This week on Dyed Green, we speak to Shane Neary, the co-owner of NearyNógs Stoneground Chocolate in the Mourne Mountains outside Newry, County Down. NearyNógs was the first bean-to-bar chocolate factory in the north of Ireland when the Neary family opened in 2011. Originally a passion project created to help pay the medical bills of Shane and Dorothy’s daughter, the high demand for the Nearys’ incredible chocolate caused a career pivot and changed their lives forever.

Today, the Nearys run their solar-powered chocolate factory with about ten employees, and ship around the world. On this episode, we talk to Shane about his commitment to sourcing ethically and paying farmers a living wage; tasting notes & terroir in chocolate; and the difference between craft chocolate makers & “melters.”

Dyed Green is a project of Bog & Thunder, whose mission is to highlight the best of Irish food and culture, through food tours, events, and media. Find out more at www.bogandthunder.com

After a bit of a break, Dyed Green is back with a conversation with Paula McIntyre, a chef, writer, and broadcaster and the director of Slow Food Northern Ireland, based in Portstewart in County Derry. Paula’s passion for cooking began at the age of 8, when she visited an Italian deli in Edinburgh, where she had a formative experience with parmesan cheese and Parma ham. As luck would have it, Kate met Paula at a market in Rome while crying and eating pizza.

Chef Paula McIntyre thinks chefs waste too much time trying to make something fancy that would taste better if it were more simply prepared: “You're not going to end up with anything in three hours that you wouldn't have ended up with in two minutes.” On today’s episode, we discuss Paula’s enduring love affair with turnip tops and Red Cow parmesan, attending culinary school in the United States, and following the food journey of Ulster Scots immigrants along the Appalachian trail.

Dyed Green is a project of Bog & Thunder, whose mission is to highlight the best of Irish food and culture, through food tours, events, and media. Find out more at www.bogandthunder.com

Rose Greene began her culinary career on a rapidly ascending yet predictable trajectory—a four year culinary arts course followed by many years working in Michelin starred kitchens around the world—before realizing that the nightly slog just wasn’t for her. The never-ending long hours, shady sourcing of produce, and restaurants whose models rely on unpaid labor made her rethink her approach to food and a life in the industry. Then she met her partner Margaux, discovered the wonders of fermentation, and decided to slow down and move forward on her own terms. Together they started 4 Hands Food Studio and haven't looked back.

We spoke with Rose about the importance of a work/life balance; food as nourishment; building her own home; and growing a business that fits your life instead of the other way around.

Dyed Green is a project of Bog & Thunder, whose mission is to highlight the best of Irish food and culture, through food tours, events, and media. Find out more at www.bogandthunder.com.

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Ireland, like many places around the world, is in the grips of a housing crisis. Many young people are living with their parents far into adulthood and being told that home ownership may not be within their financial reach. What if there was an alternative to meeting the salary requirements for a bank loan and incurring a huge debt to pay for a mortgage? Our guest on this week’s show, Harrison Gardner, may just have some ideas for you. Harrison is the author of Build Your Own: Use what you have to create what you need, and a co-founder of the Clare-based Common Knowledge, a social enterprise focused on teaching people the skills they need to build sustainable housing from the ground up.

On this episode, we speak with Harrison about empowering people to use tools for the first time; the importance of making mistakes; the integral role of food in community projects; and how joy, hope, & possibility are key ingredients in any and all efforts to build toward our common future. Tune in for this truly inspiring and motivational conversation and be prepared to want to put on a hard hat when it’s done!

Photo courtesy of Erin McClure.

Dyed Green is a project of Bog & Thunder, whose mission is to highlight the best of Irish food and culture, through food tours, events, and media. Find out more at www.bogandthunder.com.

