The Shelbourne Hotel lost its character when it was revamped, but its restaurant seemed reason enough to visit. I headed there with our good friend Geordie Sue a few weeks ago to check out the early bird menu; €22 for two courses and €25.95 for three. It’s quite a large space with an open kitchen, lots of waiters buzzing around, and quite a few covers. The early bird seemed a popular option, but the crowd thinned out as the night went on.

Having so thoroughly enjoyed The Saddle Room at Taste, I had high hopes. Both Sue and I opted for a carpaccio of tuna starter, served with a sesame and soy sauce. The starters arrived promptly, but one of them was not what we had ordered. No problem, it was immediately taken away and replaced within a minute, with a very nice (although unnecessary) apology from the manager. We were even offered an extra drink as an apology. Excellent customer service, but I declined the kind offer.

My main, sadly, was a real letdown. The confit of rabbit was served with soft polenta and what I can only describe as a ”red” sauce (not ketchup). The meat was succulent and well seasoned, but the soft polenta had the texture and flavour of lumpy cheese sauce. This was a horrible mismatch. The red sauce was, presumably, primarily meant to add colour to the dish. But it also added a slightly unpleasant blandness. Everything about this dish - from its inception, through to my stupidity in ordering it and the final creation - was a mistake. I wonder what on earth the kitchen were thinking. That said, I don’t think this will be on the menu again.

Sue’s main fared much better: fresh hake with chorizo. Fresh, well executed, and the fish not smothered by the richness of the meat. Both meals came with fresh vegetables, cooked al dente, and some chips.

We both opted for dessert: Sue’s meringue was sweet, soft, and chewy as it should be, dripping with bright, fresh fruit and thick cream. My lemon tart was pleasant, although there was a little too much pastry and meringue topping, and not enough lemon.

Now, I know some readers will question why I didn’t kick up a fuss about the rabbit, and point out that it’s a bit unfair to complain now. But the truth is… I just wasn’t that bothered at the time. It was okay, it was edible. Sue and I were having a lovely evening, and I didn’t feel like a fuss.

They’ll be more surprised when I say that despite the disaster of my main, I’d be inclined to give The Saddle Room another go. The service was professional, the atmosphere was fancy without being too stuffy, and most of the food was good. I think it’s worth another try.

Related posts:

1. Review: Early Bird at the Eastern Tandoori, Cork
2. Early bird dinner in The Larder, Parliament St
3. Review: Early bird at Star Anise, Cork

Last week, I spent four successive days swearing that I wouldn’t be hungover again until September (I was marking the end of summer). With so much alcohol residue coursing through my veins, the cravings kicked in; I stumbled up to Centra in Sandyford (south Dublin) for a can of Coke. Or three.

I’ve always found Centra the most tolerable of all the convenience stores. Their deli is reasonably high quality, they often have offers to match those of the main supermarkets, and it’s usually clean and well laid out. Their staff are, for some peculiar reason, friendlier than in other local shops.

So there I was at the till with my three cans of Coke, costing just under €3 altogether. The shop assistant then very kindly pointed out to me that there was a special offer on Coke that day - six cans for €3, if I was interested. No gain for the shop assistant, no manager nearby, and no extra money for Centra - but I got three cans of Coke for free. Score! I gave them to my friends and they thought I was great. Thanks, Centra man.

Readers, can you share a tale of an unnecessary act of kindness or good customer service  from a shop assistant?

Related posts:

1. A tale of good customer service: Glenilen Farm
2. Specials at Centra
3. Special Offers at Centra

So well done Catherine, commenter no 79! We’ll be in touch to let you know how to claim your free meal for two, and we really hope you enjoy it.

Don’t forget to visit www.milano.ie/createyourpizza where you can enter your own pizza creation for the chance to win a trip to Rome.

Related posts:

1. Milano Competition winner
2. Sponsored Post: Milano Create Your Pizza Giveaway
3. Milano Competition Winners

Photo source: The Guardian

The blackberries are out and it’s your chance to get free food. You can use them to make jam, cakes, ice cream, compote, crème brulée, coulis and even tea.

You can also use blackberries in savoury sauces. Venison goes well with autumnal purple-red produce and this Pan-fried venison with blackberry sauce is very fast and easy to make. This recipe can be cooked and prepared in less than 30 minutes.

The trick is to cook venison as you would beef. Good quality steaks and tenderloin can be pan-fried but try to avoid overcooking. The venison season is soon approaching and although it’s not the cheapest meat it is really healthy and has higher iron levels than any other red meat and contains less fat than a skinned breast of chicken. This dish goes very well with celeriac mash.

