Hello all,
As I have mentioned in other posts I have wanted to move to Ireland for a while and been researching it. My wife has come up with two items she will miss from growing up in California.
REAL Mexican food (Hint: mixing corn in doesn't make it Mexican food and soft corn tortillas are real tacos)
My offset smoker/BBQ
For the first she is working on learning to make tortillas from scratch, and pondering how well I could grow jalapeños and other peppers in a small poly green house/raised bed. There is also a specialty shop in Dublin that does carry some items but it wouldn't be a quick trip.
For the second I am thinking I will need to buy a smaller one to ship with our household items unassembled.
For those who have moved, what do you miss?
For those who are thinking to move, what do you anticipate being an issue?
Making the move next June. The plan was to move later this year, but we want to travel Australia and New Zealand for 3 months early next year, so we postpone Ireland till June next year. Also, if would be nice to settle in during the summer months.
Born and raise in Ca and Mexican food is on the top of the list. Tomatillo for salsa verde and cilantro are on my list to plant. Also, to make friends with a butcher that can cut tri tip. Walked into a butcher and he had no clue what a tri tip cut was. I guess it's a west coast thing.
Thing I will try and fit in a luggage
1. Ninja blender- cost over 200 euros
2. Rice cooker- Growing up in a Filipino family with a rice cooker I can absolutely tell the difference with Uncle Ben's microwaveable rice or the bags dropped in hot water. My wife's family think I'm crazy, I just tell them how would they feel if they ate mash potatoes from box.
3. Keurig
Tri-tip is known by other things worldwide. The Wikipedia article has some names it is known by the butcher might be more familiar with. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tri-tip
I did show this page to the butcher and he even checked YouTube... Still had no clue
This story about the origin of the ban tri-tip may also help:
http://www.santamariaelks.com/history/tritip.html
Amongst other things...
When I'm living in the US, I miss a decent pint of Guinness 🙂
When I'm living in Ireland, I miss the infinite selection of dining selections in CA.
For BBQs, blenders, coffee makers etc, I'm sure you can at least get a very close equivalent in Ireland. There are plenty of large retailers to find that kind of stuff on. E.g. B&Q, Woodies, etc. Also Amazon.co.uk ships to Ireland.
I have been checking around. An offset smoker like I am looking for is pretty unique to the US. They were invented in the oil fields of Texas and Oklahoma. It was originally made out of old pipe or propane tanks. Steel thick enough to insulate. It has a smaller fire chamber to one side, and smoke is drawn into the larger chamber and around the meat. The doors are relatively small to prevent loss of heat. There are a lot of cheap ones on the market in the US, and that seems to be the only ones I found on UK or Ireland websites. The cheap ones are thin, and often open the whole top half, losing a lot of heat and smoke each time you check the meat.
To crate it and send it couldn't be to expensive, right? If it is irreplaceable, you might wanna see what it'd cost. If you don't mind how long it will take, then it could be cheaper than you think.
The one I have is not something I could pack up. I did find one that will work on a UK website. It is $299 in the US, and needs about $50-100 in mods to make great. The base model is £479 in the UK.