I first met Yvonne Carty quite a few years ago at my very first networking event, run by the Offaly and Laois Enterprise Boards it was held at Durrow Castle which lies deep to the south of Laoise near the borders of counties Tipperary, Carlow and Kilkenny.
Yvonne Carty, the creative genius behind Hey Pesto! lives close to me and yet I'd to travel some distance to meet her. I recognized her as someone I 'knew' by sight immediately and on gentle probing discovered that she is in fact from nearby Tullamore but lives a little closer to hand - in the same village as me!!! That in itself tells a tale about the kind of life I was living prior to our initial formal introduction, it was frenetic to say the least. Thank goodness fate had intervened and rendered me unfit to continue, demanding a break from all that I knew while introducing me to so much more...
As well as being incredibly busy with her catering business Yvonne is actively involved with the Geashill Tidy Towns committee in organising the brand new Muc Fair in Geashill, Co Offaly on 31st July 2011. (Contact the tidytowns committee for information regarding stands, etc) Without a doubt she's a lady with community conscience and can be seen here promoting Tipperary Tastee's, although she did sneak in a taste of Offaly by using locally produced cream in her main course (wink!)
For more information on Hey Pesto! why not check out their Facebook Page?
For those of you who live locally I thought I'd bring your attention to my local kennels. Owned and run by Maria & John McNally, who's youngest son stayed over at LB's sleepover last night Ballycrystal Kennels is a bright and modern facility offering top class accomodation to all breeds of your very best canine friends.
The dogs are housed in purpose built kennels which is large enough to take seventeen occupants. As the McNally's love dogs and have several of their own they are well placed to look after yours, if you are unable to take them on holidays with you. Each is given their own individual pen and is walked in the fields daily by members and friends of the family. A word of caution though, only those with full vaccination certificates are welcome!
If you would like to know more about this great service why not check them out and visit their new website for more details. You'll be surprised at how reasonable their rates are! If you do decide to visit Ballycrystal Kennels don't forget to tell them that Polly sent you!
Early this afternoon I logged into my Facebook account to catch up with the world, his brother and sister and basically to have a good look around. Amongst the regular updates about Farmeville and the like (all of which I studiously ignore!) I came across the latest update from Glenisk.
Regular readers are no doubt aware that Glenisk is in fact one of my neighbours. In rural Ireland, if someone lives within a couple of miles as the crow flies, they are your neighbour and I am thrilled to have the pleasure of having watched the Cleary family from Newtown, Killeigh expand their business over the past three decades. Time after time I'm proud to say that this family business has been nominated for and received top awards and this week is no exception...
Glenisk is the overall winner of the SFA National Business Award 2010. Winning the Food & Drinks category, Glenisk also beat off competition from 35 other finalists to take the top prize. The award was presented to finance director, Gerard Cleary by An Taoiseach, Brian Cowen, TD, on Thursday, 4 March.
While we're on the subject of the latest from Glenisk, why not have a look at their new TV advert. Apparently, this was filmed in the middle of a particularly chilly December which meant that it wasn't practical to film au naturel, ie out on the farm. If you want to see how they did it head over here for more details...
So, congratulations to Vincent, Ger and all the lads over in Newtown! Keep up the good work and carry on bringing national and international awards back to our parish, making organics and sustainability hip, and the nation healthier...!
This morning I checked into Microsoft Outlook to see what delights had landed in my inbox and was not disappointed to spot the Offaly CEB December Ezine. My attendance of events organised by this group is unfortunately infrequent; due to previous commitments clashing. I keep an eye on things though; just in case...
In the wake of a whole swathe of award ceremonies it was a natural progression to publish some of the Offaly success stories; many of which had to do with food. Some; admittedly, in a somewhat round about way, but nevertheless come under that category!
Strangely enough this accolade must be awarded to Agetek who are based in Tullamore. Their stange name belies the fact that this company won the 2008 OCEB Enterprise Of The Year Award; but how is this connected with the subject at hand, ie Food? Well, simply put these guys manufacture doors for kitchen units and I'm sure we're all agreed that they are an integral part of the food preparation area...
On a much larger scale the Silver Award for cheese making was presented to Ralph Haslam of Mossfield Organic Cheese for his cow’s milk cheese with garlic and basil at the 2008 WORLD Cheese Awards which were held in Ireland for the first time this year; featuring over 2,400 entries from around the globe.
This award winning farm is situated at the foot of the Slieve Bloom Mountains some six miles from Birr, County Offaly. Having undergone organic conversion in 1999, Mossfield began production of award winning organic cheeses in 2005 and are hoping to expand into the field of yoghurt and ice-cream production in the future.
On a National Scale; the overall winner of any success story has to be Glenisk the overall Winner of National Organic Award 2008 for their Glenisk Irish Organic Butter. Glenisk Irish Organic Butter was judged the best of more than 100 entries in the 2008 National Organic Awards, organized by Bord Bia in conjunction with the Department of Agriculture.
