Darina Allen’s great Forgotten Skills of Cooking gets a Chicago Tribune review:
The recipes are old-fashioned and mostly Irish. You’ll find a lot of recipes here calling for salting, canning, pickling, smoking and even potting in butter — preferably homemade. Allen is a big do-it-yourselfer. Founder of the Ballymaloe Cookery School, she’s a born teacher, and her enthusiasm is infectious. Still, be warned: To get the most out of this book, you need to be not only a do-it-yourselfer but also able to handle yourself in the kitchen, the garden and even the slaughtering shed.
via Darina Allen: Forgotten Skills of Cooking cookbook – chicagotribune.com.
Eoin Purcell's Blog 
The last time I was in the Republic of Ireland was nearly 25 years ago. I’d unexpectedly found a one-week break in a busy work schedule, so at the last minute booked a flight for one person, Toronto-Dublin return.
Dublin could be dreary in the ’80s before the “miracle” so within a day or so I searched my guidebook for an escape. I stumbled upon “Ballymaloe House” which sounded good, and booked for two nights. I took a bus to Cork and another to Ballycotton, asking the driver to let me off at the Ballymaloe farm.
Ivan and Myrtle Allen were still in charge; Myrtle very much in charge of the kitchen. I remember her introduction to the Sunday dinner: “There’s a misapprehension, particularly in North America, that a buffet cannot provide a fine meal. This is untrue.” Well it is certainly untrue if Myrtle Allen was in the kitchen. I can still taste the Turkey White/Turkey Brown.
I’ve got two copies of her original Ballymaloe Cookbook, one purchased while visiting (the second edition, published by Gill & Macmillan, with an introduction by Len Deighton), and a later hardcover edition with colour photographs (the third edition, now available only in paperback).
A search indicates that the first edition was published by “Agri-Books” in 1977 in hardcover. I can’t pin down the details, but would suspect it was self-published.
There’s a good biography of Myrtle Allen written upon the occasion of her receiving an honourary Doctor of Law from the National University of Ireland.
Thad,
Thanks so much for a wonderful comment! Ballymaloe is still going strong thankfully and a new generation of the Allen family is making a living from cookbooks. Rachel Allen is Myrtle’s Grand-daughter in law and Ireland’s bestselling cookbook author.
Eoin