• Quality Garden Tools, Ecological Books and Products
• Organic Seeds
• Handmade Jewellery, Soaps, Handknits
• Woodcrafts and Artisan Crafts
• Candles, Paintings, Pottery
• Organic Cakes and Preserves
• Christmas Cards and much more.......

Gift Vouchers for any goods or services provided by the Organic Centre available to purchase.

The Grass Roof Café will serve seasonal dishes, mince pies and non-alcoholic mulled wine

Low Miles - Local Smiles

 

 

Get Your Kids to Eat Veg - The easy way!

Tired of battling with your children to eat more healthily?  This course will introduce you to the fine art of hiding fruit and veg in everyday meals.  Reduce your food waste and your shopping bill by getting your kids to enjoy healthy meals and snacks. 

Venue: The Organic Centre

Dates: Tuesday 18 & 25 November

TIme: 7pm - 9pm

Cost: €50

The easy way to get your '5 a day'

You don't have to spend hours slaving over a hot stove to eat well.  Learn how to cook fast nutritious meals using seasonal, organic fruit and vegetables, to feel brimming with health and energy, using local seasonal produce to reduce your costs and food miles.  Includes healthy Christmas ideas!

Venue: The Organic Centre

Dates: Tuesday 2, 9 & 16 December

TIme: 7pm - 9pm

Cost: €75

Fees payable in advance, please call 071 9854338 to book, or email info@theorganiccentre.ie

Great news for anyone thinking of buying a polytunnel or wondering what to do with the one you have.  Due to demand the Centre will run an extra Introduction to Polytunnel course on November 16 with Craig Sands.  The course will cover a tour of the Centre's many tunnels as well as advice on the most suitable type of tunnel, how to erect it and choice of site.  Also ground preparation, growing systems and rotation, propagation and soil fertility management, pest and disease prevention and control. 

Student comments:

'Thought the day was very useful and I learned a lot'

'Being able to see the various types (of polytunnels) and discuss their merits and drawbacks was most useful'

'Craig was pleasant, very knowledgeable and helpful'

 

You can now buy seeds, books and other sundries, book a place on a course and join or renew as a member of our Friend's Scheme, all on our website.  Please browse the categories under Shop Online in the left hand column and tell us what you think, we want to continually improve it so that you have a better experience shopping with us.  Also, keep an eye out for the Seed Catalogue and Course Brochure 2009, which should be available in early December. 

Invitation to the Organic Centre’s

 

APPLE DAY  2008

Sunday 5^th October  11am – 5pm 

Fruit growing can be difficult in the often wet conditions in the Northwest, where diseases such as apple crab and canker are particularly problematic. Nonetheless with careful selection of varieties and rootstock and good orchard management good quality fruit can be produced. The day is designed to give you as much information as possible to start growing apples and answer your questions. 

Phil Wheal, the Centre’s fruit expert and Cormac Cullen from the Irish Seed Savers in Co. Clare will guide you through the day with demonstrations, tours and talks. Apple trees will be on sale and The Grass Roof Café will serve tasty and creative apple dishes throughout the day. 

The Organic Centre’s orchard contains around 60 apple trees, half of them Irish varieties and the other half selected because of their resistance to diseases. 

The Fruit Autumn/Winter workshop will take place on 29th November and includes advice on pruning and propagating your own stock, unusual fruiting plants, forest gardens and landscaping with fruiting plants. Cost for the day is €90. 

For more information and bookings call 071-9854338, e-mail: info@theorganiccentre.ieWebsite: www.theorganiccentre.ie 

 Provisional Programme  

11.30 Tour of the orchard, questions & answers 

12.30 Pruning demonstration 

14.15 Grafting Techniques 

15.00 The work of the Irish Seed Savers with Cormac 

15.30 Juicing session 

16.15 Tour of the orchard, questions & answers  

The Grass Roof Café is open all day with delicious apple dishes. Apple Trees are for sale. We will also take bookings for the Fruit Autumn/Winter Workshopon November 29^th. 

Carraig Dulra, host to The Organic Centre's Wicklow-based courses, is having an Organic Week Walk & Talk on Thursday 18th September, with tours of the demonstration organic gardens and apple orchard at 3pm and 5pm.

This event is free of charge, but pre-booking is requested as parking is limited.

For more information or to book, please contact:

Carraig Dulra organic farm & living skills bank
info@dulra.org
(087) 222 3412
www.dulra.org

(Saturday 13th September Harvestfeast in Drumshanbo)

Sunday 14th September: Harvestfeast at The Organic Centre www.harvestfeast.ie

Guest chef: Noel McMeel, Cooking with Seaweed with Dr. Prannie Rhatigan, Raw Gourmet Food demo with Gaby Wieland, Potato Recipes with Lucy Madden, vegetarian dishes in the Grass Roof Café with Lynn and Noel

Monday 15th and Friday 19th September: Organic School Gardens and Healthy Eating for Children

Wednesday 17th September: Women’s day and Women’s Organic Horticultural Training Project (project presentation of the WOHT project, garden tours, cooking demos, growing herbs, woodland walk)

Thursday 17th September: Community Food Project - Harvest celebration of the Community Food Gardens in the North WestGrass Roof Café and Eco-Shop open all week!

