Vegan Sources of Umami

by Liz Child

Good cooks will all instinctively know about balancing the tastes; sweet, sour, salty and bitter, but there’s a very important 5th taste, umami, that is trickier to describe. The Japanese translation of ‘umami’ is a delicious savouriness – but how is that different from salty?

I would describe it as a sort of humming background flavour, rich and rounded, associated with broths and meat, but it is also very prevalent in plants. Umami is found in foods that contain a high level of glutamate, a naturally occurring amino acid. Although many of these foods are animal products, it does occur in plant based foods too, so no one needs to miss out on the 5th taste. Here are some plant based ways to get more umami in your life.

Seasoning, Spices & Herbs

Use spices like smoked paprika, cumin and coriander seeds to impart a smokey, meaty umami to many dishes. Toast the spices before adding them to your dish to release the oils and make the most of all that flavour.

Green tea (and black tea) is umami rich, add it as a secret ingredient in your brothy soups and stews for an extra layer of flavour. Try brewing an umami rich broth of green tea, dried mushrooms and dried seaweed. Drain, stir in some miso paste and enjoy with vegetables, silken tofu and noodles.

Nutritional yeast brings umami in a cheesy form, it’s a great replacement for parmesan cheese. Use it to sprinkle over popcorn, risotto, soups or pasta, or whisk it into a vegan cheese sauce.

Mustard, miso, soy sauce, toasted sesame oil…all make brilliant seasonings or marinades to add umami to your vegetables.

Vegetables

Mushrooms, seaweed, tomatoes, onions, garlic, broccoli, beetroot, cabbage, celery and more are all naturally high in delicious glutamates.

Dried vegetables have an even more concentrated supply so think about adding dried mushrooms, tomatoes and seaweed into your dishes for an extra layer of flavour. Tomato puree is another way to get a concentrated dose of umami.

Fermenting or cooking your vegetables in certain ways adds even more umami deliciousness! Read more about that below.

Fermented Foods

Fermented vegetables go far beyond sauerkraut and kimchi. Think about adding miso, soy sauce, wine, dark vinegars, beer, kombucha, mustard, olives, chocolate, coffee, capers…to your cooking. All these mouthwatering fermented foods are mouthwatering for a reason.

Cooking Techniques

The way you prepare a vegetable can markedly affect its flavour. Think about the difference between a boiled Brussels sprout and a roasted one. Roasting, grilling, pan frying, charring, smoking, barbecuing, caramelising…all these techniques will increase that essential umami flavour in your dish.

Toasted or caramelised flavours are so good! Add toasted sesame oil and toasted seeds to your meals for an instant savoury hit.

Do Small Changes Make a Difference?

by Kenneth Keavey

When I was younger, I believed that by convincing my parents to recycle glass bottles and joining Green Peace that we would make a difference, I was utterly convinced, I never doubted it for a second, I knew the planet was precious and that our changes made a difference.

All young children have a connection with nature and they believe they can do anything, what happens as we grow up? Why do we lose that sense of value for the natural world that we had as children? 

When we started the farm, I believed growing sustainable food would change the planet, and that all we needed was a tractor, some seeds and we would have a successful farm. 

At times on this journey, there has been disillusionment, pressure and stress, the fighting to do the right thing when it seemed it was all going against us. But ultimately, we stayed the course and stuck to our principles. 

I am not sure how long it normally takes, but it took (and continues to take) a long time to realise that no one change in isolation changes anything. Real change and success is built on lots and lots of little things done consistently over time.

This is as true for building a new habit as it is for fixing the planet.

So maybe one by one and little by little all our changes taken together can effect real change. Maybe your choice to plant a tree, to avoid weed killer, or to tell your kids about biodiversity and educate them in the beauty and preciousness of nature contribute to real positive change.

By buying from us you are effecting real change, you are choosing a different way to eat and are supporting serious changes behind the scenes. You are supporting your health, and the planet, sustainable food production and a new system of growing and selling food.

Your choice to support us means you are one of a community that are choosing a new and better way to eat, you are supporting farming and food for a better planet.

Does it matter? Does it matter that you support a zero-waste circular economy, a sustainable means of growing food and a better food future, does that matter?

Well in my book that does matter it matters a lot.

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
― Margaret Mead 

Thank you for your support.

