Author Archives: Keith

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January 1, 2011

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Awards Winners

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The Megabytes Awards 2010 from Sally and John McKenna

Calling out the best is one of the stepping stones to improving standards and The Bridgestone Guide is a veteran in the support of good, local Irish food.

On 30th Dec they posted up their 2010 awards and they are extracted below:

Artisan of the Year: Anna Leveque, Triskel Farmhouse Cheeses, Portlaw, County Waterford

Restaurant of the Year: Harry’s Bar & Restaurant, Bridgend, Inishowen, County Donegal

Chef of the Year: Mickael Viljanen, Gregn’s Castle, County Clare

Inspiration of the year: Michael Kelly, GIY Ireland

Man of the Year: Jack McCarthy, McCarthy’s Butchers, Kanturk, County Cork

Farmer of the Year: Jimmy & Bernadine Mulhall, Coolanowle Farm, County Laois

Retailer of the Year: Ardkeen Stores, Waterford

New Food Award of the Year: Highbank Orchard Syrup, Cuffesgrange, County Kilkenny

Newcomer of the Year: Tastefully Yours, Dunhill, County Waterford (Update – have done an Irish FoodBase entry for them – http://irishfoodbase.com/tastefully-yours/)

Food County of the Year: County Kilkenny (some relevant links: www.savourkilkenny.com, www.trailkilkenny.ie/food-trail/)

Megabytes 2011 Award: Clanwood Farm, County Offaly

Megabytes Achievement Award: Field’s Supermarket, Skibbereen, West Cork

Some of those I am familiar with, others are new to me.

Very happy to have played a part in the foodcamp which is referred to as part of the Kilkenny award and fully determined (along with a host of others) to continue to encourage the spread of artisan, local and small scale food production and consumtion in Kilkenny.

Keith

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December 29, 2010

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Marketing

Irish Food Producers & Social Media: Brownes Soups

Came across this today – in November Sarah Browne from Brownes Soups used a combination of her Facebook Page (with 329 fans at the time of writing) and Surveymonkey to do her first online survey. It is still up here: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/KSZ8FFX.

She was offering a draw for some of their sauces (pictured below) as an incentive – nice idea.

In a post on the page today (29th Dec) Sarah said she had a great response to the survey. On the back of her first appearance on youtube after the Clonmel Food Producers event great to see her extending her use of the tools available to her.

Keith

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December 29, 2010

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Packaging

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Artisan and local food packaging examples

First two from Scandanavia and Dieline.

The first is a humorous take on Santa at Christmas – used by a Swedish micro-brewery near Stockholm. Can imagine these being strong on the shelf edge.

via Dieline

The second is a range of gingerbread and the brief was for packaging for the best gingerbread in Finland in time for Christmas 2010. Very contemporary.

via Dieline

The next two are student concepts and come from the Lovely Package blog.

This one is from Martín Azambuja in Uruguay. “The project was to design new packaging of flour for people who like cooking. I decided to use two colours and a reticle picture.”

Strikingly different from the flour packaging which I am familiar with here in Ireland.

via Lovely Package

The second is from Thorleifur Gunnar Gíslason in Iceland – more accurately he is credited but the work is from a group of 3 students. Again for a micro brewery the brief: “The concept is a simple one. One beer, 10 different bottle designs by 10 different designers. The design would be changed annually. The design could be put on beer glasses as well. The design is limited to black graphics on a 33cl glass bottle.”

You can see see 3 of the designs below. All 10 on the blog post linked underneath.

via Lovely Package.

keith

 

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December 29, 2010

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Uncategorized

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Mella’s Fudge, Cork

I spotted this brand while working in Gorey and having lunch in Partridge’s Artisan Cafe there.

You can see the orginal foodspotting post here and a full write up on the brand on the Irish FoodBase here.

Keith

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December 27, 2010

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Great brands and producers

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Chocolate Garden, Wicklow

A series of posts coming up which feed off (ouch) the local and artisan food brands from my Foodspotting activities.

Chocolate Garden

This is a long established brand which is run by a husband and wife team (Mary and Jim Healy) whom I did a small amount of work with a couple of years ago. Since then they have moved to a purpose built premises in Carlow and taken over Tipperary IceCream. The brand evolution looks like it is starting to settle down to a more uniform presentation of their logo and packaging which is great.

