Ciaran’s Omnipurpose Blog

After my tomato crop was wiped out in the summer, I decided to plant some carrots and broccoli to grow during the autumn. The broccoli's almost ready to eat, and we've got the steamer on standby!

This stuff usually retails for quite a pretty penny, and it's usually best cooked fresh from the garden. We've also got rocket salad growing too, so with luck, we'll end up spending very little for tastless food at the supermarket this summer!

I'll nail my colours to the mast: I'm a big fan of Barack Obama. He's not perfect: he's a politician after all, but I can't help being moved by his increrdible rhetoric, and the apparent transparency and fair play his campaign demonstrates.

Having said all that, Obama's not only winning this, but Hillary's losing it as well:

• She can't raise money anywhere near as effectively as Obama. In fact, some analysts claim that she only continues to run because she's in debt and needs to raise more money in a campaign to pay these debts off.
• She played a very dirty game against Obama. He's played it passive-aggressively.
• She lied repeatedly before and during her campaign, including a notorious story about dodging sniper fire in Bosnia.
• She appears to be in the race entirely and cynically for her own benefit, changing stories/ policies as she goes.
• She seems manipulative, and some have argued that she's dragging feminism backwards.

Obama might have similar faults, but I don't see him showing it yet. He has also turned a lot of the mud flung at him into positives, such as his "A More Perfect Union" speech.

Anyway - there's everything for Hillary to play for, according to this video: 

Despite the snow today, summer's definitely coming. I can feel it in the air: there's this frisson of ozone. I can also hear it: the birds are singing. I can see it too: it's light when I go home (usually), and my flowerbed and veggies are starting to wake up.

Summer also means barbeques. Lots of them. It also means some experimentation at Nev's place. Last year we grilled pretty much everything we could lay our hands on, but there was always a trusted favourite that we keep coming back to: the Nev Burger.

I call it the Nev burger, but chances are Nev found it somewhere else. I don't know and I'm not really sure I care. It's delicious.

Here's the recipe. You'll notice that it's a "guy" recipe, in that it doesn't rely on weights and measures in the same way that a "chick" recipe might. In "guy" land, measures are units of booze and weights are things you lift in the gym to pack the burgers you eat onto your Herculean physique.

Back to the recipe (feeds the guys you have over):

• Some ground beef. Maybe half a kilo. Maybe more. Use your judgement.
• Fresh Coriander
• An onion or two
• Garlic
• Some buns
• Lettuce
• Beef Tomatoes
• Creamed Horseradish
• A pack of cheese slices (the plasticky kind)
• Some chilli powder
• Mayo
• Ketchup
• Mustard

Chop the onion and garlic, chuck them into a bowl with the beef. Add some chilli powder and creamed horseradish. The horseradish acts as a flavour enhancer and binder. Chop the coriander. Chuck it in. Chuck some more in. Salt and pepper the mix. Form into patties and chow down with the rest of the ingredients in traditional burger fashion.

Enjoy with a cool, crisp, refreshing beer or a mojito.