Kenneth

PS We deliver nationwide, explore our range here.

Small Sustainable Swaps – Plastic Packaging

by Liz Child

Did you make any sustainable new years resolutions?

Resolutions are a nice idea but often it’s impossible to stick to a big, drastic change. So we suggest making a series of small sustainable swaps, they all add up. Here’s how we can help with one area – plastic packaging. Choosing to buy products without petrochemical based plastics sends a clear message to big companies and producers, there is a better way!

Our fruits and vegetables are delivered plastic free, nationwide to every address in Ireland and Northern Ireland, and we use compostable bags for things like salad and spinach leaves that need that extra protection. If you are on one of our local routes (in green on the map below) then we collect and re-use the cardboard boxes too! Some of our deliveries are with a courier company (in orange on the map below) so we can’t collect those boxes yet unfortunately, but they are compostable or recyclable so please dispose of them responsibly.

As well as our fresh produce, we deliver organic groceries and we are always looking at the most sustainable options. We have a growing plastic free aisle and here are a few of our favourites from the plastic free swaps we’ve been making recently.

Herbs and Spices – Plastic Free Refills

Sonnentor are our new herb and spice supplier. We love the organic contents of course, they are high quality and full of amazing flavour to make our dishes sing. But we are also really impressed with the packaging. The contents are protected in clever, compostable bags and then packaged in lovely sustainably sourced cardboard boxes. Read more about Sonnentor here. Add some of our selection to your next order here.

Grains, Pulses, Dried Fruit, Nuts and Seeds – Refills (in compostable bags)

We now have a really useful range of nuts, seeds, dried fruit and grains in compostable bags. Perfect for refilling jars in your kitchen. We love having big jars of ingredients like these visible in our kitchen, they remind us to cook from scratch and have healthy snack bowls. The clear visibility makes writing a shopping list of what we are running low on easy! Check out our range here and here.

Plastic Free Teas

Did you know that most tea bags contain plastic? Not good for us and certainly not good for our compost bins! We stock a lovely selection of plastic free, organic teas here.

Chocolate!

Chocolate is a bit of a sustainability minefield. Cocoa production is linked to child labour, slavery, deforestation, and low wages. So how can concerned chocolate lovers make the most sustainable and ethical purchases? As well as researching different brands on their cocoa sourcing, choose bars with biodegradable packaging. For example, our Vivani bars are wrapped in a protective, compostable film which performs like regular plastic. It is made from sustainably sourced wood fibres. The paper and cardboard packaging is also FSC® certified and printed using mineral oil-free inks. Check out our sustainable chocolates here.

Eco Toiletries

Switching to bamboo toothbrushes and shampoo bars is an easy way to massively cut down your plastic consumption in the bathroom. We are really impressed with our shampoo bars, they smell incredible and really work! Check out our eco toiletries here.

One of Those Weeks

by Kenneth Keavey

Last week was a terrible week. Have you ever had one of those? Where everything that can go wrong, does go wrong. We are a small family business, we are based on our own family farm in county Galway and small things can have a big impact. 

Have you ever faced into a time when you really can’t figure out which way is up? Everything is going against you? Things are unravelling before your eyes? Well if you have then we can certainly empathise. 

Last week was the week, we have had quite a few of “those weeks” over the last two years, and we know we have been the lucky ones, many businesses have not been so lucky, we have managed to stay open and stay going. I think maybe even Florence and George our pet rescue pigs knew there was something amiss last week.

Most of you our customers will hopefully have been none the wiser that there was anything amiss.

The week started with several staff not being able to come in to work due to close contact related stuff, we were down people and were on the back foot from the start. But we got busy, the guys and girls working put in amazing effort.

Then there were delays to deliveries, disruptions to our transport partners that meant we were left with significant stock shortages. Again, everybody got pretty busy both harvesting extra on the farm and changing contents in boxes to make sure everybody got as close to what they wanted as possible.

Then in the middle of it all more of the team were out,  so we had to put a stop on most of the harvest temporarily and drafted the farm team into the packing shed to help with packing. We were working flat out. 

By Wednesday we were stretched, stressed and there was just too many plates spinning.

