Shanahan’s on the Green, Dublin 2

Posted: 18 May '10 by Ciara

My 30^th birthday fell on a Friday this year so before the party that was planned for Saturday night my husband and I decided to celebrate my joining of the 30 club by taking a trip to Shanahans on the Green for one of their renowned steaks.

Being huge fan of steaks it rates at the top of our “favourite restaurant” list – they serve certified Irish Angus beef which is cooked in a special broiler, charring the surface of the meat while keeping the centre tender and moist.

Shanahan’s is situated at the top of St. Stephens Green in Dublin 2. Founded by John Shanahan, born in Boston Massuchussets, who always identified with his rich Irish heritage, he embarked upon Shanahan’s on the Green to try and capture his love of cooking and his passion for Ireland.

In addition to its scrumptious menu, which includes those certified Irish angus beef steaks, Irish seafood, hearty sides and mouth-watering desserts, it also has top class service. The elegant service together with the top class food is complimented and heightened by the beautiful old Dublin décor of the restaurant. “The Oval Office”, the restaurant’s downstairs bar featuring historical documents and mementoes from each of America’s presidents of Irish Heritage and also JFK’s original rocking chair from air force one blends both cultures and histories together classically.

We always enjoy a drink in the Oval office before dining in the restaurant as the comfortable leather green chairs and low lit table lamps and frequently lit fire add to the relaxed and friendly atmosphere helping us to unwind and ponder over the menu and beautiful wine list.

Each of the staff at Shanahans are also extremely professional and friendly and if you ask them about any of the artifacts they will willingly give you a history of the restaurant.

The details

For the wine I choose a Portugese red, Duas Quintas Reserve, 2006. This was quite full bodied, quite strong at first but delicious with the steak. Since Cor doesn’t like wine he choose his usual, an Austrian beer called Stiegel – Shanahan’s is one of only a few places in Ireland that serve it.

After making final decisions on our food order our waitress bought us over a selection of fresh breads, cheese and onion flavoured crusty bread and chilli flavoured muffins, still warm from the oven. I decided to have a slice of each, conscious of my huge steak that I was determined to finish. I opted out of a starter and Cor went for the sizzling black west coast mussels presented on a huge plate along with shallots, garlic, fresh herbs, lemon and butter. I watched in horror, not being a fan of fish, as Cor devoured the whole plate. I shook my head laughing telling him he’d never finish his steak.

When our 12oz medium done fillet mignon’s arrived my mouth watered in anticipation. I waited patiently as our waitress placed our beautifully presented side orders of whipped potatoes with butter and chives, sautéed wild mushrooms and Shanahans renowned large portion of onion rings on our table in their copper pots.

We exchanged satisfied smiles and tucked into our meal.

As always, we were thrilled with our meal: the steak was mouth-wateringly satisfying and cooked to perfection, as were the creamy whipped potatoes, the thin and crispy onion rings and the mushrooms, all of which combined to create the perfect meal. 

The only downside was that I was so stuffed after my main course that I almost couldn’t breathe.. But not so stuffed that it prevented me from getting a dessert! We shared a huge portion of cookies and cream cheese cake. I was so full at this stage but had to keep eating as it was too nice to leave (and Howard from Take That had arrived into the restaurant with his friends at this stage so I took my time eating the cheesecake while glancing back and forth at him and his companions).

Starters
Sizzling Black west coast mussels	€19.75
Main Course:
Fillet Mignon x2	€48.50 ea.
Whipped potatoes with butter & chives	€9.25
Sautéed wild mushrooms	€9.25
Crispy fried Onion rings	€9.25
Dessert:
Cookies and cream cheese cake	€12.50
Sundries:
Duas Quintas Reserve, 2006	€65.00
Stiegel Beer x5	€6.00 ea.
Total:	€252.00

Our verdict

We have been to this restaurant quite a few times and have yet to be disappointed. To me, it ticks all the boxes. The intimate, relaxed, classic and historical atmosphere, the beautifully presented and largely portioned food, the extensive wine list and the lovely staff all add up to make my perfect night out.

It is pricey but you do get what you pay for and, as my father-in-law says, “money spent on good food is money well spent.”

Our rating: 5 out of 5

Shanahan’s on the Green
119 St. Stephen’s Green,
Dublin 2
Ireland
T: 00353 (0) 1 4070939
W: www.shanahans.ie
You can also find Shanahan’s on Google Maps.