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While Ireland’s rolling green hills are lovely to look at, they reflect a country whose landscape has been dramatically changed over many years. You may not even know that Ireland is the most deforested country in Europe. But what is Ireland’s “natural” landscape, and what does that even mean? For this week’s show, we spoke with Matt Smith, the manager of Hometree, a dynamic organization based in Ennistymon, County Clare, dedicated to planting more native trees into the Irish landscape. Hometree is not your average reforestation program, however! Built on a solid foundation of environmental science, they eschew carbon credit schemes, and their work incorporates community involvement, education & outreach—and even a healthy dose of Irish culture.

In this conversation with Matt, we discuss the need for speed in our cultural shift towards thoughtful tree-planting schemes; the concept of rewilding as applied to the landscape; how Hometree has grown from a community garden project to the force of nature it is today; and the role that hope can play in the face of the unfolding climate crisis.

Dyed Green is a project of Bog & Thunder, whose mission is to highlight the best of Irish food and culture, through food tours, events, and media. Find out more at www.bogandthunder.com.

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Having too much or too little salt can make or break a dish, and as chefs know all too well, even the variety of salt used can dramatically impact flavors. Salt is a seasoning that we consume every day and is necessary for life, but how much do we know about its contemporary production? Although typically associated with warmer climates, Dingle Sea Salt co-founders Tom Leach & Moe McKeown have created a small batch Irish sea salt that not only rivals their Mediterranean competition, but is made in the most environmentally sound way possible.

For our first episode of 2024, we speak with Tom & Moe about their love of surfing and its relationship to salt production; how it’s possible to use solar evaporation to make salt in an Irish climate; and why it’s important to grow their business thoughtfully, with intention and care for the natural world.

Dyed Green is a project of Bog & Thunder, whose mission is to highlight the best of Irish food and culture, through food tours, events, and media. Find out more at www.bogandthunder.com.

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As the impact of the climate crisis unfolds all around us, the reality of what’s at stake changes our relationships with each other and the natural world. More and more of us are finding ourselves drawn to reconnect with the land and to build community—to “rewild,” in a sense. But what does it mean to live a wilder life? Is it even attainable or realistic for most of the globe, especially if you live in a densely populated urban area?

Our guest on today’s show is Lucy O’Hagan, a teacher, forest school leader, wildlife tracker, bushcraft instructor, and the founder of Wild Awake Ireland. Through Wild Awake, Lucy guides people through rites of passage, teaches ancestral skills, and helps people to distill what it means to rewild on a personal and practical level, regardless of where you live.

On this episode, we speak with Lucy about the Wild Biome project and what it’s like to eat exclusively wild, foraged food for three months; honoring age transitions through nature-based, participatory rituals outside of traditional religious practice; using ancestral skills to understand the role of power and privilege in our modern day lives; and the importance of collaboration and building community in our efforts to reconnect and reengage.

Dyed Green is a project of Bog & Thunder, whose mission is to highlight the best of Irish food and culture, through food tours, events, and media. Find out more at www.bogandthunder.com.

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Social media has been abuzz these past few weeks as the world tries to come to terms with the abundance of creative talent bursting forth from Ireland, from literary greats like Paul Lynch, whose Prophet Song just won the Booker, to actors like Cillian Murphy, Paul Mescal, and Barry Keoghan, who continue to dominate the silver screen. As the pundits continue to pontificate, we’re here to tell you that Ireland’s verdant climate, political history, and nourishment of the arts creates the conditions where bards can grow in every corner of society.

Case in point: Our guest this week is a poet who might not even know it: Pat Whelan, of James Whelan Butchers, is a man whose passion for farming, the craft of butchery, and using the whole animal has led him to become Ireland’s foremost butcher, and the co-author of the best-selling Irish Beef Book, which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year.

On this week’s episode, we speak with Pat about growing up on a family farm and being inspired by his hard-working parents; how important the role of a local butcher is to connecting stewardship for the land to our tables; how the food industry should take lessons from the wine world with regard to cherishing and promoting meat; and much, much more.

Dyed Green is a project of Bog & Thunder, whose mission is to highlight the best of Irish food and culture, through food tours, events, and media. Find out more at www.bogandthunder.com.

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