But on Thursday the ultimate disaster struck our whole website and all the software we rely on to keep the wheels turning crashed and was not back online again properly until Friday afternoon. That left us with a backlog of nearly 300 orders to pack in one day, as close to an impossible task as there is. 

Not only that but an already stretched customer service team were trying their very best to get back to the many queries that were coming in as a result of the outage.

It was intense, busy, stressful, and at times energised, fuelled by pizza and loud music, but the team came through in the end. 

The final icing on the cake was not having our orders ready for our usual transport link to Dublin and we had to hire our own truck, which arrived and was not big enough, so we had to make two runs though the night to get the orders to Dublin for Saturday morning delivery, 4.45 am the last boxes were loaded onto the truck on our farm on Saturday morning.

Not only that but the team were back in on Saturday again to try and mop up the missed pieces and Darragh our Limerick Agent was even packing his own orders by hand on Saturday and Sunday to ensure they were done for delivery on Monday.

It was close to the most difficult week we have had. But you know what we got through it. The team here were remarkable and did an astounding job, and I am grateful for all their hardwork. 

Thank you guys.

Kenneth

Eat The Rainbow

by Liz Child

I’m not talking about eating skittles here, all plants contain phytonutrients (phyto means ‘plant’) which make them the colour they are. The different colours in plants indicate the presence of different nutrients, so it makes sense to ‘eat the rainbow’ and ensure you are getting your weekly dose of all the different vitamins and minerals that plants have to offer. Scroll down for a brief summary on what the different colours contain.

It’s easy to fall into a routine of eating the same fruits, vegetables and even the same meals each week, but it’s important for our health to eat a wide variety. Getting a set fruit and veg box delivered to your home each week is an easy way to make sure you’re switching things up regularly and getting some diversity into your diet. We always make sure to add some blues or purples to our order too as that’s one that often gets missed. So red cabbage, aubergine, blueberries, red onion, beetroot, purple sprouting broccoli etc, whatever is in season. Explore our organic veg boxes here, we deliver nationwide.

Liz x

RED

RED fruits and vegetables are high in Vitamins A and C, Potassium and powerful antioxidants. Red food are especially good for your guts, they support your immune system and prevent inflamation. Add tomatoes, strawberries, peppers, red currants, cherries, apples, chillies, watermelon, pomegranates, radishes, rhubarb and more to your diet!

ORANGE/YELLOW

ORANGE & YELLOW fruits and vegetables are high in antioxidants Vitamin C and Beta-carotene. All great for your eyes, your skin and your immune system. Add citrus fruits, carrots, pumpkins, sweet potatoes, peppers, yellow tomatoes, melons, stone fruit and more to your diet!

GREEN

GREEN fruits and vegetables are especially good for your heart and blood pressure. Eat your greens for lots of Vitamin K, magnesium, nitrates, folates and antioxidant high polyphenols. Add cabbages, kale, sprouts, beans, asparagus, broccoli, peas, courgettes and more to your diet!

BLUE/PURPLE

BLUE/PURPLE fruits and vegetables are especially high in anthocyanin. This special antioxidant can cross the blood-brain barrier to apply their benefits on brain cells. If you want to improve your memory, mood and cognition, eat more purple foods. Add red cabbage, beetroot, blueberries, red onions, purple sprouting broccoli, aubergines and more to your diet!

WHITE/BROWN

WHITE/BROWN fruits and vegetables, although not as brightly coloured, also contain important vitamins and minerals. They protect against certain cancers and keep bones strong. Add mushrooms, garlic, onions, potatoes, rice, wheat, beans, cauliflower, parsnips, celeriac and more to your diet!

Going Gluten Free?

by Liz Child

It is Gluten Free day on the 13th of January. Check out our gluten free section here.

Coeliac disease affects 1% of the population, however it is estimated that only around 30% of those people are diagnosed. There’s a big difference between people with coeliac disease and people who are gluten intolerant. When a person with coeliac disease ingests gluten, even just a small amount from accidental cross contamination, their immune system will attack its own body’s digestive tissue causing pain and serious problems including the inability to properly absorb nutrients. Whereas, if a person is gluten intolerant, the consumption of gluten will cause short-term bloating and belly pain. Unlike coeliac disease, gluten intolerance doesn’t usually cause long-term harm to the body. Either way, if you are avoiding gluten, perhaps just to try and improve your gut health, here’s a quick summary of what to look out for and some tips. All the images in this post are gluten free, organic products that we stock alongside our fresh produce to make your gluten free journey a little easier.

