The Emerald Isle.

So last week I was in Ireland with my boyfriend, a native Dubliner. We spent the week exploring both Dublin and some of the West Coast around Galway where I experienced some of the most dramatic scenery I'd ever seen; invigorating coastlines, serene lakes, sleeping giants of mountains and luscious green wilderness. There were also the tourist traps, some of which we visited briefly, and mainly consisted of a shop or two of green colour explosion. Imagine Kermit devoured a gift shop and spewed it all back up. My friend Dani would have loved the pure tat, so obscenely twee.

Along the way we discovered some amazing eateries and also some less so. There are two restaurants that have cemented themselves into my memory, both as different from each other as they are distant. The first was in Dublin, a place called Rustic Stone which (now I've had to read up on this after being told the basic story behind it's conception) is owned by Michellin starred chef Dylan McGrath, also the judge on Masterchef Ireland. This is his concept taken from the restaurants website,
""At Rustic Stone our philosophy is simple. We source the best seasonal ingredients, then we apply simple techniques to extract the most flavour, while giving you the information you need to add nutrition and structure to your diet. The produce I've chosen and our demand for freshness, is the cornerstone of our Rustic idea, while providing a healthy but affordable eating approach." After a stressful past in fine dining and suffering deeply in Ireland's recession he met nutritionist Erika Doolan and the two spent a year devising the menu which focused an a healthier choice for diners. There's an interesting blog on the restaurants website if you'd like to know more.  

So anyway, back to my experience. I chose the Posh Pesto salad which sounded good on the menu, and included some flavours I already knew I liked and some peculiar new ones too, "Watercress, baby spinach, baby gem leaves, iceberg, cherry tomatoes, black olives, coriander, basil and pickled saffron shallots bound in pine nut herb pesto." It was a risk but I can honestly say it paid off, this is the best salad I have ever tried! And not by a small fraction either. So now I strive to recreate this behemoth of salads. Now of course I'm fully aware of the inconvenience and cost of some of the ingredients, I don't think picked saffron shallots are something you could casually pick up from the local supermarket and I haven't the faintest inclination to pickle my own saffron infused shallots so I've had to omit accordingly. I've picked out a few flavours and created a basic salad with some of the key ingredients for texture, colour, greenery and health. The result was great, obviously not Michelin star worthy but the flavours were definitely there, along with the convenience!

The reason this meal is sweet sticky toffee in my mind is because it was a salad! Now remember that a year ago I refused to eat rabbit food, i was a self confessed salad dodger! The lighter me is now quite partial to a salad and this is another area where I'm really trying to learn how to satisfy my tastebuds. I'm aware that there are endless ingredients, assembly methods, seasonings, textures and themes that can build a salad but as I'm new to (an awful lot) of these foods i find that the path of discovery to mouthwatering salads is a slow one but this was a great start.

Ingredients: 

2 handfuls of pre-packaged salad. (I used morrisons lambs lettuce, baby spinach and rocket)

A small handful of fresh basil (I didn't have coriander or I would have used this too).

6-8 cherry tomatoes (pan fried in olive oil until very slightly browned on the edges)

8 black olives 

1 level tea spoon of green pesto- mix the pesto with a little dollop of olive oil to thin it enough to drip it over the salad then add an extra drizzle of olive oil to the salad.

Salt and pepper to season

Sprinkling of mixed seeds just for texture!