Reasons To Be Cheerful

Reasons to Be Cheerful, Dec 31st 2011

After tough times in 2011, Claire Byrne and panel discuss whether we still have things to be thankful for.
Produced by Bernadette Comerford.

Contributors:
- Eveleen Coyle who has a background in publishing, but she changed tack seven years ago when her love of food became her work. Her company is called Fab Food Trails. www.fabulousfoodtrails.ie
- Niamh Hourigan is a lecturer in sociology in UCC. Her next book Ireland in the 21st Century: Who are we Now? explores the link between work, family, and identity in Irish society.
- Ian Robertson is Professor of Psychology at Trinity College Dublin and in addition to his numerous academic publications he has published the self-help book Stay Sharp.
- Feargal Quinn is an Independent Senator, founder of the Superquinn chain, and we’ve recently seen him on RTE television in Local Heroes - a campaign to support Irish jobs.
- and in our Cork studio, singer/songwriter John Spillane, who gives us all a reason to be cheerful with the songs on his new album Rock to Cling To.

Eveleen Coyle’s recipes

POTATO SOUP WITH BACON AND VEGETABLES
Serves 4-6

50g butter
900g potatoes, peeled and diced
1/4 big head celeriac, peeled and diced
2 medium carrots, diced
900ml chicken or vegetable stock, or water
1 leek cut lengthways and sliced
1 onion, diced
300 ml cream or milk, optional
pinch freshly ground nutmeg
salt and pepper to seaon
75 g smoked bacon
croutons
2 scallions, cut into strips.

Hear 25g butter in a heavy saucepan and sauté the potatoes, celeriac and carrots. Cover with the stock or water, bring to the boil and simmer for about 40 minutes. Purée half the soup with a mouli and set aside. Heat the rest of the butter in a pan, sauté the leek and onion lightly (be very careful not to overcook or burn them), and combine withe the purée and the rest of the soup. Add the cream or milk (or if you don’t like cream or milk in soup, just add some more stock), season with the nutmeg, salt and pepper and cook for a further 5 minutes. Dice the bacon, brown it in the butter-coated pan.
Serve the soup with the croutons, diced bacon and scallions sprinkled on top.

CANARY PUDDING

120g butter or margarine
120g caster sugar
200g flour
3 eggs
grated rind of half a lemon
1/2 tsp baking powder

Lemon Syrup Sauce
rind of half a lemon
juice of 1 lemon
120 g white sugar
1/2 pint water

Cream the butter, sugar and grated lemon rind together. Beat the eggs and add a little egg and little flour at a time and beat well between each addition. Add the baking powder with the last addition of flour and beat again. Turn into a greased pudding bowl (about 2 pint capacity), cover and steam for about 1 1/2 hours or until a skewer comes out clean.

To make the syrup:
Cut the rind off half the lemon and cut in to fine strips. Put the sugar and water into a saucepan and when the sugar has dissolved and the water boiling, put in the shreds of lemon and simmer gently for a couple of minutes. Finally remove from the heat and strain in the lemon juice.

Turn the pudding out on to a hot dish, and pour a little syrup around it and serve the remainder in a warmed jug.

The syrup is always very popular so we always double the amount

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Reasons to Be Cheerful, Jan 1st 2011

You might think that as a country we haven't got much to be cheerful about at the moment: but it’s the start of a new year, and Claire Byrne has gathered together five people who have been given the task of finding some reasons to be cheerful in 2011.

Róisin Ingle, is a columnist with the Irish Times. She edited The Thank You Book published by the Irish Hospice Foundation earlier this year.

Theo Dorgan is a Corkman who’s been living in Dublin for many years. He’s a poet and the author of two prose books, including Time on the Ocean which was published this year.

Maureen Gilbert is impossible to categorise…in her working life she’s a freelance disability and equality consultant but in work or out of it, she’s one of life’s great enthusiasts.

Mick Wallace is a bit of a contradiction: he’s a builder and property developer who is critical of builders and developers. He has a social conscience, and he loves food and wine and Italy, not necessarily in that order.

Dr. Maureen Gaffney is a psychologist by profession, she’s a broadcaster and columnist, and is currently writing a book called Flourishing Under Fire.

More information on The Thank You Book on http://www.thankyouproject.ie/

Theo Dorgan read his own poem The Promised Garden.

Sephardic orange and almond cake
(by Maureen Gilbert, closely related to a recipe by Claudia Roden)

Serves 12

Place two large oranges in a pan and almost cover with water. Bring to the boil, cover the pan and boil for just under two hours. Drain. Allow the oranges to cool, then cut them open, discard any pips and then pulp the oranges, skin and all, into a puree.

Heat the oven to 190°C or gas mark 5. Prepare and line a 23cm Springform baking tin.

In a large bowl, beat six large eggs with 250g caster sugar. Add one teaspoon of baking powder and 250g ground almonds. (For a delicious variation, substitute 125g ground hazelnuts for the same quantity of ground almonds.) Mix well. Add the orange puree, and mix well again. Pour the mixture into the prepared tin, and bake for about an hour. Allow the cake to cool in the tin before turning out.

This is a very damp cake that should be stored in the fridge. It can be served on its own or with a slightly sour accompaniment, such as plain yoghourt, crème fraiche or fromage frais. It freezes well.

Note that the almonds take the place of both flour and fat. If you use the right type of baking powder, the cake is gluten-free. The term “Sephardic” in its name relates to the cake’s origins in the Judeo-Spanish tradition.

For more on this delicious, varied and fascinating cuisine, see The Book of Jewish Food by Claudia Roden (Penguin Viking, 1997).