Hi Foodies!
As Easter is fast approaching, we have decided to host another small raffle.
To have your name thrown into the hat, all you have to do is like our Facebook page here http://www.facebook.com/pages/Brennans-Cookshop-Cookery-School/195822267131993 and share this post.
The winner will be announced on the 2nd of April so there’s plenty of time to enter!
What’s the prize?
Check our Facebook Page to find out!
Hi Foodies!!
Of course we had to save the best for last… DRINKS of course!!
Now, since not everyone can have or wants to have alcoholic drinks, our chef Johann Doorley came up with a wonderful alternative.
Here are the recipes:
Mulled Wine
2 bottles cabernet sauvignon
1 ½ litre water
2 cinnamon sticks
1 orange studded with 15-20 cloves
2 oranges sliced
2 lemons sliced
Brown sugar to taste
Splash of Cointreau
2 tbsp. grated fresh ginger
Place all ingredients into a stainless steel saucepan and bring to “shimmer” stage. Just before it simmers.
Keep at this temperature for 10-15 minutes then remove the sliced orange and lemon.
Serve in thick wine glasses.
Spicy Sparkler!
This is a refreshing spicy syrup that an interesting non-alcoholic alternative to sparkling wine.
2 un-waxed lemons
1cm peeled ginger
1 red chilli
225g brown sugar
300ml water
Finely grate the zest from the lemons into a saucepan.
Grate the ginger into the saucepan.
Cut the chilli length ways from the green stalk to the point leaving it attached at the stalk.
Add the chilli, sugar and water to the pan with the lemon zest and grated ginger.
Put the saucepan on a medium heat and bring to the boil. Simmer for 2 minutes.
Cover the pan with a lid or cling film and leave overnight.
Next day cut the lemons in half and squeeze the juice into the saucepan.
Strain the contents of the pan through a sieve and bottle. Dilute to taste with still or sparkling water.
And that brings our Christmas Series to an end, we hope that all of you will have a wonderful Christmas, surrounded by loved ones!
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year foodies!!
Hi again!
Continuing our Christmas series, part two actually has the yummy mince meat treats… NOM!
Here’s what you need…
Mince Pies
About two weeks before Christmas we start to want these to get us in the Christmas mood.
The flaky pastry is worth making for mince pies. But if time is short bought pastry is as good
1 jar of best mincemeat
250g plain flour
185g butter very cold
150-160 ml cold water
1 egg beaten
Sift the flour in to a bowl, cut the butter into small cubes about 1 cm square and stir gently into the flour.
Pour in the cold water and mix to a stiff dough with a knife. Shape into a rough rectangle and wrap and leave to cool in the fridge for 30 minutes.
Remove from the fridge and put onto a floured surface and roll out into a 1 cm thick rectangle with a floured rolling pin. Fold the pastry in three and turn so that the 3 layers are towards you and roll out again, fold in 3 again, turn, roll and fold again. Wrap and leave in the fridge for an hour.
Set the oven to GM7, 220˚C, 425˚F .
Cut the pastry in a two thirds piece and a one third piece and roll out the two thirds piece until it is about 3 mm thick. Cut into rounds with an 8.5 cm scone cutter and use these to line 24 bun tins.
Gather up the scraps of pastry into layers and set aside. Roll out the other third of the pastry and cut out 24 stars or snowflakes.
Into each of the pastry cases put about 1 teaspoon of mincemeat depending on how deep the bun tins are. It does tend to bubble up and out if there is too much. Dampen the edges of the pastry and top each one with a star or snowflake.
Paint the tops with beaten egg and bake for about 15 minutes. Makes about 24.
Cinnamon Mincemeat Flapjacks
These have all the elements of Christmas and are deliciously nutritious way to eat oats.
225g mincemeat
175g butter
300g golden syrup
1tsp ground cinnamon
425g rolled oats
Set the oven to GM 4/350˚F/180˚C.
Line a Swiss roll tin with baking parchment.
Put the mincemeat, butter and syrup into a saucepan and warm on a low heat.
