Wing night!

Thursday was a gorgeously sunny day. After work, Ciaran made the suggestion of walking to the Devlin Hotel and having wings for dinner rather than cooking.

This sounded like a good plan to me so I readily agreed.

We shared a bowl of wings at the bar in the Americana Bar, which is on the ground floor of the Devlin Hotel, along with enjoying a couple of drinks.

The setting is great (suberb decor) and the staff are excellent it made for a really pleasant casual evening.

A fun night for sure and nice to get out of the house and up to Ranelagh village on a sunny evening!

 

Before the Devlin Hotel was built, I never knew what was missing from Ranelagh. But now that it is here and given the amount of times I visit here, I can honestly say that the one that thing missing from the village was this boutique hotel. It is a really nice addition to the village.

I am booked in for brunch in the Rooftop restaurant this Sunday so will report back on that afterwards. Watch this space!

Irish Ice cream weather

I have a great cycle to and from work - particularly on sunny days when the view looks like this.

Another thing, I like about my cycle is that it takes me past Scrumdiddly's ice cream shop. I love seeing the big queue of people snaking around the shop waiting to get in and buy their ice cream on sunny days (and even on not so sunny days!)

It looks like such a fun thing to do hanging out with friends and family waiting for ice cream. In some ways it reminds me of the charms of the traditional soda fountain in USA.

Love it - enjoying an ice cream on a nice day is a small pleasure in life!

Keeping it Keto!

I've been eating Keto since the end of May and loving it.

I haven't been missing sweet food but was really happy to get a sample of Keto Cookies from a colleague in work who had baked last weekend. They were so good and only about 3 carbs per cookie.

Well they were so good, I made a batch myself.

So easy and fast to make - only 10/12 mins or so in the oven.

I switched out some chocolate for chopped hazelnuts in the recipe. This was a really nice addition - I plan on adding more nuts on the next batch. 

Here's the recipe if you would like to make "Keto Cookies"

Check out how my batch turned out!

 Next time I make them I may bake them a little longer to brown them a bit more. I was a afraid of over baking them on this occasion.

They really are delicious - almondy and moreish.

Let me know if you make them!

A blog about........straws!

Straws, you say, what on earth is there to say about straws that is blogable?!

So here goes....

I am a fans of straws. I enjoy drinking my go to cocktail of Vodka & Coke Zero through a straw.

However, I am always trying to reduce my use of single use plastic so straws were something that I had on my radar and I knew I was going to either change my straw habit and stop using them or find an alternative to plastic straws.

I found 3 alternatives and you can see my reviews of each below. I also was told of a 4th option by a bartender in the Devlin Hotel. I will tell you about this one at the end of the blog so scroll on to the bottom to see what it is!

1. Paper Straws
The first move I made away from plastic straws was that I bought paper straws. The good thing about paper straws is that they tend to be really pretty in nicely coloured patterns. But the bad things is that they tend to start to go a bit mushy when you are using them. You can slow down the disintegration of the paper straw by taking it out of your drink between sips and balance it on top of your glass - but this is a bit of a pain. Quite honestly, paper straws are not for me, I don't like the feel of them in my mouth when I am partaking in a beverage.

So the search for a plastic straw replacement continued and I went on to try the next one.

2. Metal Straws
I was so happy to receive a gift of a packet of metal straws from my sister. There were four in the pack and they even came with a little skinny brush to wash them with. 
I was really expecting to like the metal straws but it felt a bit too solid when using and I think they could be quite dangerous as you could accidentally stick it in your eye! Take care when drinking through one!!
I think you can buy metal straw with a plastic bung at the end in order to make it both nicer to drink from and also a bit more safe but if you use this you are back using plastic - but at least it is not single use plastic.

And so I am now on to what I am currently drinking my "bevs" through.

3. Bamboo Straw
A bamboo straw!  Yes really!
While on holidays in the USA, I found a packet of bamboo straws for sale in the Key West Custom House Museum Gift Shop for the very reasonable price of $8.95. There was about 10 in the packet and they are all different sizes, some being very skinny and others being quite thick. It really doesn't matter what size one you pop in to your glass - they all feel really nice to drink from. And they have a really cool natural tropical look about them.

So for the moment I am giving top marks to bamboo straws and they get my vote as being a great alternative to plastic straws.

And now if you are still reading this, you get a bonus tip for what to use instead of plastic straws as passed on to me by the bartender in the Devlin Hotel:  

PASTA!

Yes there is such a thing as a pasta straw! 

A quick google leads me to this website.

Pasta straws sound pretty cool - but have you got any other alternatives to plastic straws? Leave a comment below...... 

Fun day Friday!

Last Friday, I met up with my mother for coffee, a chat and a wander around town. It was a lovely sunny day so I cycled in to town and when we met we went for coffee in Insomnia. There was a little garden out to the front of the cafe so we sat out in the sun.

I brought along my little cream holder (or any liquids) that I got in Coach recently. Check this out - 3 little bottles in a cute little zipped up box. I think it is meant for travelling and decanting things like make up remover, etc. in it. But I think it is far more useful for carrying cream for my coffee!

After that we went for a walk down George's street and looked in some charity (thrift) shops where I tried on a fab black Halston jumpsuit. It was so nice but just a tad bit too small for me on the trouser length.

We got up to lots of fun stuff including a game of hopscotch outside Benefit! 
Hopscotch in the city, you might ask. What's that all about?!
Well in what I thought was a very clever marketing event, Benefit were giving out free samples of their new foundation if you took part in a game of hopscotch. Love it!

Check this building out. Wowser!
The whole front fascade has been left up but the rest of it is going to be redeveloped. I'm sure it will be great.

So we got up to lots, saw interesting things and then went for lunch and had a glass of wine in the sun before both heading our separate ways to our homes on different sides of Dublin city. 
A fun day for sure!

I'm back at Bookcrossing!

Years ago I used to actively "bookcross". This means that I registered books on the bookcrossing website and then leave them in public places for other readers to find them and also track them on bookcrossing.com if they wanted to.

I'm clearing out my shelves of books at the moment. To my shame, I have loads of books sitting on my shelves that I have never read.

So......

I'm registering them on the bookcrossing website and then giving them to charity (thrift) shops or leaving them in cafes and other places.

So far I've got rid of 15 books with plenty more to go.  Nobody has registered that they have found any of my books......watch this space!

Click here if you would like to go hunting books in your neighbourhood. Happy Bookcrossing!

What I've been getting up to......

Saturday morning was chilled we took Bones out for a walk around Ranelagh and did a few chores along the way.

I saw Pigsy's latest piece in the flesh on the wall on Saturday.  OMG, this picture does not do it justice, the colours pop way more than in this photo. Click here to read all about the painting.

Sunday night was mid-Summer drinks for Barry & Elsie's house warming. What a house!

Have a look at their house being the feature of this FBD Insurance ad!

On Sunday, I kept it keto by doing brunch in Pot Bellied Pig - and Bones came along too......

Look how good he was!