As I think I may have mentioned before one of the many reasons for wanting to spend more time than we do in Ahakista is the ready availability of good cheese all made on the doorstep. There are a large number of world class artisanal cheeses being made in West Cork and there is something special in being able to pick these up in either one of the local supermarkets or from the stall at Bantry Market and then chew at them over a long lunch.

The cheese that is closest to home is Durrus, named after the village, and made in the hills that rise above the back of the church. It is proably one of the first of the Irish cheeses that we tasted and along with Gubbeen was top of the list of the cheeses I wanted to sell when I had vague thoughts about open the cheese shop from which this blog takes its name.

Just over a week ago I was standing at the bar in Arundel’s pub buying myself a couple of pints and a lady walks in carrying a large round of Durrus cheese. She passes it over the bar and explains that it is a small contribution to the festival.

She looked vaguely familiar, so I asked,’Are you the lady who makes the cheese?’

she acknowledged that she was and so I found myself talking for brief few moments to Jeffa Gill, the lady who makes the Durrus cheese.

I had time to explain that the cheese that she makes was one of the great attractions of the area before we got on to talking about the festival and which of us had been able to get tickets for the pub quiz that had been presented the night before by Graham Norton. We had, she hadn’t. Those tickets must have been like gold dust.

I first read about Cavolo Nero in The River Cafe Cook Book which I was given as a birthday present back in September 1995.

It was one of the many ingredients in the book that I could only read about with there being no great likelihood that I would have an opportunity to eat it. The veg plot has changed that and I have grown it over the last five years or so. As I said yesterday it seems that we are going to have a surfeit of it this year. Unfortunately the kids are not big fans so I will have to find ways to smuggle it into them.

The recipe I cooked last night might just work. It came from the River Cafe book and was a sort of Cavolo Nero pesto.

A good handful of leaves was blanched in boiling water with a couple of cloves of garlic. That was all drained and then pulsed through the food processor. It was then pulsed some more with a cup full of olive oil until it turned into a thick dark green sludge. Another two crushed cloves of garlic were mixed in with more olive oil until it was the consistency of thick double cream.

I then cooked some pasta, drained it and stirred in the sauce until each piece was coated green. We ate it with grated Desmond cheese instead of Parmesan.

After that we had a chicken from the Farmer’s Market. It had spent the afternoon marinading in crushed garlic, lemon juice and olive oil. I then roasted it in the barbeque.

For most of the day we listened to a combination of Chic and The Bee-Gees.

Three weekends away and the veg garden and greenhouse have gone bonkers.

The purple sprouting broccoli has all gone to seed and is no good to anyone and will need to be pulled. Most of the courgettes have grown into great fat watery marrows. We may be able to use some of them for soup but the rest are going to look brutish for a week or so before being discarded.

Great swathes have been taken over by nasturtium so we will have plenty of flowers for salads although all the salad has bolted.

Inside the greenhouse the tomatoes have all turned into mini triffids and collapsed over themselves. They will need to be cleared of extraneous growth and lifted so they small growing green tomatoes can get some air. Pulling them back it appears the chilli plants are doing okay and I was able to spot the one Padron Pepper making its way out into the world.

One of the advantages of going to Ireland early this year was that at the last visut to Bantry Market I was able to buy some small trays of veg to plant some of which may actually survive. So I have some mixed salads to replace those that have bolted, cabbages and calvolo nero all ready to plant out.

Calvolo nero are one of those veg you read about but can never find in the shops. So if want to eat it you have to grow it yourself. I bought the tray at Bantry Market in case the stuff I had planted already failed for some reason whilst we were away. It didn’t and it appears we are going to be eating a lot of calvolo nero over the next few months.

There was activity on the pier and I went to see what was going on. I went the back way over the small stile in the low wall and onto the pier patch. The pier patch is a piece of rough ground that separates the garden and the Cottage from the sea and the pier. On the seaward side a wall was created when the pier was extended in 1997 to provide a buffer for any changes to the tide that might take place as the pier was pushed out into the bay. It is covered by course grass and fennel.

I walked over to the sea wall from where I would be able to look out over the pier. The tide was out and my eye was caught by what looked like a scrunched up doormat lying on the rocks below. I almost looked away but thought better of it and as I did so I realised I was looking at a sleeping otter just six feet below me. I stepped forward to take a closer look and found that I was standing directly above it. It was curled round itself close to an old black flip that had lost its flop and a piece of knotted blue rope and a clump of dried seaweed. At first it was so still I thought it might be dead. But then it shifted slightly so I could see its black tail.

I stood there watching it for about two minutes hardly daring to move again in case it shot off back to the water. It looked bedraggled and tired and gave no impression that it was going to move. I edged gently back to get my camera.

There was no-one in the garden so I shot inside the house and made my way back to the rock. I fully expected it to have gone but it was still there.

I took a couple of pictures, evidence that I had seen it, again expecting that squeak the camera made as I turned it on and the click as each picture was taken would scare it off. Apart its breathing it didn’t move.

I got down to my knees and then lay down flat on the rock so I was looking out directly above it less than five feet away know.

It stirred now and lifted its head and pulled out a paw from under itself so I could see the webbing between its toes. It then started to lick down its fur. It had obviously only just come out of the water and its coat was still damp. One of its eyes had a milky look to it and there were pale pink patches on its nose.

It paused every so often to shift position and a couple of times it looked up directly at me but did not seem to see me. There was an old and tired look to it. I was torn between continuing to watch and going back to get others to come have a look.

It was getting more active now. Getting up on its feet and walking round before carrying on with its grooming and then it was gone walking quickly into one of the gaps in the rocks below where I was lying.

I went back then to tell what I had seen. Not surprisingly there was a rush of kids to the pier patch all wanting a look. Again to my surprise it was back on the rock but this time there was too much noise and it quickly disappeared back into the rocks.

Later that afternoon there was shout from one of the kids on the pier. They’d seen the otter again sitting in one of the grey rubber tenders eating a crab. The crack remains of the shell were lying in the bottom of the boat. There were sure it was a different animal.

Talking to Tommy later he asked if it might have been a mink. Rather too quickly I assured him it was an otter because of its size.

However having now looked up mink in Ireland I am no longer 100% sure. Mink in Ireland are bigger than I thought they were growing up to 50 – 65 cm. It is very unusual to see an otter and this one seemed to be remarkably unconcerned by my presence. If it was an otter then it must have been old and infirmed to have stayed there so long. I think it was an otter. They have more pronounced webbed feet and these are clearly visible, the coat was not as dark as a mink and there was a pronounced pale patch on its chest. Any thoughts?