Catalan Cooking with Codorniu

Tapas are extremely popular here in London but Spanish cuisine has a lot more to offer then jamon y queso. Rachel McCormack feels it’s her mission to bring the “other” cuisines of Spain to London. To that end, she has set up her own small cooking classes, called Catalan Cooking. Roughly twice a month, Rachel takes...

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Mardi Gras, Gumbo & Bubbles

I’ve always wanted to go to a Mardi Gras celebration. The beads, the parades, the music, the copious amounts of alcohol consumed. I mean, doesn’t that sound like fun? What if you threw in Mardi Gras at an American theme park? Like say, Universal in Orlando, Florida? It might not be New Orleans but it was a hell of a lot...

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Cheval Blanc, the secret’s in the…

Cheval Blanc. To those unfamiliar with the wines of Bordeaux, it was the fine wine that Miles gloomily drank from a styrofoam cup with a burger in the movie Sideways. To Bordeaux wine afficionados, it’s one of the two wines that stand head and shoulders above the rest in St. Emilion, being designated a Premier Cru Grand...

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Visiting a Butter Museum(?)and lunch at Fishy Fish, Kinsale, Ireland

I have seen 1,000 year old butter and it’s not pretty. Nor, I think, is it edible. It was in a glass enclosure so none of us could stick a finger in it but it did make for an interesting introduction to the Butter Museum in Cork, Ireland. It was my last day in Ireland with Tourism Ireland and our first stop was the Butter...

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A horsey break in the mtns of Cordoba,Los Potreros Estancia, Argentina

“I think it’s gin o’clock, don’t you?” said my hostess and trail boss, Louise (Lou) Begg. After a rough two hours on the trail ( not really, the horses barely broke into a trot) we were back at the estancia in time for a pre-lunch drink. I was spending a few days of R&R between all my visits to...

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Cafe Paradiso, eat your veggies (and drink your wine)

Do you know what my favourite thing about my press trip to Ireland was? It wasn’t the fantastic food, the amazing people (both my travelling companions and the Irish we met), the unbelievable sunny days and beautiful scenery or the fact I got to pick all the wines with most of our dinners (although those were all great!). It...

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