The Cleary family business has been based in Killeigh, Co Offaly producing a range of organic yoghurt and milks for over twenty-five years. Sourcing quality organic milks from fifty farms across the island of Ireland; harvesting 90% of all organic milk produced, this company has gone from a dream to Award winning reality.
Another notable winner; the 2008 OCEB Enterprise Of The Year - Artisan Award was presented to Ballyshiel Artisan Foods who lovingly create a deliciously tempting range of speciality confectionery and chocolates; hand made using authentic family recipes. Their range includes Toffee Dulce de Leche (used in making Banoffee pie), exquisite Chocolate Sauce, Karina Handmade Chocolate's which include old time favourite; Macaroon Bars.
Ballyshiel Artisan Foods promise is that all their quality products are gluten, preservative, artificial flavouring, hydrogenated oil and fat free making them suitable for coeliac's and vegetarian's.
Also included in the list of Offaly CEB finalist's was Yvonne Carty of Hey Pesto! Who specialises in making entertaining a stress free adventure of the culinary variety. Catering for corporate and domestic customer's Yvonne has her craft down to a fine art and having sampled some of her wares I can heartily agree!
I'm sure we can all agree that the above list makes interesting reading for us Offalian's! It's nice to hear of anyone in the region succeeding in business but to be honest it's even better when this applies to food. At a time when there's less money available to splash out on expensive treats it's good to know that we have some award winning products right here on our door step. What's even nicer is that the quality of these products is assured...
I hope you enjoy checking out the links as there are some terrific products and companies to be found. Be thankful that Polly didn't launch into one of her famous rants about the dangers of eating 'normal' foodstuffs...
My new blog Wedding Invitations By Vinca is just nicely getting off the ground and funnily enough I seem to be finding things related to whole area of weddings purely by coincidence. Yes coincidence!
As it pays to be aware of what is going on around me with regard to my interests, my greeting cards, wedding stationary, name, etc I run a Google alert on an on-going basis. This service is provided FOC and allows you to set up notifications when items of specific interest are published on the net. To date it has proven invaluable and has often given me ideas regarding subjects to blog about.
The other week I got another alert which was probably going to be one of the usual throw away references to someone or other's funeral. The second entry caught my eye and persuaded me to hang onto it. Just a couple of days ago I finally got around to opening and viewing the links; where I found some buried treasures.
Once again this is of a Weddingly type nature, although DM Williams cover many different areas of photography with my favourite being a black and white image of pregnancy and the birth of this husband and wife team's twins last December.
For more on this talented couple's work head over to Wedding Invitations by Vinca. This is especially relevant for couples thinking of booking a wedding photographer on either side of the Atlantic.
On a lighter note; I can see a white padded envelope to the left of the console, its colorful contents spilling out untidily over my desk. Finally my long awaited prize arrived, in the midst of yesterdays angst!
Mr Postie gingerly passed it to me; through the narrow crack between the door and its frame; hurriedly exchanging "Good Mornings" while I struggled to keep hold of Tilley Two's head between my knees. My poor aching arm wouldn't have held her for more than a moment. Excited as I would have been; to receive my prize from Craft Journal; TT was also eager to GO for poor Mr Postie! She had not been taunted by the ringing of the door bell; it doesn't appear to be working today, the silent delay had alerted me to MP's appearance at the front door.
I was excited about winning my prize. I had been enjoying the anticipation of its arrival,I had just about managed to control myself regarding my urge to bug MP about my parcels impending arrival.Unfortunately yesterdays excitement had been dulled somewhat by the ingestion of the pain killing cocktail!
I had even worried that it mightn't be delivered to my pseudonym. Luckily; MP is a genius. He has the patience of Job; which is essential considering that there are no post or zip codes where we live. There are, however, townland's.
The townland is a postal address which signifies the area in which one lives & it can cover a sizable distance. Often the neighbours opposite will live in another townland, while the neighbours half a mile down the road do not. Occasionally, the next door neighbours can be in another village altogether!
Believe it or not, there is only one house in the village of Geashill. While there are many houses surrounding this one house, not one of them has the same postal address! There appears to be neither rhyme or reason to the allocation of townland names and boundaries and yet MP always delivers on time.
To further complicate matters; MP has to deal with the usual problems of incomplete addresses, over embellished addresses, illegible script, incorrect titles, maiden names, double-barrelled names and in my case the occasional alias. Regardless of the many impediments, MP delivers the mail each and every day with a grin on his face and the occasional salutation.
My rescue dog, Tilley Two does not like men. Indeed, she really does not like men; she hates them. The two exceptions to this rule are my soul mate and partner DG; the second being the postie. It is probably understandable that she sensed the relationship with DG immediately; but could anyone possibly explain why the postie? And another thing, I don't mean MP; our regular miracle worker; it's Oighan, his stand-in.
The relief postie who learnt our crazy round in a week has made friends with my equally crazy dog! Now that does take some doing! Whoa! It does rather illustrate why I have great respect for the An Phoist; the Irish mail company. doesn't it?
So; three cheers for MP, Oighan & all their overworked and underpaid colleagues. Please God, don't replace the human factor with digital sorting machines; there is NO competition for the kindness of man.