If the idea of eating Bambi is all too much and you don’t have the cash to splash, why not use your picked produce to rustle up something sweet. I saw a lovely looking ‘Blackberry and star anise friand’ recipe in the Guardian this week. Very very good looking.

Blackberry and star anise friands

Makes 10

Ingredients

• 340g egg whites (10 egg whites)
• 100g plain flour
• 300g icing sugar
• 180g ground almonds
• 2 tsp star anise, finely ground
• ⅓ tsp salt
• Grated zest of ½ lemon
• 220g unsalted butter, melted and left to cool, plus extra for greasing
• 150g blackberries

For the icing (optional)

• 70g blackberries, plus 10 extra, to garnish
• 2 tbsp water
• 300g icing sugar, plus extra to dust

Instructions

1. Heat the oven to 170C/335F/gas mark 3. Use melted butter to brush the bottoms and sides of 10 mini loaf tins (4.5cm high x 9.5cm long x 6.5cm wide), or similar small baking tins, and chill. Put the egg whites in a large bowl and whisk to froth them up a bit; don’t whip them completely. Sift the flour, icing sugar, ground almonds, star anise and salt, add to the egg whites and stir until incorporated. Add the lemon zest and melted butter, and mix just until the batter is smooth and uniform.
2. Pour into the baking tins, filling them two-thirds of the way up. Halve the blackberries and drop into the batter. Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. Remove from the oven, leave to cool a little, take out of the tins and leave until completely cool.
3. To ice the cakes, put the berries and water in a small bowl and use a fork to smash the fruit in the water. Pass through a fine sieve, pressing the pulp against the sides. Pour three-quarters of the purple juice over the icing sugar and whisk vigorously to a uniformly light-purple, runny paste. It should be just thick enough to allow you to brush it over the tops of the cakes, and will set as a thin, almost see-through coating on top with some icing dripping down the sides. (If not, add more juice.) Place a blackberry on each friand and dust with icing sugar.

Pan-fried venison with blackberry sauce

Ingredients

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 2 thick venison steaks, or 4 medallions
• 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 150ml beef stock
• 2 tbsp redcurrent jelly
• 1 garlic cloves, crushed
• 85g fresh or frozen blackberries

Instructions

1. Heat the oil in a frying pan, cook the venison for 5 mins, then turn over and cook for 3-5 minutes more, depending on how rare you like it and the thickness of the meat (cook for 5-6 mins on each side for well done). Lift the meat from the pan and set aside to rest.
2. Add the balsamic vinegar to the pan, then pour in the stock, redcurrant jelly and garlic. Stir over quite a high heat to blend everything together, then add the blackberries and carry on cooking until they soften.
3. Celeriac mash: Thickly peel and chop a small celeriac, then boil with 3 small potatoes. Drain when tender and mash with butter and plenty of seasoning.

Related posts:

1. Maria Crispy Cooks Again
2. Recipe: Impress/Downgrade Your Friends For €5
3. More fast, easy and healthy recipes

• Panini press - €25.99
• Italian biscuits - €1.99 each
• Italian spice mills - 99c each
• Premium pesto - €1.39 each

Nothing for picnic goers, but I’m jealous of you all so HA HA. No tents for you: that’ll ruin your weekend, right? Click here for details.

The current Super6 offer - valid until September 11 - includes pears, kiwis, apples, and carrots for 69c. Click here for details.

Related posts:

1. Special buys at Aldi
2. Special buys at Aldi
3. Special Buys at Aldi

Current food offers at Lidl include:

• Red/ white cabbage - reduced from €1.29 to 79c
• Pinot Grigio delle Venezie Blush (750ml) - reduced from €5.49 to €3.99
• Something called “chicken olives, with pork, sage and onion stuffing” (answers on a postcard please) - €2.79

Remember, new set of food offers every Monday at Lidl. Click here for details.

Super Saturday offers, meanwhile, include diced steak and half price fruit drinks. Click here for details.

Special buys

Not much in the way of special buys for Electric Picnic-goers this weekend, although for some ladies’ wellies. You can, however, pick up some bed linen, kid’s clothes, and plants. Click here for details.

Next Monday’s special buys include laundry baskets, ladies’ clothes, and vacuum cleaners. Click here for details.

Also at Lidl

Lidl’s Taste of the Orient promotion includes a selection of Sharwood’s sauces for €1.49. The same sauces cost €1.85 at Tesco. There’s also some good deals on back to school specials.

