Ómós Digest #188: Ballymaloe House is a Very Real, Very Irish Story

Capturing the Essence of Hospitality.

Dear readers,

Apologies for the slight delay with this newsletter — the past couple of weeks have been full tilt. While I always intend for this to sit front and centre on my list of priorities, life had other plans (as it sometimes does). That said, I took great joy in writing this one — a reflection on a truly memorable and impressionable stay at the iconic Ballymaloe House in Co. Cork. I hope you enjoy discovering my many learnings.

Love,

Cúán.

Dear Readers, 

I listen to a podcast, The Go-To Food Podcast, where chefs, restaurateurs, food writers and critics share their stories and experiences. The guests are mostly British, with an occasional Irish accent to be found here and there. It’s no exaggeration to say that I have heard Ballymaloe House, Ireland’s farm-to-table icon, referenced more often than any other business, with the exception perhaps of St John – Britain’s nose-to-tail equivalent. 

Ballymaloe Country House Hotel and Restaurant, located in Shanagarry, Cork, was established in the 1960s by the pioneering matriarch of Irish cuisine Myrtle Allen and her family. In Ireland, Ballymaloe is widely regarded as the original country house, showcasing low food miles and local producers long before it was fashionable, paving its own path. But to hear so many of the most acclaimed British chefs and writers acknowledging Ballymaloe as being in a league of its own, certainly defies one opinion I recently read that Ballymaloe is “not the trend-setter it once was.” 

I’m a believer that most restaurants and hotels are culinary schools in themselves (as indeed St John and other restaurants of its ilk are for so many). That being said, Ballymaloe House actually shares its grounds, name and ethos with a fully fledged culinary school, where aspiring cooks and chefs dedicate themselves to 12 weeks of intense training, and shorter courses are available to those looking to dip a toe into culinary scholarship. Like St John, the diaspora of past students spans far and wide. The Ballymaloe alumni have gone on to achieve great culinary careers, which is a testament to the practices and philosophy of the school. 

During a recent stay at Ballymaloe, I had the pleasure of being shown around the 100 acre farm and school by Rory O’Connell, a co-founder of the school with his sister Darina Allen. We visited the market gardens, munching on sweet snappy cucumbers growing in polytunnels, snacked on tay berries and Worcester berries (which I had never heard of), and visited the dairy, where the students make butter, country yoghurt and cream for the restaurant and hotel. When I think of my own college experience, we were certainly well trained in how to wield a knife, tie a rack of lamb or produce a sauce of great brilliance, but what I never learned was the appreciation for and respect of good quality produce in the way it is taught at Ballymaloe. To develop this respect, you need exposure to where the produce is grown and harvested. As well as learning foundational culinary skills, students of the school learn about organic agriculture, local producers and ingredients, and the hard work it takes to achieve these most precious fruits of labour. 

Ballymaloe House is the kind of place where generations of families might return together year on year. Little has changed other than the cost, the bill now somewhat more confronting than it may have been a decade or so ago. There are few views that can rival those found at Ballymaloe at mid summer. The house looks out on fields of barley, performing a hypnotic slow motion wave in the light evening breeze. A pathway left by a tractor's wheels directs the eye long into the horizon, causing one to wonder what further magic lies beyond. It’s one of those rare places where for the duration of your stay, given the amount of freedom given to guests to explore and wander the grounds, you might imagine the place your own.