Categories: Restaurant Reviews

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Pasta with a creamy smoked bacon and pea sauce

Posted: 04 May '10 by Ciara

With my sister and her 3 kids visiting at the weekend i thought that I’d search through www.channel4.com/food for a few recipes. I decided upon the pasta with creamy smoked bacon and peas sauce for the kids.

They loved it – and with very little cooking required, so did I!

Ingredients:

• 10 slices smoked streaky bacon or pancetta
• A small bunch of fresh mint, chopped finely
• 150g Parmesan cheese
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 400g dried or fresh pasta
• Olive oil
• A knob of butter
• 300g frozen peas
• 2 heaped dessertspoons crème fraîche
• 1 lemon

Method:

1. Finely slice the bacon.
2. Pick the mint leaves and discard the stalks.
3. Finely grate the Parmesan.
4. Cook the pasta according to the packet Instructions.
5. Add olive oil and knob of butter to a large frying pan over a medium heat.
6. Add the bacon and pepper and fry until golden and crisp.
7. Finely chop your mint leaves.
8. When bacon is cooked, add frozen peas and give the pan a good shake.
9. After a minute, add crème fraîche and mint to the bacon and peas.
10. Drain the pasta reserving some of the cooking water.
11. Add the pasta to the frying pan.
12. Half your lemon and squeeze the juice over the pasta.
13. When it begins to bubble, remove from the heat.
14. If the sauce is too thick for you, add a splash of the reserved cooking water to thin it out a bit.
15. Add the grated Parmesan and give the pan a shake to mix it in.
16. Plate up and server.

Enjoy!

Categories: Recipes

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Broccoli & Pasta Bake

Posted: 23 March '10 by Ciara

This is a great crowd-pleasing dish in our house. You can make it as a vegetarian dish or alternatively add bacon, pancetta or chicken.

It’s also quite quick and easy to make.

Ingredients

• 400g Penne Pasta
• 1 red onion
• 250g Broccoli florets
• 2 chicken/vegetable stock cubes
• 1 tablespoon of french mustard
• 200g creme fraiche
• 100g gruyere cheese
• 1 tablespoon of parsley
• 2 handfuls of breadcrumbs
• 1 teaspoon of mixed herbs
• 50g parmesan cheese

Method

1. Heat the grill.
2. Boil pasta and chopped onion in salted boiling water for 7 minutes then add florets and boil for a further 3 minutes.
3. Reserve 400mls of water, then drain pasta and vegetables.
4. Return reserved water to the pan and dissolve vegetable/chicken stock cubes. Whisk in mustard and creme fraiche and season to taste.
5. Add pasta, vegetables, gruyere cheese and parsley to the stock, mustard and creme fraiche mixture. Stir until melted.
6. Tip pasta and vegetables into ovenproof dish.
7. Mix the parmesan cheese, bread crumbs and mixed herbs together, then scatter on top of the pasta and vegetables.
8. Place under the grill for 3 minutes.

Serve and enjoy!

Categories: Recipes

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Looking for tasty treats in Dublin? Make sure you ‘Get Fresh’!

Posted: 12 March '10 by Ciara

After reading Niall’s article about Carluccio’s I felt that I had to mention one of my favourites: “Get Fresh” in Rathfarnham, Dublin 14.

It is possibly my favourite food place to shop in Dublin. If I’m cooking or baking something that requires extra-special ingredients or if I need the freshest fruit or vegetables, this is the place I go to.

Founded by Colm Eadie, his inspiration for setting up the store arose from his frustration at finding it extremely difficult to locate certain foods/ingredients in stores throughout Dublin.

It certainly is an impressive store with a bit of everything in it. If you are bored with the normal brands of food stocked in the supermarket this is the place to go to for something a bit different.

It’s stocked daily with the freshest fruit and vegetables to include the likes of porcini, chestnut and shitake mushrooms. They stock a wide range of cheeses such as halloumi, wensleysdale, French brie and parmesan which are also available in large quantities at great value, much cheaper than any store brand that I’ve tried. They also stock various hams, various salamis and a wide range of fresh pasta which I find hard to come by in supermarkets. From different organic pestos, homemade chutneys and soups to large quantities of spices also at a great price, I have yet to go to their store and not find something that I was looking for. All of your baking and cooking needs are catered for.

If you didn’t feel like baking, you could always pick up lovely treats from homemade tea brack or panettone bread, lemon drizzle cakes, mini coconut macaroons, various types of nougats or bread sticks in different flavours including a personal favourite of ours, mini garlic and pesto bread sticks.

At the weekends they also have a special treat in store stocking baskets of assorted fresh bread around the shop, from ciabatta, croissants, muffins, scones to “Belfast baps” or in this case Dublin baps, the selection is too hard to resist.