Related posts:

1. Special offers at Lidl
2. Special buys at Lidl
3. Special offers at Lidl

It’s a big leap for the retailer, which has always prided itself on selling only its own produce, but it’s worked successfully in several UK stores since last year. M&S say that all the branded products will be competitively priced, and that key lines will be price matched weekly with other major supermarkets.

M&S are focusing on areas where they typically have a low market share: soft drinks, confectionary, beer, laundry, personal care, and pet food; or on areas where they have no own brand equivalent. I’m surprised to see confectionary on the list; M&S sweets and chocs are delish. And why buy Colman’s mustard, Jacob’s Cream Crackers, or Nescafe when M&S own brands are so much tastier?

Although I rarely go to M&S for the basics, M&S are one of the best supermarkets for offers; with judicious shopping last weekend, I brought my bill down from €76.99 to €46.09. Some of their range - notably the fruit - is a bit expensive for most, so it’ll be interesting to see how the price of branded goods at M&S compares with those in other supermarkets.

Readers, what do you think of this plan? Would you go to M&S for your Kellogg’s Cornflakes and other brands?

Click into the post to see the full list of new brands at M&S.

*The branded products that will be of offer to Irish customers are: Absolut; Atora Suet; Alldays; Always; Anadin; Aquafresh; Archers; Ariel; Aussie; Bacardi; Baileys; Bakers Pet Food;   Barry’s Tea; Batchelors; Bells; Bisto; Bold; Bombay Saphire; Bonio; Bounty; Bovril; Branston; Budweiser; Bulmers; Cadburys; Canderel; Capri-Sun; Carlsberg; Catsan; Cesar; Chef; Cif; Cillit Bang; Cheerios; Club Milk; Club Orange; Coca Cola; Colgate; Colmans English Mustard; Comfort; Corsodyl; Croft Original; Crunchie; Dettol; Dove; Elastoplast; Fairy; Febreze; Felix; Finish; Fixodent; Flahavens; Flake; Flash; Fosters; Galaxy; Gillette; Go Cat; Gordon’s; Guinness; Harveys Bristol Cream; Head & Shoulders; Heineken; Heinz; Hellmanns; Herbal Essences; Horlicks; Hula Hoops; Imperial Leather; Jack Daniels; Jacob’s Cream Crackers; Jamesons ; John Smiths; Johnnie Walker;  Kelloggs; Kit Kat; Knorr; Lea & Perrins; Lenor; Li-Lets; Listerine; Lo Salt; Lucozade; Lynx; Lyons Tea; Malibu; Maltesers; Marmite; Mars; Martell; Martini; Mi Wadi; Miller; Mini Cheddars; Minstrels; Captain Morgan; Mr Muscle; Nescafe; Nivea; Nutella; Oasis; Old Speckled Hen; Optrex; Oral B; Oust; Pantene; Pedigree; Penguin; Peroni; Persil; Pimms; Piriteze; Radox; Raid; Red Bull; Revels; Ribena; Robinsons; Ryvita; Savlon; Schmackos; Schweppes; Sensodyne; Sheba; Shredded Wheat; Simple; Smirnoff; Snickers; Southern Comfort; Special K; Steradent; Strepsils; Sure; Tabasco; Tampax; Tayto; Tia Maria; Timeout; Twirl; Twix; Vanish; Vaseline; Veet; Walkers; Weetabix; Whiskas; Wispa; Wrigleys; 7UP

Related posts:

1. Branded Products - Lidl v Tesco
2. Tesco cutting prices, removing Irish brands from stores
3. Special Offers at Dunnes Stores

I’m a big fan of “supper clubs” - I call them that for lack of a better word - and we’ve written about the idea several times here on CheapEats. Simply gather some friends together, get one person to make a starter, another the main, and someone else the dessert. A great alternative to eating out.

Now, I’m planning another supper club on Thursday September 30, to mark Amnesty’s Taste for Freedom day. I can’t say enough good things about Amnesty, and don’t want to get all preachy here, but will say that their focus on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights has been a steadfast voice for justice and against tyranny, across the world.

Amnesty are asking people to hold a fundraiser on that day, big or small, centered around food. Hold a coffee morning, lunch or dinner, banquet or BBQ, wine tasting, or just a pizza and beer night. Throw a fiver in the hat if it’s all you can afford (after you chip for the food, cheapskate!), or offer more if you can.

Between now and the end of September, CheapEats will offer a few suggestions for the day. If you have any ideas, recipes, or tips, please share them here!

