World's Best Food Country (3rd Place)

3rd Place
America

This is a selection that I know before writing is going to cause a lot of debate especially from people who have not travelled to the USA before! America is one of the most stereotyped countries in the world and that doesn't change when it comes to food with most people probably thinking about burgers, chips and hot dogs as they read this! The reality I am happy to report is totally different with some of the world's best food coming from the states these days. Yes you will find burger joints and junk food easily but you will also find these in the other countries on the list. America is like a huge melting pot of cultures and what that produces is some of the most unique and diverse culinary treats that you are ever likly to find.

Forget the burgers! When i think of America I think of the great diversity of New York and it's 1000s of restaurants, or the clean and vibrant cooking happening in Los Angles, or the rich and souful food of the south, or quality Tex Mex at it's best, or the trendy food in Miami etc etc. See America is like 10 countries rolled into one with lots of different flavours mingling together to create a huge variety and choice of dishes. If you add to that mix some of the world's best produced ingredients along with some very highly trained chefs you have the perfect mix for a country to make it in at number 3 on this list! I just know a lot of people are going to disagree with this and have a preconcieved idea of American food all being served in Hooters but I also know that the people who are thinking that are the people probably have never been to the country to sample it's delights!

Food Network Slip up

I remember being in the states watching this live and I still think it is one of the funniest freudian slips I have ever seen on TV! The best part is that she just tries to keep a straight face and play it off! Priceless!

World's Best Food Country

5th Place
South Africa

I have been lucky enough to travel all over the world tasting amazing food and am often asked what the best I have ever tasted is so the only way to answer is to list the top 5 based on flavour, consistancy and local produce. This will run over the next few days with the big winner being announced on Friday!

This might come as surprise to a lot of people as this country is probably better known for it's wine than it's culinary ability but believe me for those of you who havn't been lucky wnough to visit this gem of a country yet there is a beautiful range of gastronomic treats awaiting you if you do make it there! The country not only has huge Oceans surrounding it packed with incredible fish but has vast acres of incredibly fertile land that is not only perfect for growing wine but also everything thing from osterich to warthog! I must say that the cuisine does lean towards meat quite heavily but there are always plenty of seafood options.


The other best thing about SA is that it is like a huge melting pot of cultures with African food sitting alongside the best of Indian, Chinese and Western cooking. What has happened over the years is that there is natural fusion cooking that has developped rather than just some random chef throwing wasabi on parsnips and calling it fusion! The fusion element actually works really well here to the extent that some of the best curries I have ever had were in Durban and I think it must have a lot to do with the quality of ingredients the chefs are workig with.

The best thing about SA is that it is a country well and truly on the rise from a culinary perspective as they have had bigger battles to fight over the last century. Now that there are a new crop of chefs coming through and torism is booming the quality will only rise along with their ranking on this list in the future.

See Position 4 tomorrow!

The World's Smallest Restaurant

I was in a bar in Dublin a week ago that is the "city's smallest bar" which got me thinking about the world's smallest restaurant and with valentine's day fast approaching I think i might have just found the perfect romantic getaway. Turns out that it is a quaint little place just outside Pisa in Italy with one table called "Solo per Due" or "only for two" in English. Now it would appear that the gentleman who runs this place has elected to keep the seating arrangements as they are either because he wants to keep an incredibly high level of service or just that he is plain lazy! Space is certainly not an issue as the "restaurant" is situated in an old 19th century building with lush gardens and ample room to squeeze at least another 12 tables in!
There is one major drawback and to be totally honest it is one that I expected from an establishment so small and that is the price! A meal for 2 and I would assume this is the sort of place where you would need a date rather than sitting there listening to yourself breath will set you back a whopping 500 Euros! I suppose it is pretty unique and you are never gooing to have to worry about other diners, getting rushed out for the 9 o'clock sitting or the waiter confusing your green slad for a bloody steak but 500 Euros would be a lot to pay in a fine Michelin starred restaurant never mind trekking up the hills to sit in Marco's living room and have him grinning at you like that!

