Make Your Own Pad Thai

My first pad thai was got from a long-tail boat in Thailand.....not on Phi Phi but somewhere around that vicinity.

Ever since I've been trying to find a pad thai on Irish and European soil that had that authentic taste with the crunchy peanuts, that sweet sugary-ness and those rice stick noodles. The best I've had is, without a shadow of a doubt, Saba's on Dublin's Clarendon St. So I got their cookbook, staked out a few oriental shops around the town (Oriental Market on Moore St is great)....................invited a few friends 'round.....

 

 and made my very own very pad-thai-tasting pad thai........

You'll need......

Meat, veg and noodles:

450g rice stick noodles (even just 400g will do - the shop on Moore St sells them in packs of 400g)
12 prawns
3 chicken breasts (really finely sliced)
3 dessert spoons of sunflower oil
3 eggs beaten
1 dessert spoon of sunflower oil for the eggs
100g bean sprouts
4 spring onions (chopped up into 1cm lengths)
4 dessert spoons of roasted, unsalted peanuts, crushed
1 dessert spoon of dried chillies

The All-Important Sauce:

8 dessert spoons of tamarind juice*
3 dessert spoons/60g palm sugar
2 dessert spoons of sugar
1 dessert spoon dried chillies
1/4 teaspoon salt

Serve with:

1 lime quartered
2 dessert spoons of roasted, unsalted, crushed peanuts
1 dessert spoon of dried chillies

You'll need to.......

*Get going on the tamarind juice - you'll need a pack of tamarind fruit - you put a heaped dessert spoon of it into a cup of hot water and leave it soak for about 10 mins...... then in your hand squeeze the paste in your hand and strain it all with a sieve and use the water with the bits of brown stuff as your juice, you'll get your 8 dessert spoons out of this.

  
 Wash and chop your veg and chicken and prawns....


Now you'll need to get going on the rest of the sauce. Boil your 8 spoons of the above juice, your 60g of palm sugar, and other ingredients in the above sauce list and once the sugars have dissolved leave to simmer. It takes no time.

Next get the peanuts ready. Right I searched high up and low down and couldn't, for whatever particular reason, find unsalted peanuts. So we bought monkey nuts..... and Neil volunteered himself to de-shell them.....

Once de-shelled, crush them all up and roast them in the oven at 180 degrees Celsius for about 20 mins and keep an eye they don't burn.

Cover your rice stick noodles....... this is what they look like pre-soakage.....

( a pack (which will serve 4) cost just over €1 on Moore Street).............in just boiled water for about ten minutes, once softened, rinse with cold water and drain and leave near your hob, ready to toss on your wok. Do this with the dried chillies and peanuts too and your beaten eggs.


In your wok (I used a frying pan - bit of a boo-boo) heat the pan, oil it up and cook your very, very finely chopped/sliced chicken for about 3 mins and then add prawns. Cook both for a further one minute.

Add the noodles and stir all for a minute.

Now add your sauce, you made earlier, and make sure chicken, prawns and noodles are covered.

Bring the noodle mix to the side of the wok and add the eggs. Stir the eggs and then once they start to cook turn the noodle mix over on top of the eggs and mix them altogether.

Now add the beansprouts, spring onions, chillies and peanuts. Toss them altogether for about 30 seconds.

Serve with crushed nuts, chillies, a quarter of a lime and some sprigs of coriander.

Do squeeze the lime in.......

5 Best Tikka Masalas in Dublin

Whenever I go away I make sure I take in the city's best chicken tikka masala complete with peshwari naan bread. I have sampled ones in Thailand, Rome, London and even Barbados but the best one I ever had was in Lanzarote.

One in New York came a close second (Dawat - owned by a famous actress and just off Fifth) but the one in Lanzarote, my God! It was made by the impassioned hands of an Indian woman, who had come to the Canary island with her ailing husband. He had been told to get some good, clean air for his lungs and they took a three week holiday there and never left. He has since returned to full health.

