Food File: the weekly food news round-up

From the Greenhouse to the Black Pig
Aileen Burke, previously sommelier at The Greenhouse in Dublin 2, has joined the team at the Spanish food and wine shop Black Pig in Donnybrook. While continuing her wine education, studying for the Wine & Spirit Education Trust Diploma, she will manage the shop part-time and will expand its collection of Spanish and Portuguese wines. Black Pig owner Paul Walsh intends to spend more time developing the wholesale business. "Our own brand cured Iberico meats are in a number of independent food and wine shops and we want to expand this part of the business," he says.

Karma cook-off 
SuperValu has launched a Good Food Karma campaign to get customers cooking for one another, sharing recipes, and generally promoting the benefits of cooking from scratch.
The idea is that you create your own Good Food Karma circle of friends, cook for each other and post your images, recipes and tips to the SuperValu Ireland Facebook page or tweet @supervaluirl using the #goodfoodkarma hashtag.

Of course there are prizes involved: four €250 shopping vouchers. See supervalu.ie where there are some entries already in so you can check out the competition.

Waterford kitchen competition
Waterford Stanley is offering discounts of up to €500 on its range cookers until the end of May, as well as a chance to win one. Check out the Waterford Stanley Facebook page for details of how to enter a competition to win a €3,500 Stanley Supreme dual fuel, double oven, six burner gas hob model.

The competition involves uploading a photo of your kitchen and submitting a reason, in no more than 100 words, why you want to "bring your kitchen back to life".

Dax donation
The €11,000 cheque recently presented by Olivier Meisonnave of Dax restaurant to Dublin Simon Community was raised through the restaurateur's commitment to personally donate €2 per table of diners over a 12 month period, rather than through voluntary additions to his customers' bills. Meisonnave and Dax will be hosting a barbecue in aid of the charity at the Run for Simon fun run in Phoenix Park in October.