Plastic Bag Tax

Nothing annoys me more than the sight of people loading 20 plastic bags into the back of their SUVs as they carry out their weekly shopping! I am lucky enough to live in a country where we have a forward thinking government who several years ago introduced a 22 cent environmental tax on plastic bags which has cut their use by 94%. If you take into account that the UK alone use 10 BILLION consumer shopping bags and that they take on average 500 years to decompose in landfill sites you see the scale of the problem that we are up against!
So if the model in Ireland is so successful and drastically cuts the consumption of these horrible bags why has it not been embraced in other countries sooner? Are the big corporations lobbying to keep them? I am no politician but it’s not hard to see that cutting use by 94%, raising additional money in tax whilst changing the mentality of the consumer all in one fell swoop has to be a very good thing! These bags are causing immense harm to the environment and it needs to get to the stage where it is a social stigma akin to wearing fur to be seen carrying a shopping bag and the best way to change people’s habits as usual is to hit them in the pocket!

Google Chefs Rock!

I have a hunch why Google have become one of the biggest companies in the world in the blink of an eye and it doesn't just have to do with the incredibly effective technology they provide us all with for free. It's the age old adage that if you look after your staff they will look after you and google has found a way straight to their staff's hearts by providing them with daily restaurant standard food totally for free! It has been clear from the start that Google have had a passion for food and that this comes from the top with Co-Founder Sergey Brin recently commenting on their search for 2 new executive chefs "These two chefs will play an important role in managing the company's growing appetites."

With an ever expanding workforce and staff from all over the world how many companies would be able to offer dishes like this in their corporte cafeteria...Ahi Tuna & Avocado Poke, Eggplant Ratatouille, Pollo en Huerto, Seared Day Boat Scallops in Green Coconut Curry Sauce, Arugula with Dried Apricots, Sautéed Wild Mushrooms, Spinach Lentil Dal and Tropical Shrimp Bisque soups, Hazelnut Shortcakes with Plum Compote, Chocolate Coconut Cheesecake and Creamy Lemon Macadamia Nut Cookies?

I really do applaud Google for trying to make their staff so happy and even though the end game is probably the bottom line they have certainly found their way into a lot of their staff's hearts! A lot of companies could learn from this but my guess is that they would never be forward thinking enough!

You just have to watch this video to get a better idea of how it all works. The good news for the rest of us is that they all seem to be putting on tons of weight!

McDonalds Subliminal Advertising

We all know that advertising is a huge industry and that the advertising of food products makes up a huge part of that industry. We also know that advertisers are looking for increasingly creative ways to target the ever more elusive consumer. Of particular interest to advertising execs is subliminal advertising and they might just have cracked it already by the looks of this video! For those of you living outside the USA, Iron Chef is one of the biggest food programmes in the country and watched by millions every week. Watch this video and make your own mind up! Could it just be in innocent mistake? I don't think so!

Chris Walken Cooking Video

What do movie stars do when they are bored in between getting $10 Million per movie? Simple they put their pinnie on and do a little bit of home cooking! This video shows well known actor Christopher Walken(Batman Returns, Pulp Fiction etc)cooking a lovely looking roast chicken with simple instructions! What was he thinking and what is the cat doing at the end? All very strange!

Brilliant Gordon Ramsey Videos

Last week I showed a 50 second video of Gordon Ramsey on Boiling point 10 years 8 years ago and it shocked some people to see the transformation in the man. Today just under the surface of the swearing lunatic personality lies a very polished media savvy superstar chef who know how to work his audience. These videos show just what he was like back in the day and just how he has changed! You will never see a better insight into how a real restaurant actually works than watching these clips, magic!

Most shocking food video ever

I was sent this this food video today and must say they really have gone for the shock factor! It's from canada and am guessing that the TV regulators must be pretty liberal there as there is no way you'd ever get away with that on this side of the pond! Actually when i was about 20 i saw a guy do excatly the same thing with a pot of soup but he missed the face and only burnt his arm and chest so i suppose it does happen, just that am not sure i want to see it on TV as i sit down to my dinner!