Meanwhile back in Dublin, where I live, I have gone a similar hunt......

In no particular order and all for varying reasons, the following are the 5 best tikka masalas in the city.

The Spice of India on South William St does the yummiest of tikka masalas. Total yum-ness. Situated right beside the Jewel in the Crown and opposite The Port House, the only thing that really makes this place stand out aesthetically is its bright orange awning. There's no need for a starter, just head straight to the main event. Their chicken tikka masala is done with proper skewered tandoori chicken, the sauce is thick and tomato-y and get their pilau rice it's tasty. The peshwari naan comes in four, perfect-for-sharing, quarters and is perfectly sweet and nutty and piping hot and fresh. Get your own rice, share a portion of bread and it'll set you and your dinner date back by around €20 a head. http://spiceofindiad2.weebly.com/contact-us.html

Somewhere where you really can't go wrong in the chicken tikka masala stakes is Jaipur. There are a few around. There's a Chakra one in Greystones which is fancy out and there's one in Dalkey (you can't get through the door with all the award plaques on the walls). There's also one in Malahide, Ongar and George's Street. Ananda is also associated (see below). My favourite one is in Dalkey. The guys there are lovely. The tikka masala is particularly creamy here and they do a great old early bird which they're flexible with. All in all, they're sound, they can cook and the price point is good. A winner. http://jaipur.ie/

 Now.......... if you're going all out and want haute cuisine as well as Indian then head for Ananda in Dundrum Town Centre. Executive Head Chef, Sunil Ghai, has won every award under the red hot sun and as soon as you step over the threshold of this place you'll soon discover why. I went here for a special occasion because price wise it's not somewhere you can just pop in willy nilly to. Bear in mind, the chicken tikka masala isn't labelled as such on the menu, it's murgh something or other, you'll be able to work it out if you read the details below the heading......or alternatively ask the waiter/waitress. It's over €20 just for your main. But God is it worth it.......this man has won prizes because he's very, very good. The cocktails are nice and the general atmosphere is fine-diney. http://anandarestaurant.ie/

 Another good spot for a chicken tikka masala is Indian Summer in Stillorgan on the Lower Kilmacud Road. Now I didn't actually consume my tikka masala on site, I got it to go, one Saturday evening post work. As far as take-aways go.........and quality of food is concerned, I'll absolutely give this joint a 5 out of 5. You pay for what you get, it's not cheap as chips for a reason, mainly because it's very decent food. http://www.indian.ie/

 Last on the list, but not last in podium terms is Indie Spice, of which there are a few around. I'm familiar, from a three-month rental sojourn, with the one in Sandymount. This one is the nuttiest in an almond-y kind of way. They do loads of deals and the peshwari naan bread is to die for folks. I've never actually sat down in the place I've only ever gotten it to go, but it was top-notch restaurant standard take-away. Love it. www.indiespice.com

Fairylights

Doors

Cool Couches

Wallpaper

Shower Curtains

Orangery

Retro Interiors

Floor-to-Ceiling Windows

Tomato and Pepper Crostini

Ode to Julie and Julia........

Not sure to which one more....... Julia Child aka Meryl or the actual food blogger Julie Powell..... But in that juicy movie detailing the real-life passions of a Yankee food blogger, the said food blogger, makes a very juicy looking crostini for her and her husband, it is over this very crostini that Julie decides to take on Child's great work, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and to blog about her adventures..........

Here's what you'll need.....

1/2 red pepper
1/2 yellow pepper
10 cherry tomatoes
A handful of chopped basil
1/2 red onion
1/2 glove crushed garlic
A good glug of olive oil
A good glug of balsamic vinegar
A fresh Vienna roll

You'll need to......

Wash and chop/crush/slice your vegetables and fruit (tomatoes) and throw them into a bowl and cover in oil and vinegar until they look like this.....

