Dublin bread...and cheese

So a little bit more chatting and not baking before I start making some breads, hopefully very soon...

Almost 2 months living in Dublin already (well, more come back to live here after almost 7 years) and starting to settle down, so what better than check out bakeries and breads in Dublin. Little bit of research and decided to go to 3 of them, artesian bakeries.

Fist one was The Bretzel Bakery in Portobello, nice Dublin area along one of the canals. This bakery is open since 1870 although has changed owners.The Bakery is well known to generations of the Dublin Jewish community and still known as the Jewish Bakery with it's Kosher status re-established since William Despard and Cormac Keenan took over in 2000.

The Bretzel Bakery in Lennox Street, Dublin 8

They have a good selections of breads, whites, browns, rye, some specialities and confectionary and breakfast, with 4 sourdough: 100% rye, 30%rye, pizza base and small sourdough. This last one, the small sourdough is the one I bought and tried with one of the 3 cheese I got in Sheridans Cheesemonger off Grafton st. I have to thanks staff of this shop for their recommendations and being so professional and kind. You can see in this picture this bread with an irish cheese that I really like: Coolea Mature, from West Cork.

Sourdough from Bretzel Bakery with Coolea cheese

Next bakery was Il Valentino, an italian artisan bakery in Gran Canal, another very nice Dublin area. They only use the 4 ingredients and nothing else (flour, yeast, water and salt) and have as well a good range of breads, patries and cakes, including a sourdough bread. They also have a cafe where you can sit and try their range of products.

Il Valentino Bakery and Cafe

When I was there they didn't have the sourdough bread so I chose the stoneground flour load. Very crusty bread, nice crumbs. This time I used a spanish manchego mature cheese (yeah, couldn't avoid tomato and olive oil)

Stoneground from Il Valentino with Mature Manchego cheese

Last but not least, Paris Bakery, a french bakery in the busy Jervis area. This bakery is quite new (opened in november 2010) and founded by french baker Yannick G. Forel. They also have a nice coffee area where you can taste they breads and pastries.

Paris Bakery in Moore Str.

Loads of bread that you can check from the window and of course I went for a sourdough french baguette. but they have a few more sourdough breads, including a 1kg and another than seemed to be a 6kg sourdough! bread for a few days. So french bread, french cheese. This time a pure recommendation from Sheridans Cheesemonger, Ardi Gasna, a Basque-French from the Pyrenees area cheese meaning literally in basque "sheep cheese". I have to say that the combination of this bread and this cheese was my favourite

Sourdough baguette from Paris bakery with Ardi Gasna cheese