5 shocking chef's secrets

One of the first questions people ask you when you are introduced as a chef is "Have you ever spat in the food?". There just seems to be a fascination with what goes on behind the closed doors of the kitchen! Now i can personally say that I have never done anything remotely like that although you can be pushed to the limit by needy customers especially working for the rich and famous. There are countless stories, a lot of them being a mixture of urban myth and the inevitable exaggeration the story receives as it gets passed on from person to person but the following stories are all 100% true as I have witnessed them with my own eyes! These are my top 4 favourite stories of annoying customers and funny kitchen incidents and how they have been dealt with over years....

4.This is one that never goes down well but believe me happens a lot on a day to day basis! Even Gordon Ramsey said it on Hells kitchen (although he later retracted it as a joke!) and I have seen it happen countless times all over the world. Basically vegetarian soup usually tastes like nothing so chefs add chicken stock to make it actually have flavour. Terrible practice and totally shocking to our vegetarian friends but believe this happens a lot!

3.Nothing shocking actually happened here but I was cooking for Posh Spice and she ordered a bowl of fresh berries with sweet mascarpone and she sent it back 4 different times. First she wanted the mascarpone removed, then the anglaise sauce, then the icing sugar and finally the lazy bony waif sent it back cause she didn't want the piece of mint on top, I mean come on, lift your manicured finger and lift it off yourself you lazy $"$$!

2.Working in a very prestigious Michelin star restaurant one of the senior chefs made the ultimate mistake of over cooking a steak that had been requested rare. I watched as he removed it from the oven and tried soaking it in blood on a tray he had in his fridge to try and make it appear it was rare and get past the monster of a head chef who was plating the dish. He got it past the chef only to see it return 2 minutes later, I'll let you figure out what happened next!

1.The chef bought the fish on Friday but it didn't sell over the weekend so now its Monday evening and he wants to get rid of it. He washes the smell off under running water for 10 minutes then puts it on the menu with a spicy rub to mask any remaining smell! Horrible but seen it at least 100 times! The rule i go by is if i wouldn't eat it myself i wouldn't serve it.

The good news is that 99.99% of chefs are well trained professional operators who ensure you get the best food possible but like any industry there will always be a few rogue operators out there! The difference with other industries is that even though their actions might effect you directly you don't have to put it in your mouth and eat it!

Gordon Ramsey Quotes

Following on from the best food quotes of all time the other day and having watched Mr Ramsey on Kitchen Nightmares USA last night I feel that he actually deserves his own post on it's own so I've assembled a selection of his best rants and raves here.....

3.She thought that the price of the meal would be on the house. I told her that the only thing on the house was the roof.

Talking about Joan Rivers


2.“The problem with Yanks is they are wimps.”

Speaking about our American Friends


1.Everyone thinks you’re an asshole to work for because you get straight to the point. I’ve the most amazing relationship with my guys, and yeah, if things go wrong, they have to take it.

"Take it" is an understatement

To be honest quotes from Gordon don't actually seem that passionate when you read them, it's in his delivery and the mannerisms he uses that they Really come alive.

The interesting thing about Gordon is that he has actually been making TV for an incredibly long time and his personality has evolved considerably. He now knows exactly what he is doing and works it very well but I'd like to show you this clip from a behind the scenes documentary they Had about 10 years ago which shows the real face of Gordon. This footage shows exactly what it is like to work in a 3 star Michelin restaurant and the pressures that are involved. Quite a different Gordon, you certainly wouldn't argue with him! Scary!

Mr Balls and the Chubby Brigade

Ed Balls, the Schools Secretary in England who is rather better at his job than his name might suggest yesterday introduced a fantastic initiative that should rapidly be adopted by other countries before our school doors need to be widened and the seats load tested for the little chubsters! We are all blue in the face hearing about the growing obesity problem but apart from the forward thinking Mr Balls there are very few innovating ideas out there.

