Christmas is coming.....

After the terrible events of Thursday evening in Dublin City when the city was overtaken by a rioting mob (truly a dark day) I was happy to sit back and relax and watch the Late Late Toy Show.

I didn't plan to wear my Christmas jumper this early in the season but my sister texted this pic in to our sisters what's app group with a note that she was ready for the toy show.

So after seeing Katie in her jumper, I changed in to mine and then took a pic to send to the group - along with Bones because he was going to watch with me!

I've written about the Late Late Toy Show before on my blog and you can read about it here

This year we had a new presenter with Patrick Kielty taking over the helm. Well he did a great job and I really enjoyed the show. I reckon it was the best show in years!

So once the Toy Show has been on, it is really the start of the Christmas season here in Ireland.

So because of this, Ciaran and I started our Christmas Sandwich Search / Competition. 

We have a thing where we select a few places that serve a Christmas Sandwich and we go visit and taste it and then rate it.  We each get to select 2 places but then go to 5 in total because the winner from last year automatically gets in to the following year's lineup.  

Well KC Peaches was the 2022 winning Christmas Sandwich so we put it first on the list and visited there this afternoon.

Here's the pic of the sandwich (we made a small modification where we removed the spinach which was an ingredient on the sandwich)

Well it was a good start but we hope to have some better sandwiches after this one. Here's our scores for the KC Peaches one

Price: Enid 4/5 Ciaran 4/5

Ingredients: Enid 3/5 Ciaran 2/5

Construction/Aesthetic: Enid 3/5 Ciaran 3/5

Atmosphere/Experience: Enid 3/5 Ciaran 2/5

Tradition: Enid 2/5 Ciaran 2/5

Both our scores were added together and this sandwich got a total of 28 out of 50 (a fairly good score for the first sandwich but I don't think it will be the winner).

For the record, here's the receipt for two sandwiches, 1 prosecco and 1 cup of tea. Watch this space for more Christmas Sandwiches and to see which one is the winner for 2023!

Hola! Back at learning Spanish

Here's what I've been getting up to over the past few days. Unfortunately I took no photos so will just have to see what I can find online.

Thursday evening brought me back to somewhat formal Spanish learning with a teacher led conversational Spanish class in the library.  I'm currently doing Duolingo but am finding that that the less Spanish I speak the more I am losing my words and any fluency that I have built up. So it was good to be back conversing in Spanish. At the first class we spoke about food that we like and in the next class the plan is to talk about the airport.

And then on Friday, I took half day from work in order to meet my mother and niece for a lovely lunch in a Chinese restaurant on Wicklow Street (my mother's choice). Both Mam and Eleanor had curry (chicken and vegetable) while I had chicken with satay sauce which was so good. There were lots of tasty veg in my dish and the sauce was perfectly peanutty with the slightest bit of heat. We shared starters of spring rolls, salt & chilli chicken and Satay chicken skewers. With some nice red wine to wash it all down it was a great meet up in the centre of Dublin

And later that evening on Friday, I suggested to Ciaran that we should head over to Capel Street on the north side of the city as Dublin City Council were running a night market street event with loads of activities on Capel Street.

We took the Luas to O'Connell Street and from there we walked to Capel Street. When we got to the street, a screening of "The Goonies" was just starting at the top end of the street (not the Quays end) and we walked from the top to the bottom and took all the activitiy in. There was live music, games and market stalls along with cooking demonstrations.  

It was so busy with the street packed with people so I couldn't event really see if there were stalls selling hot food - this is what I had hoped for, as Ciaran hadn't eaten all day so I thought he could get something here. We even tried to get in to All Bar Chicken but that was fully booked.  So perhaps for the next night street event like this there could be food trucks as part of the event. But fun all the same!

We took the bus home and cooked chicken wings for dinner along with a glass of cava while watching Big Brother live evictions. 

All in all another great day in Dublin City!

Tomahawk Steak for 7!

 7 for 7

- that's how it went this Sunday evening when we hosted a dinner of 7 people starting at 7pm.

Prior to the dinner I had a scavenger hunt on my hand having set myself the task of sourcing Tomahawk Steaks. Not easy! 

With a search that took me from Dun Laoghaire to Rathmines and beyond, I finally settled upon two 30 day aged steaks from the butcher in Ranelagh, hitting about the 2kg mark in total.

Cooking these bad boys normally involves a reverse sear method and a very smokey kitchen - which isn't great for an open plan kitchen and no dinner guest likes to be sitting in smoke!

So this time I decided to the reverse of the reverse sear method and instead seared the steaks when guests arrived and while they had a pre-dinner drink in the front room. After searing a nice crust on each of the steaks I popped them in the oven with a meat thermometer set for 52 degrees celcius in order to achieve a rare cook.

It all worked out perfectly with no smokey kitchen and, after a starter of a blue cheese wedge salad, followed by some tomato meatballs on a small ring of pasta and some smoked salmon blinis (with cream cheese and sweet chilli sauce), we all enjoyed the meat along with brocolli and hasselback potatoes. 

I sure was glad it worked out because (1) I didn't want to ruin the good meat and (2) truth be told I was very nervous about cooking for 7!!