Mix with a wooden spoon until the butter has melted and add the cinnamon and rolled oats. Mix them in well and pour the contents of the saucepan on to the Swiss roll tin. Spread the mixture out well and smooth down with a spatula or the back of a spoon.
Bake in the oven for about 20-25 minutes. When they are done the edges will have darkened a bit, take the tin out and mark the flapjacks into squares and leave to cool in the tin. When they are cold take them out of the tin.
Hi Foodies !
If you want to break the mould this year and prepare something else, here’s a tasty one.
375-400g fresh spinach
30g butter
pepper
nutmeg
50g grated parmesan
3 eggs separated
pinch of salt
150-200g cream cheese
1 gherkin finely chopped
1tbs chopped dill
2 scallions finely chopped
lemon juice
salt
100g smoked salmon slices
Lemon wedges & salad to serve
Set the oven to 200˚C, GM 6.
Line a Swiss roll tin 23cm X 32cm with baking parchment.
Wash and spin the spinach to remove most of the water. Put the spinach in a pot over a very low heat until it wilts. Empty the spinach into a sieve to drain, press down on it with the back of a spoon to remove most of the moisture.
Let the spinach cool, while you put the butter, a few grinds of pepper, a pinch of salt, some grated nutmeg, the Parmesan and the egg yolks in to a food processor or blender. Add the spinach and blend to a puree.
Put the egg whites into a clean bowl and add a pinch of salt. Whisk the egg whites until they are stiff.
Fold the puree into the egg whites and pour the mixture into the prepared tin.
Bake in the hot oven for 15- 20 minutes until firm and beginning to colour.
When done turn the spinach ‘cake’ out onto a clean piece of parchment and carefully remove the backing paper.
Loosely lay the baking paper on top of the cake and roll up.
Leave to cool.
In a bowl whisk together the cream cheese, gherkin, dill and scallions. Taste the mixture and season with salt and lemon juice.
If it is very thick thin it with some cream or yogurt.
Unroll the cooled spinach cake and spread it with the cream cheese mixture, leaving a 1cm strip at one of the short ends.
Cover the cream cheese mixture with the smoked salmon slices. Carefully roll up again and wrap in cling-film and chill until needed. Slice and serve with some salad.
Serve with salad and wedges of lemon.
There will be a few more recipes coming up soon, until then Stay Cooking!
Hi Foodies!
At Christmas, it’s time for sharing and selfless giving so we have decided to do just that.
To thank you for being such lovely customers all year round, to give you a helping hand, we are giving away not one but 10 Chantry Knife Sharpeners!!!
No one hates blunt knives more than at Christmas time isn’t it? This baby will sharpen all of your knives, plain or serrated and scissors too. For more information on this award winning sharpener, check our previous post here : http://cooking.cookshop.ie/2011/06/the-chantry-knife-sharpener/
There will be ten winners picked using random.org as always.
The giveaway will end Monday, 19th of December at midnight and the winners will be announced on our blog and facebook page. This giveway is opened to Ireland residents only.
On Tuesday, 20th of December the prizes will be sent with GLS Courier and you will have it at your door on Wednesday / Thursday at the latest.
So here are the rules, they are quite simple and straight forward really 
- like our Facebook page and share on your wall
- once you’ve done that, send an email to cookshop@brenco.ie forwarding your full name and address
That’s it!
Keep an eye out on the blog and facebook page as we are going to come up with a couple of recipes for Christmas to make everyone’s life just a bit easier, they’ll be up in the next couple of days.
PS : Please do not forget to send the email, we really want you to get the prezzies before Christmas! Your details will never be used for any other purpose than this giveaway, never shared with a third party.
Stay cooking!
Hi Foodies, we just thought it would be helpful if the opening hours will be widely available so here they are :
NOVEMBER :
Monday 21st to Thursday 24th : 9am to 6pm
Friday 25th : 9am to 7pm
Saturday 26th : 9am to 6pm
Sunday 27th : 1pm to 5.30pm
Saturday 26th & Sunday 27th we’ll have our Pre-Christmas Sale, all the Christmas stock will have a 15% discount and also all other Sugarcraft & Bakeware will carry a 20 % discount. There will be other special offers available for the Pre-Christmas Sale.
