ICE cream made from boiled down sea water, cheese from a company that only manufactures for 45 days a year when the milk is the sweetest, traditional Irish sausage rolls, chowder packed with seafood caught in the Atlantic Ocean.
These are just some of the delicacies I discovered this morning while doing a foodies walking tour of Dublin.
The Dublin Tasting Trail, with a guide from Fabulous Food Trails, is a two-and-a-half-hour excursion that takes in a collection of stops that could include butchers, bakers, cheesemongers, food halls, traditional Victorian pubs, a chocolate shop or ice creamery.
We started our morning walk at Sheridan’s Cheesemongers in Anne Street, where we tasted four varieties produced by Irish artisan cheese makers.
Our Fabulous Food Trails guide Pamela explained that cheese making is only a young endeavour in Ireland, with a handful of farmers rediscovering the tradition some 50 years ago.
Cheese making stopped during the 13th and 14th centuries, when the Vikings invaded Ireland to pillage the country's rich monastery settlements, and while butter making resumed no one started making artisan cheeses again.
Then, five decades ago, a couple of "hippies" from Europe moved to County Cork to start farming – the region enjoys slightly warmer temperatures than the rest of the country thanks to the jet stream, so is the perfect place to farm – and had to find a use for all the milk they were producing.
They created a washed rind variety, a mix that's become Ireland's unofficial signature cheese.
Today Sheridan’s stocks between 80 and 100 cheeses, with 80 per cent of them coming from Ireland and France, and the people who work in the shop can tell you about the farmers because they work closely with them to produce the right varieties.
I tasted the Killeen Goat, a goat's milk cheese produced in the village of Balinasloe in County Galway, and the raw cow's milk cheese Glebe Brethan that's made by a farmer from Dunleer in County Louth.
Both were very creamy, and had a lovely taste without that harsh dusty edge that you often get in tasty cheese.
Our tour also took us to The Swan Bar, which is one of the city's 12 remaining Victorian pubs, and a butcher shop that sells Irish beef grown in counties Carlow and Kilkenny which has been in the same family for three generations.
Ireland isn't a place that's know as a food destination, and our guide Pamela explained that the locals have only been eating well for the past 50 years, but now that people are taking care producing food there are some foodie treasures springing up around the city.
"People are interested in home cooked food that's prepared using local ingredients,'' Pamela explains.
"You are still going to get Irish stew and black pudding, but it won't be boiled and overcooked, these foods are now being prepared with a sense of confidence and a bit more creativity.
"Belly of pork is a real traditional meal in Ireland, because it's been a cheap cut of meat, but our young people have gone and spent time abroad and are now back here preparing this old dish in a modern way.
"There are also loads of food businesses opening at the moment, business people who have lost their jobs are wanting to do something different, and there are so many vacant buildings around at the moment charging very low rents.''
- Posted from my iPad
Location:Dublin,Ireland