Related posts:

1. Special offers at Superquinn, August 25-September 7
2. A Taste of Mexico
3. Taste of Dublin Festival

Mezze are so versatile: they make great snacks, dinners, and lunches, whether just for yourself or a larger party.

Aubergine salad

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

• 2 medium aubergines
• 3 garlic cloves, peeled
• 5 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 2×400g cans of tomatoes, drained
• 100g coriander sprigs, most of stalk removed, finely chopped
• ½ tsp ground cumin
• juice of ½ lemon, or to taste
• ½ tsp dried chilli flakes
• ½ tsp finely ground black pepper
• sea salt
• ¼ tsp paprika

Anissa Helou

Instructions

Add the aubergines to the tomato sauce together with the lemon juice, chilli flakes, pepper and salt to taste. Mix well and simmer over a low heat for another 15 minutes, stirring regularly. Add the paprika, then taste and adjust the seasoning if necessary. Serve at room temperature.

Herb and toasted pitta salad

Serves 6

Ingredients

• 1 medium pitta bread
• 3 tbsp sumac (or fresh lemon juice)
• 6 tbs extra virgin olive oil
• 400g little gem lettuce
• 300g cucumbers (preferably small Middle Eastern cucumbers)
• 100g spring onions, trimmed
• 300g firm red tomatoes
• 200g flat-leaf parsley, most of the stalk removed, coarsely chopped
• 100g mint, leaves only, coarsely chopped
• 100g purslane, leaves only
• sea salt

Instructions

1. Open up the pitta bread at the seams, so you have two discs. Toast until golden brown on both sides, then break into bite-size pieces and place in a bowl. Sprinkle the sumac all over the toasted pitta pieces, then add the olive oil and toss well.
2. Remove any damaged outer leaves from the lettuce, then cut across into 1cm strips. If using a regular cucumber, peel, quarter lengthways and deseed; if using small cucumbers, simply halve lengthways. Cut the cucumbers across into slices. Thinly slice the spring onions. Chop the tomatoes into bite-sized pieces. Put these ingredients into a large salad bowl.
3. Add the herbs to the salad and season with salt to taste. Add the seasoned bread and toss well. Taste and adjust the seasoning if necessary. Serve immediately.

Related posts:

1. Mezze recipes, part one
2. Recipes: Beef up a summer salad with bread
3. Recipe to put a Spring in your step

M&S’s Dine in for Two for €12.50

I’d been meaning to try the Tesco offer, but needed to wait until I was in the right frame of mind for buying Tesco ready meals: ie, exhausted and full of self-loathing.  Sure enough, I had a particularly long and stressful Thursday at work a while back, and on the way home, found myself wandering around Tesco in the Jervis Centre blankly picking up and putting down food.  I slowly twigged that it would be the perfect time to try their Dinner for Two; I was far too tired and hungry to even care what I was eating, let alone cook anything from scratch.

The selection on  their Dinner for Two shelf had been fairly well picked over, and there didn’t seem to be anything fresh in the range, only ready meals.  But the Steak in Pepper Sauce, the Horseradish Mash and the Lemon Tarts are all dishes that I like, and they didn’t look too bad.  The wine selection was pretty impressive, and I picked up a bottle of Malbec.  What I found when I got home and prepared the meal was pleasantly surprising:

• Horseradish Mash: Delicious. Fantastic.  Perfectly creamy with a very decent amount of heat from the horseradish.
• Malbec: Incredible. Exquisite.  Really, really delicious.  Worth the price of admission even without the food.
• Steak in Pepper Sauce:  Not great, but edible.  The meat didn’t taste like steak, but like stewing beef.  It was still tender nonetheless, but the pepper sauce was a bit not quite right.
• Lemon Tarts: Very good.  No complaints at all.

So as you can see, this wasn’t too shabby at all.  The wine especially was an eye-opener: according to the price label, the bottle would usually be over €12.  We all know that you can’t really trust the pricing of wine ‘offers’ in supermarkets, but this was definitely a very smooth and drinkable wine.   The side and dessert were also excellent quality. If they would just make some fresh ingredients available for the mains, this could be a very attractive offer indeed.

So I’m here not to bury Tesco, but to praise them.   Who’d have thunk it?

Have you tried Tesco’s Dinner for Two? What do you recommend picking up or avoiding from the range?

Related posts:

1. Tesco launch their own dinner for two
2. Product Review: Cook 1,2,3,4 at M&S
3. Special Offers at Tesco, Apr 19th