They also run chocolate workshops with 2 coming up soon:

Tuesday 4th January – 2pm
Friday 7th January – 2pm

Check out the details here.

You can see a more complete range of their products in this photo:

Keith

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December 11, 2010

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Foodspotting roundup, 11th December 2010

Doves Farm – my foodspotting link

Doves Farm is a farm based brand which started in 1978 and now employs over 60 people with a range of products covering biscuits (these ones are really tangy and tasty), flour, breakfast cereals and pasta. All of their products are organic and they have a separate mill for gluten free flour and products.

Cramers Grove – my foodspotting link

I mentioned Cramers Grove in a previous post here and the above photo was taken about a week after they opened their new cafe in McDonagh Junction in Kilkenny.

A full Irish Foodbase entry on Cramers Grove here.

Iswari Chocolate Making Kit – my foodspotting link here

This was a completely new brand to me – and a new concept for that matter. Their site is here I believe (it is in Portuguese and the translation refers to these products – but not in a normal brand website way). Love the idea of making raw chocolate – my experience of this through both Natasha’s brand (previous post here) and Booja Booja is really positive.

A Slice of Heaven – my foodspotting post here

This is a Kilkenny based business (website here) and while I have seen them before this is a really impressive product.

Keith

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December 9, 2010

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video interviews

Glenilen Farm, Cork Ireland

Glenilen were featured in a Foodspotting roundup recently here and I have also included them as one of the early brands in my new food site.

This morning I met with Avril Twomey (as part of work I do with Bord Bia) and I shot this brief video where she explains the origin of their logo.

You can see their website here.

Keith

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December 5, 2010

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video interviews

Food Producer Video interviews – Savour Kilkenny

Came across these last week – a series of short video interviews done during Savour Kilkenny in August. Unfortunately the business which shot them has disabled embedding for all except the one underneath 😦

Highbank Orchard Syrup (previously featured on this blog here)

Direct link for the above in case embed gets pulled: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9IYt_nwXdM

Others in the series which are relevant to Biabeag are:

A Slice of Heaven: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SyM-Dz2kSP0

Tess’s Baking: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vy2jyJzviY

Secret Recipe Co: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clhF6hWuGjU

Tara’s Naturally: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0rlNclrMFU

Oldtown Bakery: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-U03O2KsJw

Keith

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December 5, 2010

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Great brands and producers, Packaging

Doodle Bread, Northern Ireland

Interesting one this – a bread making kit with some great branding wrapped around it. They have also strongly built in community on the site – inviting photo’s of creations and featuring them.

A slight diversion from my usual posts this one carries a “foc” label – Rose Kane, the founder of Doodle Bread sent me a kit for free (via foodfight.ie I believe) . No obligations attached – however I really liked the approach and happy to share it here.

This is what came in the kit – mix for two loaves and reusable pieces for future baking.

This is what came out the other end after some serious mixing and kneading.

Tasty bread, healthy ingredients and fun to make with your kids :-). UPDATE – forgot to mention that you can buy the kits directly from her site – online store linked here.

I do have a memory of reading that the mix is from a manufacturer in the South (ROI) but cannot see a reference online to that – if anyone knows can you leave a comment?

Keith

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December 3, 2010

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Great brands and producers

Donegal Artisan Food Producers

Thanks to Jenni Timony for bring these to my attention. One I knew about (Donegal Rapeseed Oil) but the others were new to me.

Donegal RapeSeed Oil Company

With both Twitter and Facebook accounts these are actively working the social media scene. Rapeseed is a great product – bringing the health benefits of Omega 3 combined with Irish production. Their website is here.

Filligans Marinades and Salad Dressings

From Jenni “They do gorgeous marinades and salad dressings and supply the Aroma Cafe in Donegal Town” They do have a website – http://filligans.com – however it is only a single page and contains no decent images of their products.

Please, please do your brand justice with a decent web presence. And some good visuals – really helps to get the word out!

Found the above image on Irish Gourmet where you can purchase it online.

Quality Sea Veg

Based in Cloughglass, Burton Port, Co. Donegal they process a variety of edible seaweeds from dulse bites and caragheen moss to sea spagetti and kelp. Their website is a .co.uk – http://www.seaveg.co.uk

 

Keith