Eating out in Key West

Here's a selection of some of the restaurants we visited on our recent trip to Key West, Florida.

Bistro 245 at Margaritaville Resort
As a treat for Amy because she graciously hosted us in her gorgeous conchy cottage we went to the fabulous brunch with the million dollar view on Front Street in Bistro 245 on the Sunday that she was off from work. Truly, is there anything nicer than sitting in the sun drinking mimosa?!
Check out some of the delights we feasted on.

Sarabeths
We visited Sarabeths twice. Once for their famous fried chicken on Sunday night and then on our last day for their fat and fluffy french toast for breakfast. There was a special offer of 2 mimosa for 1 so I partook - sure it would be rude not to!

The fried  buttermilk chicken was so delicious, crispy on the outside and moist on the inside. With sides of mashed potato, coleslaw and gravy it made for a nice meal.

Origami
We love sushi and our favourite sushi spot in Key West is Origami. It's a little place at Duval Square and to me it has a really authentic Japanese feel. The sushi is soooo good and we asked for a suggestion as to what we should order next and the chef made an amazing off menu spicy Mexican sushi roll for us. Unbelievably good!

 



Flaming Buoy
We had planned on making a visit to Flaming Buoy but it looked like were going to be disappointed when we cycled past the restaurant on Margaret and Packer and saw it all shut up. However, we then heard they had moved to a new location on the very convenient Eaton Street.
We had a wonderful meal here, the food was great and the venue is really lovely - a perfect place for a nice date night meal.  And they still have their Star Wars memorabilia in the bathroom!

7 Fish
With a new location on Truman Avenue, we were looking forward to visiting 7 Fish. The food was as good as ever with the meatloaf being enjoyed by Ciaran. I had their delicious signature fish curry. It was really good but perhaps a little pricey. I missed the old location it was a cute tight for space little restaurant.  The new venue just doesn't have the same charm.

Goldman's Deli
Is there anything as American as sitting at the counter in a deli eating breakfast and reading the newspaper?

Santiago's Bodega
We saved our favourite for last and sat outside as we can't do that in Ireland. The food was divine and the ambiance and setting in the Bahama Village was chilled out. We started with blue cheese wedge salads and then ate lots of different tapas dishes including lamb and beef.  If you are visiting Key West make sure Santiago's Bodega is on your to do list!

Keto Egg bites!

I was introduced to Starbucks Egg Bites while on my recent holiday to Florida. They are sous vide cheesy eggy delicious bites.

I wish they were available here in Ireland but for the moment I have do by making my own.

In my first batch I made them with eggs and cottage cheese and also cheddar with some bacon bits.

For my second batch, I switched out the cottage cheese (too low fat) for some ricotta and also some cream cheese. I made this switch because I am back on keto due to too much Key Lime Pie on holiday!

I also added a little parmesan cheese when I was adding the cheddar - this was added for taste along with a bit more hot sauce than I added to the first batch.

So voila!  Here they are.....

One tip I would say is that you should whip the eggs with a blender and then add the cream cheese or cottage cheese. I don't think you would get this mixed properly if you were doing it by hand.

Fishing in Key West

Just back from visiting my twin sister in Key West where I had a brilliant time catching up with Amy and hanging out with her.

Amy had a few days off so we were able to get up to some of our favourite things. Namely brunch, beach and fishing!

On Saturday we were booked on to the Salty Goat (a super boat - I have fished with them before and was glad to be able to fish with them again) but headed to Cuban Coffee Queen for a nice cup of Joe before we got out on the water.

We had a fun day fishing with a so so catch by the three of us - enough for dinner and a little left over to go in the freezer.

Here's a few pics from the day....

Strong coffee to start the day and a cooler bag with strong drinks for later in the day!

Salty Goat is a great boat. Perfect size for a nice group of people to have a comfortable day fishing.

Amy lit up the barbeque and cooked up the fish on lemon - so delish!

Looks great and tasted even better :-)

And the perfect ending to a perfect day, came in the form of:

PIE!!

Look out for a few more blogs all about my Key West trip over the next few days.....

"Pigsy" short film - now online!

Woo hoo!

Film maker Mike Andrews 8 minute short about Pigsy is now available to view online, after featuring in Film Festivals across Ireland and the UK

Press play below!

In the sunny South-East for the weekend!

We spent a lovely  few days in Dunbrody House this weekend. 

Good weather was forecast and we set off in the sun on Friday to drive the 2.5hrs down from Dublin to Wexford in the Smart car.

For dinner on Friday we went to the pub on site at Dunbrody House. It is called "The Local" and we had the best fish & chips ever!

Our room was incredible. It was massive and really comfortable with a balcony out on to the garden. The arrow below shows the room location.

On Saturday we went for a short car ride to Ballyhack and then spontaneously drove the Smart on to a ferry over to Passage East. What fun!

We booked in for dinner on Saturday night in the Dunbrody House dining room.  Originally we were in for 8.30pm but then changed to a much better time of 7.15pm. This worked out great and we went straight for dinner after watching Leinster v. Saracens in the Heineken Champions Cup. Sadly Leinster lost :-( 

Pictured below is the duck breast from the tasting menu.

We had a bottle of malbec - my favourite!

Here's the tasting menu. My favourite was the duck while Ciaran liked the fish best.

There was a good continental buffet for breakfast and there was also a cooked to order hot breakfast. As well as the usual full Irish there was such things as omelettes (I had one on the first morning) and pancakes which I had on the second day.

It was a wonderful weekend and I really enjoyed relaxing, reading a lot and chilling in the sunshine.  Ireland is a wonderful country when the weather is good.

Online Release of "Pigsy"

Exciting news!

Film maker Mike Andrews has announced that his Pigsy documentary will be released online on May 20th.

While you wait for the release you can watch the trailer below




After screening in Galway, Bristol, Cork and London it's great to know that it will be seen by a wider audience once it goes online.

Edit - 

Here's the film, now available online

Litter picking......again

Yesterday, I was back out litter picking again. The first Saturday of the month is the Friends of the Grand Canal meet up day (do join in, meet up is at the first bench at Wilton Terrace near Leeson Street Bridge at 10am).

It didn't seem like it was only a week previously that a big clean up had been done - see my post on the Dublin Community Clean Up Day.

I moved slightly away from the canal and concentrated on the Leeson Street /Leeson Park area.

Look how much I picked in an hour from about 10.30am until 11.30am. 

The bag to the right is full of an old wet sleeping bag that I found on the ground. This bag was so heavy that I had to ring Ciaran to ask him to drive and meet me and take the bag back to the collection point. When he got back to the bench where the clean up starts the man from the council was loading up some rubbish from the clean up in to his van. Ciaran said he was a lovely guy, when he heard that I had needed Ciaran to pick up the bag, the council man said he would have taken it, if he had seen me as he drove around.

I didn't stick around for coffee at the bench after the canal clean up (very kindly sponsored/provided by Starbucks Leeson Street) but instead cycled along the canal to Pot Bellied Pig for a lovely brunch with a nice glass of bubbles!

How beautiful is the Grand Canal?!

Happy Bank Holiday to all my readers!