Leave them all hang out together for a while, 10 minutes will do but the longer the better and tastier. Meanwhile slice up your roll and toast, when toasted put a little bit of olive oil on the bread and spoon on the tomatoes, peppers, onions and basil........

Sheer divinity. And that's it then!

Greenacres

I love getting a bite to eat somewhere you can browse around afterwards and pick up a few bits in their shop there, basically somewhere that's that bit more than just a restaurant or a cafe.

Greenacres in Wexford town have a nice lunch and dinner menu. Have great breads and a deli with preserves and olives and sun-dried tomatoes and there's an art gallery there too. Oh and they have lots of fancy wines for sale too.

It's in this gorgeous building......

Me and my date just got a light lunch each.

I went for the goat's cheese, walnut salad with balsamic dressing and it looked like this.....

The date went for the anti pasta meat plate that came with a little Kilner jar filled with pesto......

After we'd gobbled up our lunch, we had ours outdoors (the heatwave), they have lovely outdoor seating, one of the few places in Wexford/Ireland, we went inside to see if they had any of their amazing Guinness bread left to purchase......... they didn't..... devastation...... it sells out everyday, we were just too late......so we went for the tomato and olive bread instead......

And we got some of their lovely olives to bring home with us too.

But honestly - the Guinness bread....... will try get recipe.

http://www.greenacres.ie/

Lugala Days

If you want to head out to the wilds of Wicklow but not meet every Tom, Dick and Dublin Harry then Lugala and the Knocknacloghoge walk is a pretty safe, non-crowded one to do.

Park your car at the black gate seen here, go through the gate and just start walking down, down, down...... through the old Guinness estate, by all the deer and over little bridges and through great big, tall trees. It takes two hours to Lough Tay and back but bring a picnic, it's gorgeous down there.

That's an old scouts cottage I think........

OK, so the full route is here.

And here's what you'll discover along the way.

Looks like Canada doesn't it? Oh yeah it's where they filmed parts of the Vikings with Gabriel Byrne, I'll show you the lake when we get there - it's at the end. This is one of the many bridges you'll cross. See, not a sinner?

And after this bridge you'll head along this green path....... 

And this is where you'll see the fields of wild deer.......

You'll eventually come to the scouts cottage (let's just call it that).......

Before arriving at Lough Tay where Vikings is being filmed.

Up to the right there is where the big, fancy Guinness house is nowadays. Climb Djouce and you'll see it from above.

After all that exertion, we chilled by the river with all the midges.........

And had our picnic...... 

Before heading home the way we came past the fields with all the deer and rabbits.......

Glendalough and the Spinc

Another spectacular glacial valley in Ireland that is the well trodden is Glendalough in Co Wicklow.

That photo was taken really early one Saturday or Sunday morning, two summers ago and it turned out to be a scorchio day so me and my pal Susan even ended up going for a dip in the little rock pools on our way back.

But the rest of the snaps were taken on a recent and dull, wet and very windy, average Irish day.

This is the route we took, the White Route http://www.wicklowmountainsnationalpark.ie/walkingtrails.html, which starts at this little waterfall....

Before beginning the steep ascent up these sleepers......

You go up 600 of these and then come out on top of the valley and walk all along the top of the cliff until it starts to meet a river...... and you come to this bridge.....

If you run out of water worry not you can have some of the fresh stream water to quench your climbing thirst, well we drank it anyway and we're still alive.....

After you cross the bridge you'll have a view something like this.....

See the lake in the background? That's where you'll have come from.......

You'll keep walking all along this big, powerful flow of water, it had been raining heavily, so it was a fearsome flow the day we went.....

Keep descending and just as you arrive on the flat you'll get to the old mining village.......

Here we are exploring after our big climbing expedition.........

You'll then walk back along the shore of the lake to the car park. It costs 2 euro to park so have change. It's really not that tough of a walk at all, the initial ascent is a bit hard going at first but the rest is a doodle and the views are fantastic all along the way. Walking very fast and without a break you can do it in 2 hours but just taking it handy it'll take 3.