What is Gluten?

Gluten is a general name for the proteins found in wheat, rye and barley. It acts as a glue and helps foods hold their shape. It’s what makes bread and pasta dough stretchy and bouncy. Luckily there are other natural ingredients which can be used as binding agents in place of gluten. Of course it is not quite the same but yes, you can still eat biscuits, cakes, pasta and breads with a little know-how.

What to Avoid

If you are avoiding gluten, it should be clearly labelled on packaging. But you should know this list of gluten containing ingredients to make sure you know exactly what to avoid.

  • Wheat (including spelt, durum, semolina, emmer, farina, farro, graham, einkorn, wheatberries, KAMUT® khorasan wheat)
  • Rye
  • Barley
  • Triticale
  • Malt in various forms including: malted barley flour, malted milk or milkshakes, malt extract, malt syrup, malt flavoring, malt vinegar
  • Brewer’s Yeast
  • Regular Oats (although oats are technically gluten free, they are usually cross contaminated in fields and factories with wheat so look for gluten free oats!)

What To Eat

The good news is that if you are avoiding gluten there are loads of things you CAN eat! So let’s focus on those.

  • Fruits
  • Vegetables
  • Nuts and Seeds
  • Beans and Lentils
  • Certain Grains and Flours (including buckwheat and buckwheat flour, corn and it’s flours eg cornstarch and polenta, potato and it’s flour, rice and rice flour, amaranth, quinoa, millet, tapioca…oats, when labelled gluten free are fine too…)

You just need to avoid gluten which is found in certain grains and flours. Generic oats usually have been cross contaminated with wheat in the fields, whereas gluten free oats are grown carefully to avoid cross contamination and processed away from gluten containing products. This explains why gluten free oats are a little more expensive than regular oats.

Easy Alternatives

Ready made gluten free products are getting better and better. We stock a range of gluten free pastas, bread and even pizza dough in our shop. We also have gluten free oats available. Unfortunately a lot of ready made gluten free products contain lots of strange ingredients to help bind things together and imitate wheat gluten, so we recommend always reading the label, or looking into ways to make your own alternatives. We try to source the best, organic and natural products to make your choices easy. If you are avoiding eggs, be extra careful to read the labels as a lot of ready made gluten free products contain eggs to help things bind together.

Make your own

We stock many of the raw ingredients necessary to create your own gluten free alternatives. Research tried and tested gluten free recipes online and please do share your successes (and failures) with our supportive community facebook group here. There are loads of gluten free recipes, or recipes which can be tweaked to be made gluten free on our recipe blog here. In fact most of the recipes are naturally gluten free! Do you have any top tips on being gluten free? Do share them in the comments.

George, Florence & Veganuary

by Kenneth Keavey

It’s been a wet, windy and cold start to the year, the water levels in the fields are high. We have been lucky enough to have harvested enough of our key root crops like parsnips before Christmas so we do not have to go out into the muck for them in the last couple of days. It would have proved difficult.

The crops are looking pretty good all things considered, we have some amazing new produce coming in from the fields next week. The purple sprouting broccoli has been flourishing over Christmas and we intend to harvest quite a bit of that for next week. We also have the first new mixed salad, it seems crazy to think it is ready but it is. We will harvest this from our own tunnels starting next week too.

It is difficult to manage all the produce around this time of year especially as we shut down for a week and everybody gets a well-deserved break and we do end up with some waste veggies despite our best efforts. Today it was my job to traverse the muddy fields with a bucket of waste veggies to feed our two rescue pigs, they were waiting and snorting and they always seem very excited about the prospect of food. George and Florence seem content, they don’t like the cold, but they do like their bellies to be scratched, they like roaming in the trees and rolling in their straw bed that they keep meticulously clean, they do not like the rain. Florence is very adventurous and constantly breaks out in search of what, I am not so sure. But I think conversation with George seems not to be up to scratch and she goes in search of more stimulating company!