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Monday 28th November to Thursday 1st December : 9am to 6pm
Friday 2nd December : 9am to 7pm
Saturday 3rd December : 9am to 6pm
Sunday 4th December : 1pm to 5.30 pm
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Monday 5th to Thursday 8th : 9am to 6pm
Friday 9th : 9am to 7pm
Saturday 10th : 9am to 6pm
Sunday 11th : 1pm to 5.30pm
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Monday 12th to Thursday 15th : 9am to 6pm
Friday 16th : 9am to 7pm
Saturday 17th : 9am to pm
Sunday 18th : 1pm to 5.30pm
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CHRISTMAS WEEK
Monday 19th to Friday 23rd : 9am to 7pm
Saturday 24th : 9am to 5pm
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25th , 26th, 27th December - Closed
Re-opening
Wednesday 28th to Saturday 31st : 9am to 6pm
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1st & 2nd January - Closed
Re-opening
Wednesday 3rd January when we’re going back to our standard opening hours, 9am to 6pm, closed on Sundays.
Our Christmas Sale will start on the 28th December and finish on the 15th January
Hi Ladies!
I guess everyone was eagerly waiting for this.
For the giveaway, we had valid 15 entries and the winner is….
Number 15….
Congratulations Stacy Walsh!!!
And because we had so many lovely entries & comments, we decided to give away another two surprise consolation prizes to :
Number 6 ….
Pamela Noonan!!
and the second consolation prize goes to…
number 13…
Tracey Thompson!!!!
So ladies, major congratulations and happy baking on your Halloween goodies!
The winners are kindly asked to forward us an email with your shipping address to COOKSHOP@BRENCO.IE as soon as you can, we would love to get to goodies out to you sometimes today!!
And for those who didn’t win this time, we will have more competitions running in near future so do not lose hope :)
Happy Halloween lovelies!
Hi Foodies, hope you’re all well
There are only a few days left until Halloween & we thought we would run a teeny weeny giveaway to all Halloween enthusiasts!
So keep reading to see the prize :
SO, the lucky winner will receive
ONE pack of Friendly Ghosts Baking Cases (54/pk),
ONE pack of Skull&Crossbones Baking Cases (54/pk),
TWO packs of Halloween Sugar Pipings (12/pk) and
TWO packs of Skull&Crossbones Rings (6/pack)
The competition will run from today, Thursday 20th October until Wednesday 26th October 12 o’clock and it’s open to contestants from IRELAND ONLY ( sorry lads but we want to make sure that the goodies get to you before Halloween )
Now onto the boring bit! In order to enter you have to :
1. Like our Facebook Page here http://www.facebook.com/pages/Brennans-Cookshop-Cookery-School/195822267131993 ( we will be checking )
2. Leave a comment on this post (”enter me” type of thing ) , making sure that you put in your correct email address so that we can contact you
And that’s it!
The winner will be picked using random.org and announced via email & blog post on Wednesday 26th October after lunch time.
Best of luck to everyone!
Hi Foodies!
Once more, Halloween is approaching and if you’re stuck for ideas, you can check out the following posts:
http://cooking.cookshop.ie/2010/10/irish-barm-brack/
or
http://cooking.cookshop.ie/2010/10/bat-wings-with-swamp-dip/
Hopefully i’ll be able to add one more to the Halloween collection sometimes this week but til then, stay cooking!
Hi Foodies!
I know i haven’t been very active lately on the blog and for that i must apologize.
We have a lot going on at the moment, a lot of exciting plans and loads of changes!
In the meaning time, we have launched our Autumn/ Winter cooking brochure, for full details click onto the following link http://cookshop.ie/files/autumn_classes_2011.pdf or for bookings online, click here http://www.brenco.ie/cookschool.html
I’ll be back soon enough with fresh recipes for you guys to try out, till then Stay Cooking!
