Ice Cream Ireland

It’s been a crazy weekend in the shops, with a massive Easter rush, and I have hardly had a chance to catch my breath, let alone post anything. However, this sign has just appeared at the Milltown roundabout in Dingle, and I couldn’t resist snapping a photo. It certainly will get Dingle people talking.

For those without Irish, it’s a reference to the Dáil’s upcoming election and the difficulties facing the area and says: No Name, No Farmers, No Fishermen, No Small Businesses, No Post Offices, Vote No to Fianna Fáil. “Gan” actually means “without,” but hopefully you get the idea…

Technorati tags: Dingle, Election 2007, Fianna Fáil

We’ve been playing around with making ice cream Easter eggs. I had bought an egg mould some time ago, and we poured the ice cream into it. Then we wrapped it in chocolate (we tried both dipping and pouring, and both come out well) and added some caramalised hazelnut nibs. I don’t know if the customers will get any. We’re busy eating away!

Technorati tags: ice cream, egg, chocolate, Easter

 There seems to be more and more new companies roasting their own beans for the ever-increasing Irish coffee market. We’ve just received a sample of beans from the latest - Pónaire (the name is “bean” in Irish), a family operation in Tipperary.

The quality is very high, with a mild, smooth taste, and I would be happy to recommend them to anyone in the Midwest region. We’ll stick with our existing beans, though, since we’re happy with them (and our suppliers) and since they are Fairtrade…

Technorati tags: espresso, fairtrade, Ponaire, coffee, Tipperary, bean

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Here’s a video Sean and I made as a follow on to Ice Cream Magic. You’ll hear about the brown bread ice cream and see production as well as the Dingle and Killarney Shops!

Technorati tags: YouTube, magic, ice cream, blog, video

I must apologise to everyone who tried to access this site over the last days. I’ve been so busy in the shop that I didn’t realise that I had run out of bandwidth due to the extra traffic generated by the Irish Blog Awards. I had paid for extra bandwidth earlier in the month, but it clearly wasn’t enough. By the time I checked the site and my email on Friday evening, the folks at Blacknight, who host this site had headed away for the weekend, and there was nothing I could do… So sorry!

It’s an odd thing when you have a huge spike in traffic that is a “once off,” and I’d be interested to know how other bloggers handle it. The salesman at Blacknight with whom I corresponded when I bought the extra bandwidth was unwilling to cut me any slack (even in return for me singing their praises on the blog) and was interested only in trying to sell a more expensive package, which would be generally three or four times the bandwidth I need in a normal month. I was down for almost three days. Ouch! Once again, apologies…

Technorati Tags: Blog, traffic, bandwidth, Blacknight