Pigs are the ultimate food recyclers, but the myth that they will eat anything is far from true. I have learned that like our children, they tend to keep away from broccoli and kale! This I guess is fortuitous as whenever Florence breaks out, she wanders through fields of kale and never touches a bit! They definitely have their own little personalities, and they like to have the freedom to roam and to have access to decent straw bedding. As regards Florence and George they will grow old together on our farm provided of course George’s level of conversation improves!

But whether you eat meat or not, I think there seems to be some consensus that the factory farming of animals is wrong, it does produce cheap meat, but I wonder at what real cost to us as a society and to our health? I have found it interesting that my dad who has been a staunch meat eater all his life, has now changed his diet to mainly vegetables, not on ethical grounds but because he felt it was better in general for his health. He still eats meat, that is his decision and I certainly respect that.

Veganuary can cause all sorts of heated discussion, but I guess it is a personal choice, it is up to each individual whether we choose to eat meat or not, or choose to reduce the amount of meat we eat or not. But one thing that we all know for sure is that eating more fruit and vegetables can only do us good. With that in mind I look forward to next week to our own freshly harvested mixed salad and some gently stir fried purple sprouting broccoli with a dash of sesame oil.

Thank you for choosing the very best food and letting us deliver it to your door.

Kenneth

Back to Basics – Vegan Swaps

by Liz Child

These days it is easier than ever to make plant based swaps. Here’s a quick summary of simple switches to help you on your Veganuary journey. We stock the best organic groceries in our vegan section to make it easy for you.

MILK is one of the easiest switches to make. There are lots of delicious options out there. Our favourite is oat milk as it has a fairly neutral but gorgeously creamy flavour and texture. It also happens to be the most environmentally friendly option.

BUTTER is easy to switch too. We have a few organic options which (unlike most dairy free spreads) do not contain palm oil. A couple of soft, spreadable ones, Cocovit and Natruli, and the most amazing Naturli Butter Blocks.

CHEESE is a little trickier but not impossible. Dairy cheeses contain casein, an addictive property which makes cheese very hard to give up. But there are more and more delicious vegan cheeses on the market and we are proud to stock some of the best in the world. Have a look at our range here. We also stock nutritional yeast flakes which are tangy, salty and delicious! sprinkle them over pasta like parmesan or over popcorn, or stir into a vegan béchamel sauce for that essential cheesy favour.

EGGS are tricky, but not altogether impossible, to replace if you want them boiled, poached or fried. But scrambled silken tofu is surprisingly similar to soft scrambled eggs. It’s all in the seasoning. Replacing eggs in baking is easy. Follow tried and tested vegan cake and pancake recipes on our blog. Sometimes eggs are simply replaced with raising agents and plant milks, sometimes they are replaced with mashed bananas, apple sauce, milled chia or linseeds. Egg whites can be replaced with aquafaba, the liquid from a tin of chickpeas.

MEATS won’t be missed if you make sure your meals are well balanced with proteins and fats from beans, lentils, nuts and seeds. Meat isn’t missed at all if you cook traditional meat free recipes of course, but we all crave the food we have grown up eating. So replace mince with green or brown lentils and crumbled walnuts to make your bolognese sauces, shepherds pies, chillies etc – it’s all in the seasoning. Replace diced meat in stews and curries with beans and chickpeas or diced tofu. For pulled pork try replicate the texture with jackfruit, pulled mushrooms or aubergines. If you’re craving a steak, try a juicy vegetable steak made from a thick slice of cauliflower or celeriac or a couple of big, roasted, meaty portobello mushrooms. For roasts, burgers and sausages try making nut loaf or beetloaf and shaping it to your needs. For fish try firm tofu, score it thinly and marinade in lemon juice and seasoning, wrap with some nori seaweed, dip in batter or breadcrumbs and fry or bake. 

A Very Irish Christmas

by Kenneth Keavey

Against all my best inclinations I have decided I am not going to launch into a rant about the damage the supermarket food culture has wrought on our land. I have decided to instead embrace the positive this week, to celebrate the little wins and the amazing things our people, suppliers, and you our customers are doing.

We have the most amazing suppliers, the best in the world, and they are local, Irish and sustainable. Just today I met Titta from Lilly’s eco clean, she exudes positivity and is dedicated to the sustainable cause. Yesterday I had reason to speak to Franck, our local native Galwegian French man who supplies us with his amazing organic wine, he is always in good form.

