. Coca Cola advertising becomes immediately more visible and distasteful when you stop drinking it. (Despite REALLY wanting to.)

I had heard many years ago that Sprite is officially 30% sugar - I suppose it's no wonder that it was my favourite drink, for which I was notorious in Greece. My friends there were ashamed that I would order it, nearly every night. It's still delicious, I'm sure - it'd want to be - but I'm done with it. When I turned 29 last summer I toyed with the idea of stopping drinking sugary sodas at some point in the future - but now that it is fully a quarter of a year since I touched a drop of it, at all, I am happy to put it out there as another of the 30 Before 30 achieved. I do not drink soda any more.

Sunday Spices - Celery Seed

I must confess, I absolutely loathed celery when I was small. Probably because my Dad always cooked it in the same pot as my beloved carrots, and the flavour often leaked from one to the other. Stories of the Conor next door eating the stuff raw made no impact, and then later hearing that some people eat celery with PEANUT BUTTER (another taste I developed rather later in my life) truly horrified me.

I'm not sure that I'd go all out and say that I now love celery or anything, but it's definitely part of many flavours, so I've been paying more attention to it of late. At Christmas, I made two big batches of stuffing from the recipe we used when I was growing up (a quarter pound of butter, a pound of mushrooms, two celery stalks, an apple, and a whole bunch of breadcrumbs, all diced, chopped, combined and baked. Sausage meat can be included too, but the sausages here are so demanding in their flavour that I wasn't happy including any...)

With a whole bunch of celery left over from these, I decided to make some soup. But the star surprise was that in Whole Foods I found a packet of celery seeds, which made the soup far spicier and celery-er, and turned out being my new favourite spice! Did you know that it's mostly grown in India? Or that the Ancient Greeks, particularly those occult-obsessed residents of Samothrace, considered it a chthonic plant, heavily associated with death and the underworld? Not so humble now, eh?

I have a whole jar of celery seeds now, which are apparently also great for canning, preserving and pickling. Dunno if I'll be getting THAT far, but I'll definitely add a little for some richness to the next pasta sauce I try.