Not Traditional Irish Stew
I decided I wanted to add some Irish dish for Paddy's Day. I originally planned on doing a Beef and Stout Stew which is yumm and I've never made one myself so it is something I plan to do but looking around at all the different recipes I realised there's millions of them out there and it's perfect as it is so I didn't think my getting some of the ingredients wrong was going to improve it any - which honestly is an accidental but almost guaranteed occurrence. Then I thought about making Stout and Treacle Bread which is so good - especially with Seafood Chowder - but then I'm feeling quite lazy this week and any recipe I've ever read for that just sound a bit - not exactly difficult, but still definitely the sort of thing I'm going to need a few goes at to get right.
And then there's Irish Stew hmm...
We messed up so naturally the seriously disabled must suffer. Wait, what???
Last night the government announced that it is axing the Mobility Allowance and Motorized Transport Grant. The Mobility Allowance is only available to people who are seriously physically disabled and satisfy a means test. Why are the government stopping this scheme? Because they had in a place a ridiculous and inexcusable situation where it wasn't possible to apply for the allowance if you were over 66 years of age but if you had applied for it prior to being 66 you could would continue getting it after 66. Clearly this doesn't make any sense and it's contrary both to our own and the EU's equality legislation. They are stopping the scheme to avoid paying and backdating payments to people who were incorrectly refused the allowance on this basis. That is what this move is all about - avoid paying for a colossal mistake which was pointed out to them on numerous occasions by various different groups over the past few years. And yes the mistake was in place before the current government but I cannot imagine that a Fianna Fail majority government would ever take such a politically suicidal move as to attack the seriously disabled in this way. I understand that paying for mistake will be costly, but who are these people who are looking for this money? They aren't people looking to screw the system, sitting back rubbing their hands together waiting for the big pay-out. They are seriously disabled people who need this money to live. I met a gentleman a couple of years ago who was over 66, in a wheelchair, with other health complications, and caring for his wife who was in the early stages of Alzheimer's, that is how I found out about the odd situation with the Mobility Allowance. Do you think people like this should have to lose out because of this mistake? This isn't Ireland. This is not the country I'm so proud of.
Baked, Buttered Apricots
I'm back in connected land!!! And to celebrate I want to share with you one of the simplest and tasty (but far from heart-healthy) sweet treats I know. It's not my recipe. It's from Jocasta Innes' The Paupers Cookbook which I love and have mentioned many times, and this is the last recipe from that book I'm going to add to twimii - simply because if I don't stop now I'll end up posting the whole book. Did I stick faithfully to the recipe in the book? No, it seems I'm incapable of following recipes to the letter. In fairness it's not easy to find tinned apricots - at least I didn't find it easy - so I've used peach slices not apricot halves. It still works great. That's one of the fantastic things about this recipe, you can try different tinned fruit and all you need to get this great dessert is white bread, butter, sugar and cinnamon. And the result tastes like something you'd buy in a patisserie.
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