What's better than a dessert after dinner?!

Why 2 desserts of course!!

Fiona brought a delicious chocolate cake (Darina Allen receipe) while I made a strawberry cookies and cream "ice box cake"

Both so so good!

And the empty wine bottles all tell a story :-) 

And conveniently I signed up for a glass bottle bin collection service so the next morning clean up was very little hassle with the bottles all just getting put in the bin in the garden with no trip to the bottle bank having to be organised. I highly recommend this service.

Halloween Cycle in Dublin City

Friday brought the start of the Bank Holiday weekend (wahey!) 

After leaving work I headed to Dublin City to meet up with Ciaran at the start of the Critical Mass Halloween cycle. Unfortunately I had a bit of a false start after I realised that I left my phone in work, just as the train left Dun Laoghaire Station. I had to get off at Monkstown Station and cycle back to DL - in fairness it was a nice cycle on the protected cycle path of the DLR Coastal Mobility Route. After picking up my phone from my desk I returned to the station but unfortunately I just missed a train so that set me up to be late for the start of the cycle.  So I reassessed my plan and texted Ciaran to say that I would meet up with the cycle gang on Capel Street.  And that's what I did having got off at Tara Street and cycling down Abbey Street directly to Capel Street.

Many of the cycle crew were in full costume but we just wore masks - red dragon for me and werewolf for Ciarán.

Always fun to take part in this event and have a nice saunter on the bike around Dublin. But I particularly like the themed critical mass cycles depending on the time of year. I look forward to the Christmas one now that the Halloween one is over for the year.

And after the cycle it was back to Capel Street where we had wings & wine in All Bar Chicken......

....well I had wine, the werewolf had beer!

Click here to see my very first Critical Mass cycle - which coincidentally was a Halloween cycle too (and I dressed in full costume for this one)!

You can join Critical Mass if you like - just come along to the start at Parnell Square opposite the entrance to the Hugh Lane Gallery, at the side of the Garden of Remembrance. It is on the last Friday of every month and starts at 6pm. See you there!!

My new favourite thing!

Well look at this lovely surprize gift that arrived in a little envelope from my twin sister all the way in the USA - a fab ELVIS necklace!

I LOVE IT!!

It's my new favourite thing :-) 

Thanks Amy - I'll wear it to work tomorrow and hopefully I get a few comments on it! 

Before I start work tomorrow I'm getting my flu vaccine and then after work is the start of the Bank Holiday weekend. Woo hoo! 

Nyad: Never ever give up!

"Nyad" the movie about the amazing Diana Nyad's 100 mile swim from Cuba to Key West opened here in Ireland this weekend. It is a Netflix presentation so it seems like it was a limited cinema release with it then going live on Netflix in a month.

After searching around I saw that it was in Dundrum Centre Cinema on Sunday afternoon so we headed off on the Luas to see it there. 

Wow was it inspirational!

After being beaten by the cruel Florida Straits in the 1970's as a young lady, Diana made a plan to do it at the grand young age of 60. With her trainer and best friend Bonnie, she made attempt after attempt (4 times) until she finally succeeded on 2nd of Sept 2013, with a team of support around her. The film is so great and in particular the acting by both Annette Benning and Jodie Foster - they deserve Oscar nods, I think.

Diana's achievement was a serious feat and it made me feel like anything is possible. It also brought back memories to me of the Key West Swim that my sisters and I did, when we competed in the Key West Swim as a relay in the Island Swim - all 12.5 miles of it!

And speaking of sisters, look who my twin sister actually met in Key West this Saturday - only Diana Nyad who was in Key West to mark the 10 year anniversary of her epic swim.

Amy went to the movie also yesterday, and you can read her blog about it here.

And for us, after our trip to Dundrum, we stayed on the Luas until it got in to the city where we strolled down to Capel Street for wings in All Bar Chicken.

On the way to Capel Street we stopped off in Arnotts where Ciaran got a new Secrid wallet as well as getting his old one repaired by the fantastic counter assistant. So now he has two Secrid wallets. He plans to continue to use the old paint splattered one for a while more, before he switches to his new one!

New Coffee Machine

 L'Or coffee (which I love) had an offer recently for a bundle of coffee with a coffee machine for the princely sum of 70 euro.

I generally buy their coffee from Tesco on a weekly basis but it made sense to buy in bulk with this offer and pretty much get the coffee machine for free.

Here is the new machine on my bar pictured beside my old Nespresso machine.

The unique thing about this new machine is that you can make two coffees at once using the larger size capsule

Pictured above are the larger size capsules with the machine taking both sizes.

This is all the coffee I ordered. 

Along with some decaff that are the blue coloured ones

Both Ciaran and I are in agreement that the coffee is made nicer in this new machine and we both enjoy a single cup made with the larger size double cup capsule.

It also makes my takeaway cup coffee quicker which I make just before I head for the train to get to work. I make it in my Two Friends Key West Cup and it fits in the cupholder on my bike. It's so nice to get to the train station and enjoy a coffee on the platform while I wait for my train - one of the small pleasures in life!