Honor Moore on food she ate as a child
“When I look back at the food we ate when I was growing up on a small farm Northern Ireland in the late twenties and thirties, it was completely different, for the most part, from what we eat today. Porridge and a cooked breakfast for the men- the traditional “Ulster Fry” before they went off to work. ..Dinner was a predictable affair – roast beef or mutton on Sunday; cold meat on Monday (washing day), heated up in gravy on Tuesday or turned into the traditional Shepherd’s Pie with its topping of mashed potatoes, Cottage Pie or Fish Pie on Wednesday, Chops on Thursday, Fish on Friday and a Stew on Saturday, with potatoes and vegetables from the garden and a milk pudding or fresh fruit and custard. Curiously, I never remember eating pork then – bacon, sausages and Christmas Ham, but no fresh pork.
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On the Late Late Show.
“It was thinking of this meat loaf that sparked off the idea that brought a rare “Cookery Special” on the Late, Late Show down to earth. I was invited on as the fourth leg of a quartet that included Jimmy Flahive, the Head Chef of the highly praised restaurant than the pride of Dublin Airport. He was one of the first TV personalities; we all marvelled at his speed and skill in chopping onions. He had presented a typical chefs’ dinner menu that featured smoked salmon and fillet of beef. Then there was Theodora Fitzgibbon, feared food columnist of the Irish Times, famed for her exquisite dinner parties, who did a post family dinner that included a vegetable soup, pheasant and a sherry trifle. There was also an English celebrity guest, Magnus Pyke, the idiosyncratic arm-waving scientist who had just published a book on the delights of Science called “Butter Side Up”. He was so dedicated to practical research that he actually had spent three weeks in Dartmoor to check the nutritional aspects of prison diet in wartime. I felt it would be pointless to try and compete with Theodora and Jimmy’s classic styles of cooking and as a contrast I filled my table with a series of mince dishes all based on a pound (450g) of mince, from a simple Shepherds’ Pie and everyday meat balls to South African Babotie, Mexican Chilli, Greek Moussaka, Italian Lasagne and Spaghetti Sauce. It worked! And incidentally, twenty-five years later they are still just as popular. In fact, at one stage I was known as “the woman with the mince” after the show.
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“When my husband Sam died in 1965, we had gone down to Kerry for the children’s holiday leaving him in hospital, as we’d been assured that there was nothing much the matter with him, and if we went ahead I could get the children settled in down in Glenbeigh, with him following in a few days. Sadly, he had a massive heart attack the morning after he joined us. I was earning about 12 or 14 pounds a week at the time, writing cookery, which didn’t seem adequate to feed seven 
children. At this stage I had listened to Sam talking about PR problems involving his clients- and regularly brought down the vacuum cleaner to clean the office in St. Stephen’s Green. After two or three days I was called into to make decisions and take over the office, if I could. At the time, one of the most tedious accounts involved assessing the quantity of footwear made by the factories in Ireland: There were about 30 large and small ones ranging from a major Clarks factory in Dundalk, one making wellington boots in Dublin plus lots of small specialist shoemakers around the country. Each of these sent us – and the relevant government department- the details of each type of shoe they had produced every month and we had to sort and total them quickly and accurately. This was the job that fell to me as I worked myself into public relations, then in its infancy. Having to concentrate on the figures kept me from lapsing into pity for myself and probably saved my sanity.
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“Sam’s father made a tall cast-iron griddle for me when we moved to Dublin. It was attached to the gas cooker, and could be spun around to control the heat. It was large enough to bake batches of soda farls or drop scones, and these were very popular at the church or school “bring and buy” sales.To turn the split soda farls into pizzas, spread them lightly with garlic flavoured oil, then with tomato puree or sauce. Top simply with sliced tomatoes, olives and grated cheese or your preferred mixture, and cook under a hot grill for 5 to 8 minutes, until the cheese has melted and is bubbling”
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“The first barbecue I attempted was a trifle fraught. Of course, I knew the theory but as I reckoned you needed a proper barbecue which I didn’t have. I just enjoyed other people’s barbecues. Then came a friend who was giving a party to introduce everyone to her new house in Dalkey and decided nothing would do her but a barbecue party and that I should do the chicken and her husband the burgers. She turned up in my kitchen with a sackful of chicken legs and wings and dumped them on the floor. I washed them in batches, boiled them up and arranged them on roasting tins. After a thorough cooking to make sure that any potential bug had turned up its toes, they were basted with a barbecue sauce, and carefully transported to Dalkey to be heated up in the oven and nobody suffered any ill effects. Since then I have learned more of the techniques from the experts at the Barbecue Championships in Lisdoonvarna but we drew the line at tasting Barbecued Scotch Eggs which had been sitting, raw, in the sun for several hours before being cooked.
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Euro-toques Award, 23 May 2005
“As I have suggested, my family cooking at that time was more likely to be based on lamb lap, pork belly, shin of beef or mince than lobster or even chicken which was free range at the time and another luxury. The routine “shop” was augmented when I was commissioned by some public relations agencies to create recipes for their clients, then set them up for photography. Needless to say, the dishes were chilled on the spot and frozen to add variety to the basic fare. You can imagine my horror when one photographer suggested I brighten up one dish of steak with the application of some engine oil. Fortunately, the nearest shop was minutes away and I was able to shut up about the “perks” involved in creating and testing dishes. After all, you had to taste the dishes to make sure they were appetising.
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Euro-toques / Cavan Crystal Awards
Honor Moore – Lifetime contribution Award
Pic Paul Sherwood
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Culinary Ireland 