A personal favourite of mine is the way they present their “Christmas” ingredients around the store. They have a large table in the centre of the  shop stashed with an array of ingredients to cater for your christmas recipes, all of which can be weighed and measured by the customer. If you didn’t feel like baking it yourself they have a wide range of Christmas cakes to cranberry sauces available to purchase as well as hampers which you can make up yourself.

It is definitely worth a trip.

You can see more photos hereImage 1Image 2Image 3

Get Fresh
6 Rosemount Shopping Centre,
Ballyroan,
Rathfarnham,
Dublin 14
T: 01 4937148 or 0877755645
E: getfresh6@eircom.net
You can also find Get Fresh on Google Maps.

Just ask for Niall Dermody or Colm Eadie.

What I Bought..

Pesto & Parmesan Mini Bread Sticks	€3.99
Homemade Basil Pesto	€5.99
Chargrilled Red Pepper Houmous Dip	€1.69
Couvature white Chocolate Chips x2	€6.98
French Brie 275g x3	€10.47
Handful of fresh thyme	€0.99
1 bag of fresh bay leaves	€2.49
Total:	€32.60

Enjoy!

Categories: Local Food Heroes

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Tea Brack

Posted: 25 February '10 by Ciara

I got this recipe for Tea Brack from a work colleague and tried it out at the weekend. I absolutely loved it, although i had to give half of it away to my mother-in-law, being the only one in my household to like this sort of cake! Otherwise i would have eaten all of it myself…

Irish tea brack is a rich, moist cake which is perfect for a breakfast or an afternoon snack. “Brack” comes from the Irish word “brac”, which means speckled.

You can see more photos hereImage 1

Makes 2 generous tea bracks

Ingredients

• 450g Dark brown Sugar
• 2.5 cups of tea (make it in tea pot first)
• half cup of whiskey
• 375g raisins
• 525g sultanas
• 3 eggs
• 450g plain flour (no need to sieve)
• 3 teaspoons baking powder
• 3 teaspoons mixed spice
• honey for glazing

You’ll also need a little butter and some baking paper to line your baking tins.

Method

1. Dissolve the sugar in the hot tea, mix in the whiskey and soak the fruit overnight in this.
2. Next day, preheat the oven to 17o, gas mark 3 and line the loaf tins.
3. Mix the eggs, flour (no need to sieve), baking powder and mixed spice with the fruit mixture, (i just use a fork) and pour into the prepared tins.
4. Bake for 1 hour.
5. Remove from oven, place on wire rack and immediately brush with honey to glaze (I used a pastry brush).
6. Serve with tea and butter.

Enjoy!

Other information

Please note that these bracks will keep for up to 2 weeks because the whiskey preserves them, although they wouldn’t last that long in our house.

Please also note that instead of the 1/2 cup of whiskey you can just add another 1/2 cup of tea.

Categories: Recipes

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Cream of chicken and vegetable soup

Posted: 11 February '10 by Ciara

This is a yummy recipe and is made almost weekly in our house.

It’s also a great way of getting our daughter Sophie to eat her veggies.

You can see a larger photo here

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

• 2-3 tbsp olive oil
• 2 chicken fillets
• 1375mls chicken stock
• 1 onion
• 3 cloves of garlic
• 1 carrot
• 1/2 parsnip
• 1lb potatoes
• salt and pepper
• 250mls double cream
• 1 tbsp chives

Method

1. Prepare chicken stock.
2. Heat oil in a pan, remove fat from chicken fillets and seal the top and bottom of chicken fillets in the pan.
3. Add a cupful of the chicken stock to chicken and simmer until chicken has cooked through (This normally takes around 10 minutes).
4. Meanwhile chop up onions, garlic, carrot, parsnip and potatoes into small pieces.
5. In a separate pot, fry onion and garlic in a tbsp of olive oil until soft.
6. Add remaining vegetables to the pot with the garlic and onion in it, season with salt and pepper, add remaining chicken stock and boil for 25 minutes.
7. Remove Chicken fillets from the pan, cut into small pieces and set aside.
8. Add the left over chicken stock to the pot with vegetables in it.
9. When the vegetables have softened remove them to a blender and blitz until they have turned into a puree.
10. Add this back to the pot along with the double cream, chicken pieces, and chives.
11. Reduce the heat and allow the soup to heat through (around 30 minutes or so).
12. Serve with brown bread.

Enjoy!

