Two well known companies use vast amounts of Irish fruit – Bulmers and Follain Jam. Neven travels to Clonmel to see how cider is made and find out about new methods of growing apple trees: the ‘fruit wall’ is similar to a vineyard and contains 10 times as many trees per acre as the traditional orchard. On location in the Avoca store, Neven cooks chicken thighs wrapped in bacon and cooked in cider.
Most of the raspberries used in Follain’s jam come from Keeling’s farm beside Dublin airport. Neven meets MD David Keeling to learn about the new variety of raspberries they grow and to find out more about the farm which employs 1,600 people at peak time. Neven then meets the owner of Follain in the factory in Co Cork to see how homemade recipes can be ‘scaled – up’ to produce jam in much larger quantities. Follain is by far the largest jam maker in Ireland.
In his kitchen in Cavan, Neven cooks Queen of Puddings with raspberry jam and homemade custard and also Roasted Confit of Duck with marmalade jus and cider and served with pak choy, beech mushrooms and red onion.
