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The Irish Farmers Journal picture editor loves to talk and this is how Philip puts people at ease and gets the most stunning photographs. From food to farming to family and everything in between, our Philip is well worth a follow.

Letter to the Editor

January 2022

West Cork

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am a weekly reader of the Irish Farmers Journal, a wonderful paper. I am disappointed to see you are putting the results of your weekly crossword online. I play it every week and like to check the results. I am an older person and more people like me are not online.

Your faithfully,

Norah O Sullivan.

The crossword solutions were being moved online due to the wonderfully competitive nature of our crossword participants.

Conscious that winning is not the aim for many of our readers, as requested, we will publish the solutions, but two weeks after crossword publication to facilitate a closing date for entries.

– Amii

Chef’s Tip

I see a lot of online complaints about “American” measurements in recipes and how they never work properly. This might help a little bit: if a North American recipe is calling for a cup of something fairly heavy (like sugar, butter or milk), the conversion is roughly 250g or 250ml (for something like flour, a cup is actually around 130g). For butter, American recipes often call for “sticks” (ie, two sticks of softened butter). In the States, a lot of butter comes in block form (which is a standard 454g) but is divided into four individually wrapped sticks. I was always taught that a whole block is two cups, so divided by four that would be ½ a cup per stick (or roughly 125g).

Picture of the Week

Down on the farm: Sarah and Kate Egan visiting their grandad Pat's farm in Portumna, Co Galway.

Number of the Week

11 - The age our cover star Norah Patten was when her interest in space was first sparked by a visit to the NASA museum.

Quote of the Week

From Shane Lehane on the traditions of St Brigid’s Night:

In times gone by, the little piece of cloth, the Brat Bríde, had a very wide variety of applications: everything from easing the creaking of old bones and rheumatic pains to helping reluctant ewes to accept their newborn lambs