Categories: Recipes

3 Comments

Comforting beef casserole with mashed potatoes

Posted: 22 January '10 by Ciara

I am really excited about this new recipe. I tried it for the first time this evening and we all loved it. It is packed with flavour and was the perfect thing to eat on a cold snowy evening. Sophie has been quite run down recently, so i am a bit paranoid that she should be getting as much goodness into her as possible,  and i was delighted that she loved this.

Please note that I cut my vegetables quite small and also the carrots were grated quite finely too as Sophie doesn’t really like a lot of lumps in her food, so feel free to cut up your veggies to your own liking.

The recipe comes from Nigella Lawson’s “Nigella Feasts” programme.

Serves 5

You can see more photos here.

Ingredients

Ingredients: Beef Casserole

• 3-4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1 onion
• 2 carrots sliced or grated
• 2 celery stalks sliced thinly or 1 inch thick
• 3 cloves of garlic grated
• 2 dried bay leaves
• 3-4 sprigs fresh thyme
• 2lbs of beef fillet stewing meat
• 1/4 cup flour
• salt & pepper
• 1/2 cup red wine or beef stock (i obviously used beef stock for Sophie)
• 1 large can whole plum tomatoes (i also blend these for Cor, who hates lumps of tomatoes in his food)
• peel of half an orange

Ingredients: Mashed Potatoes

• 6 maris piper potatoes
• 4 knobs of butter
• 30ml full fat milk

Method

Method: Beef Casserole

1. Heat oil and over a medium heat fry onion, carrots, celery, garlic, bay leaves and thyme for 5-10 minutes until onion turns translucent. Remove veggies to a bowl leaving as much oil in the pot as you can.
2. Meanwhile, place flour and salt and pepper in a plastic bag along with meat. Shake until meat is coated. Place into the pot which you have just removed veggies from and cook until pieces are well browned.
3. When this is done add the wine or beef stock then add veggies, tomatoes and orange peel.
4. Bring to a simmer and then reduce to a low and cook for 3 hours. Remove bay leaves, thyme sprigs and orange peel and serve with mashed potatoes.

Method: Mashed potatoes

1. Boil potatoes for 20-25 minutes
2. Drain and mash
3. Meanwhile heat butter and milk together
4. Add slowly to potatoes continuously mashing

Enjoy!

Categories: Recipes

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Parmesan Chicken Goujons & Honey mustard dip

Posted: 13 January '10 by Ciara

Firstly, i would like to apologise for being a bit lazy about adding new recipes. I have been extremely busy since the end of November between shopping in New York and the lead up to Christmas. But i’m sure i’ll be forgiven when i share some of the new recipes that i have picked up recently.

I also have to write a few reviews on restaurants that i visited while in New York and also in Dublin during the lead up to Christmas.

The chicken goujons are a definite favourite in our house. These are one of my daughter Sophies favourite foods. They are really handy and can be made in advance. I made them recently with chips and mushy peas but they also go well with mashed potatoes and broccoli and parma ham.

see more photos here

Ingredients

Parmesan Chicken goujons

• 600g chicken breasts
• 50g flour
• salt and pepper
• 2 eggs beaten
• 100g breadcrumbs
• 50g parmesan cheese
• 3 tbsp oil (i used goose fat recently and it was yummy)

Honey mustard dip

• 250ml creme fraiche
• 1 tbsp grainy mustard
• 1/2 tsp honey
• 1 tsp dijon mustard

Method

Method – Parmesan Chicken goujons

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees
2. Cut the chicken fillets into finger sizes
3. Place the flour and salt and pepper into a bag
4. Place the eggs into a bowl and beat with a fork
5. Place the breadcrumbs and parmesan into another bag
6. Toss the goujons into the seasoned flour, then remove and shake off excess flour
7. Dip into beaten egg
8. Toss into breadcrumb and parmesan mix and lay themk unto a plate
9. Cook in the oven for 20 minutes turning once and serve with honey mustard dip

Method – Honey mustard dip

1. Mix all of the ingredients altogether and serve. Note, depending on your taste you may want to add more honey or more mustard.

Enjoy!

Categories: Recipes

4 Comments

About Chilli & Chocolate - A Belfast food blog

Chilli and Chocolate is a food blog from Belfast, Northern Ireland. Written by Niall and Kelly, the blog covers all sorts of good things: recipes, restaurant reviews and wine reviews, and upcoming foodie events in Northern Ireland. We also get the chance to tell you about some great local producers - who they are, what they do and how to find them.

The Pint & Pitcher is written by our friend Adrian, and covers everything you need to know about Real Ale.

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