We have had to give the harvest of our own leeks a little break until after Christmas and therefore I was on the phone to Roy Lyttle one of our amazing potato and leek suppliers. Cameron from Battlemount organic farm supplied us just a couple of weeks ago with his own freshly pressed organic apple juice from apples in his own orchard and the most amazing potatoes on this island.

Ralph Haslam and I go back along way and he supplies the gorgeous organic cheese, yogurt and if milk (I believe the best milk in Ireland) you may know his products better as “Mossfield Organic farm”. There is of course the cultured food company and Synerchi kombucha, and the Little Milk Company and Bunalun Organic, all great IRISH companies. Yorg from Solaris teas makes his tea right here in Galway and Blakes Organic roast their coffee in Leitrim, the fantastic McCabes coffee roast their organic coffee beans in county Wicklow.

Then there is all the other Irish organic growers that supply us at times during the year such as Audrey and Mick from Millhouse organic farm. Joe Kelly in Westport, Padraigh Fahy in Beechlawn organic farm. Philip Dreaper in Coolnagrower organic farm and many more.

But the best supplier of all is our own farm and the amazing hard-working team of individuals that work tirelessly on our farm. They grow the best tasting, healthiest food you can buy anywhere. Our farm is the centre of our business, it is the heart, it is our cornerstone, it keeps us grounded and it keeps us deeply connected with our food, it never lets us stray from the right path.

That is not to say that we do not have the most amazing teams of packers and drivers and customer service people because we do, the very, very best. So we really understand and appreciate the hardwork and effort of all our other suppliers, they are all amazing, struggling with the ups and downs of running and owning a small business and working extremely hard to produce great IRISH products and make their business work especially during the last two years.

This brings me to our last stars, the real hero’s of our story and I guess you may know who that is? That is, you. Your support, your purchases, your positive (and constructive negative feedback) keeps us going, it puts money in our bank account to pay for all of the above. But and this is the big one, it keeps a strong growing sustainable system of food production going. So aside from the very best healthy and (we have no shame in saying) the most amazing tasting produce you are supporting an idea for a better food future.

Thank you and have a very merry, Irish Christmas!

Kenneth

Quick Pickled Red Cabbage

by Liz Child

Red cabbages are one of those festive vegetables that often get wasted. Food waste is a big environmental problem which is exacerbated over Christmas. Instead of braising the whole cabbage for your Christmas dinner, why not pickle some of it? It makes it last a lot longer and tangy, crunchy, pickled red cabbage is the perfect festive accompaniment to cheese boards, leftovers sandwiches, and to even top currys, chillis, tacos etc. It’s quick and easy to do. All you need is vinegar, salt and sugar, a clean jar or two and some optional spices.

Liz x

Ingredients

  • 1/4 of a red cabbage
  • 300ml apple cider vinegar (we LOVE Clashganny Farm’s organic ACV)
  • 300ml water
  • 2 tbsp salt
  • 2 tbsp sugar (optional but really nice)
  • optional flavourings of your choice eg juniper berries or pickling spices

Method

  1. Start by finding a big jar or a few small ones, enough to fit in the cabbage. Give the jars a really good clean and hot rinse. Or you can sterilise them to be extra safe. Put the washed and rinsed jars in a clean sink then fill them with freshly boiled water from the kettle. Wait a minute then carefully empty the jars (use oven gloves or a folded tea towel so you don’t burn your hands). Let them air dry while you get on with chopping the cabbage and heating up your vinegar solution.
  2. Measure the vinegar, water, salt and sugar into a small pan, add the optional juniper berries or pickling spices to the jars and slice the cabbage.
  3. Then thinly slice the cabbage and stuff into the jars. Lightly press the cabbage down into the jars to pack them in neatly. You should leave a cm of room in the jar.
  4. Heat up the vinegar solution and as soon as it comes to the boil, take it off the heat and pour it into the jars. The solution should cover the vegetables, if you need to make more vinegar solution, then do so. You can halve or quarter the recipe of course if you only need a little more. Give the jars a light tap on the work surface to remove any air bubbles that may be trapped between the layers of cabbage. Then screw on the lids whilst the jars are still hot.
  5. Allow them to cool on your kitchen work surface, then refrigerate. The pickled cabbage will be ready to eat in two days and will last in the fridge for 2 months.