Every year visitors come from all over Ireland and beyond to see and enjoy our centre.  Now, we want to extend a special welcome to all of you who live close to the centre to come and see our demonstration gardens for free!  If you're from Leitrim, Sligo, Donegal or Fermanagh, simply tell us your address when you arrive and we will issue a Garden Pass, giving you free entry for the rest of 2008.  You can bring the family to visit as often as you wish!  We are open to the public 10.00 - 5.00 every day to the beginning of December.  Our Gardens include 8 different polytunnels, outdoor fruit and vegetable production areas, and an orchard.  The Café and eco-shop, which stocks a range of books covering organic gardening and sustainable living as well as seeds and gardening sundries, are also open every day.  We look forward to your visit!

Slow Food is an international non-profit association. It was founded in 1986 as a response to the standardising effects of fast food, the frenetic pace of the ‘fast life’ and the disappearance of local food traditions. Slow Food protects food biodiversity, disseminates taste education and seeks to bring consumers and producers together by promoting alternative distribution channels. Slow Food comprises of over 80,000 members in 104 countries. Globally, there are over 850 groups called Convivia. In Ireland there are 12 convivia – Erne Garavogue is yours! www.slowfood.com

11.00am – 12.30pm            Slow Food Presidia Talk and Demonstration – Boxty with Pádraic Óg Gallagher and Dave Langford 

Dave Langford: David Langford lived most of his life in Scotland where his interest in potatoes began. Since moving to Mayo he has collected around 150 varieties of potatoes which are now being grown at Lisadell House as an exhibition for the International Year of the Potato 2008 (www.internationalyearofthepotato.ie) 

Pádraic Óg Gallagher – Gallagher’s Boxty House -Managing Director Having spent several seasons cooking on charter yachts in the Caribbean, Pádraic Óg returned in the late 80’s to a pre boom Dublin and established Gallagher's Boxty House in the then as yet unfashionable Temple Bar. Gallagher’s Boxty House will soon be celebrating its 20th birthday and continues to successfully serve over 3500 people per week in its busy Temple Bar restaurant. Pádraic Óg has just completed a four-year honours undergraduate course in DIT Cathal Brugha St. studying a BA in Culinary Arts and wrote a thesis on the origins and peculiarities of boxty.   

12.30pm – 1.30pm              Cooking for Kids - This is a fun workshop where children learn about local food and see where the tasty toppings for pizza actually grow in the garden! They participate in making their own delicious and wholesome lunch The workshop will be delivered by Eithna Huel, Gaby Wieland and Dr. Prannie Rhatigan   

1.00pm – 3.00pm                 Slow Food Buffet, Grass Roots Café 

Enjoy a gourmet feast of the very best of Irish produce at the Organic Centre’s Grass Roof Café   

2.00pm - 3.00pm                 Slow Food Presidia Cheese Tasting

 

Trevor Irvine will present the seven Slow Food Presidia Irish Raw Milk Farmhouse Cheeses Hans Wieland will demonstrate how to make a hard cheese   

3.00pm- 4.00pm                  Seaweed Presentation and Cookery Demonstration by Dr. Prannie Rhatigan 

Dr. Prannie Rhatigan is an experienced GP who now works mainly in public health. A native of the West coast of Ireland she gardens organically and has been using seaweeds since childhood. She will show you how you can easily incorporate seaweeds into the food you eat daily by demonstrating some recipes from her forthcoming Seaweed Cookbook.    

Tickets: Adults: Members €28.00, Non Members €32.00Children: €10.00 

Places are limited so please contact the Organic Centre ASAP to make a booking.

Call 071 985 4338 or e-mail info@theorganiccentre.ie  

Tours of the Organic Centre and Community Food Project throughout the day  

Micro Hydro – an introductory 1-day course with Rob Doyle at The Organic Centre on Saturday 23rd August 08

Rob Doyle, who has installed a micro-hydro system at his house will describe and explain suitable locations and the basic components of a small stand alone hydro system with a site walk in the afternoon. During the day Rob will discuss the options.Why Hydro: Most efficient renewable energy system - Will generate 24 hours/day - Cheapest (usually) per installed watt - Its fun. Why not: Most site specific - You have to get cold and wet - Its still expensive He will also show what you need: Water - A hill - The water running down the hill - More hill and more water the better - A system to convert the kinetic energy in the water to electrical energy.

For more information or bookings call 071-985438, e-mail: info@theorganiccentre.ie, website: www.theorganiccentre.ie