"hey hey you, yeah you, supersize me"

The idea is to introduce at least an hour of cooking every week for teenagers with the focus placed on educating them rather than just stuffing the canteen full of spinach and apples rather than the chips and sausages they are used to. Nothing pushes you towards something more than being told you can't have it! Another major advantage with this idea is that with the current trend of celebrity chefs showing no signs of abating the world of food has never been as appealing, so allowing the kids to get a taste of it so early will inevitably lead to a whole new crop of Gordon's coming up through the ranks.

"Hey has anybody seen my chair? I'm sure there was one here a second ago"

There are a few weak points in the strategy though...It's all well and good the 12 year old learning how to make a wholesome soup in school but is Mrs Chubster really going to let him cook the family dinner when he gets home? See the biggest cause of children becoming more and more obese is the food that their parents feed them. Why not have a weekly class where the parents and kids cook together and not only improve their diet but get to bond with each other. What really annoys me is people saying that their kids are just genetically obese** and there is nothing they can do about it! WHAT? You can't do anything about it??? How about turning off his Wii, Xbox or playstation and telling them to move their ass around a sports pitch and not feeding them processed beef burgers with chips and milkshakes! Oh yeah and while I am on a rant about this why not leave your big people carrier or SUV at home for a couple of days this week and cycle to school with the kids scoring a tripe whammy of saving them from future heart disease, fitting into your tight jeans next time and cutting CO2 emissions. Fat Chance I'd say!

Help Clear the streets and leave the SUV at home tomorrow!


**I am talking about people who are massively overweight through laziness and over eating and not people who may have a genuine weight problem.

Most Expensive Meals Ever

The Dome Restaurant in Bangkok, Thailand recently served up what was billed as the most expensive meal ever sold. The six chefs who prepared this expensive meal were flown in from France, Germany and Italy. The ingredients were flown in from all over the world and nothing was spared in making this the most unbelievable banquet ever
witnessed! After 10 courses, prepared by some of the most famous chefs in the world, each accompanied by its own rare wine, each diner was presented with a bill for one million Thai baht. That's about $30,000, and the tax and tip were not included.

The Dome in Bangkok where the meal took place

Worth every penny, Italian chef Heinz Winkler told the Associated Press.

"I believe the diners tonight will experience a culinary level unseen before," he told the AP.

Nothing was overlooked. Even the wine pairings were carefully thought out. About $200,000 of some of the finest wines in the world, including rare Rothschild estate wines, considered some of the best of the last century, were included, according to Britain's Guardian newspaper. The menu also featured some of the best French champagnes.

Now I don't want to burst their bubble but i have actually cooked a far more expensive meal than that before! When I was working on a super yacht that was over 100m(330 feet) in length and cooking for some very rich and very well known clients that record meal was made to look like a bargain! We had two guests arriving and they forwarded their list of preferences for their short stay on the boat which included caviar, Kobe beef, fois gras and a huge selection of fine wines and champagnes. I ordered the food and it was delivered to the boat (mostly by helicopter as we were out at sea awaiting their arrival) and when the supplier arrived with a bill for $88,000 none of us flinched as a)this is fairly standard on a boat that size b)it wasn't my money and my life wouldn't be worth living if their favourite caviar wasn't on board!


A 100m yacht similar to the one I was working on for the $88,000 meal

So you have already done the math I am sure and worked out that my meal easily tops the Bangkok meal at $44,000 per person but the story doesn't end there! One of the guests had a change of heart at the last minute and didn't fancy the boat option and redirected the private jet to the Caribbean! So basically it was an $88,000 meal that was happily shared not by 2 famous guests but by 20 very happy crew members!

Top 10 Food Quotes

10."I will not eat oysters. I want my food dead. Not sick, not wounded, dead."
Woody Allen.

9."Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four essential food groups: alcohol, caffiene, sugar and fat."
Alex Levine

8."I refuse to spend my life worrying about what I eat. There's no pleasure worth foregoing just for an extra three years in the geriatric ward."
John Mortimer

7."In England, there are sixty different religions—and only one sauce."
(Attributed to Voltaire, 1694-1778)

6.I do not like broccoli. And I haven't liked it since I was a little kid and my mother made me eat it. And I'm President of the United States and I'm not going to eat any more broccoli.
George W Bush

5.“I love you like a fat kid loves cake.”
Rapper 50 Cent

4.“Worthless people live only to eat and drink; people of worth eat and drink only to live."
Ancient Greek Philosopher

3.Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet.
Albert Einstein

2."Last night I dreamed I ate a ten-pound marshmallow, and when I woke up the pillow was gone."
Tommy Cooper

1."The only way to keep your health is to eat what you don't want, drink what you don't like, and do what you'd rather not!
Mark Twain

Selection of fine food pictures

We have been working away for the last few weeks on a project that we are about to launch (blog readers as always will be first to get wind of it!). The project requires some really clean food photos so I thought i would share them here with you seeing as most people who read this blog are foodies! Can anybody guess what the project might be after seeing the photos?

We forgot all about the poor waiter!!

It seems that there has been a huge explosion in the "foodie culture" recently and nothing encompasses that more than the amount of food blogs popping up all over the world, at the last estimate there are in excess of 10,000! People are becoming more and more educated and eating out in the fantastic array of restaurants now available to us!

What a lot of people forget is that eating out is not just about the food but the whole package from the second you walk into the establishment! Service is just as vital as the meal itself, infact I've lost count of the amount of amazing meals ruined by poor service. On the flip side good service (which in my opinion is getting the bread there on time and keeping the booze flowing)can turn an average meal into a fondly remembered evening! The job of the waiter can be a thankless one which I think is similar to a referee in a sports match...they should not be noticed but just go about their job with effeciency and always there when you need them! Throw in a good personality, some knowledge and a corkscrew and you should have the perfect mix!


Now i want to point you in the direction of a blog that will give you a better insight into the brain of a waiter and what good service entails! This is the first "service blog" i have come accross, all we need now is a dishwasher or kitchen porter to start writing a blog and we'd have the whole dining experience covered! Enjoy the blog, it's a great read....

3 Best Irish Food blogs

With the Irish Blog awards coming up on the 1st March I thought it would be a good time to give you my own list of favourite Irish food blogs. I started writing my own under a year ago and i remember looking around for fellow Irish food bloggers and struglling to find any at all! Well the good news is that they seem to be popping up everywhere now which is great news for the Irish food scene! I've based this list on content, design, regularity of posting and food knowledge of the author! Hope you agree....

3.Ice Cream Ireland
A man with a huge passion for ice cream! Big problem with reading this blog is that you always want some ice cream, not to be read by those on diets!















2.Vals Kitchen
A women passionate about food and doing it all in a city not renowned for its gastronomy, Limerick. Best thing about this blog; the photos!











1.The Humble Housewife
Great blogger with fantastic recipes and wonderful photos! Been fantastic watching this blog evolve from the early days to the critical acclaim it now receives!

Not quite the perfect burger but heaps of fun!

You just have to play this food game. Had me hooked for a while! Can you make the burgers?

Cooking Christmas Dinner.

Working on yachts was fun but being home for Xmas is better!


For the last 5 years i have been lucky enough to be off around the world working for some of the world's richest people on their yachts. The upside was that i saw some of the world's greatest places and had a wonderful time. The downside was that I have worked for the last 4 Christmas days in a row which is not something that i would recommend to anybody. So even though iFoods is incredibly busy I will be taking a well earned break this festive season and all i have to do now is figure out what to cook for the family.

I suppose a lot of people would say that it is not exactly a day off as I'll still be cooking but the truth is that cooking for family and friends never feels like work to be honest. The only problem that I have is that i am not totally sure what i am going to cook this year! Should i stick to the traditional turkey or should I try something different like goose or lamb? I even took a nation of cooking a lovely rib of beef this morning but that only lasted a couple of hours!

So I need your help to decide what I should cook this year. Hit me with all the best suggestions and I will cook the most popular choice and film it for you all to see.
Let me know what you are all thinking of cooking yourselves this year and if there are any special or unusual festive treats you are thinking of making.