Next Tuesday 30th October, five of Ireland’s hottest young chefs will compete in Stage 2 of the annual Euro-toques Young Chef of the Year competition. It’s a big deal for up-and-coming chefs (previous winners include a fellow called Neven Maguire, who you may have heard of since) and a cleverly run competition emphasising all the things core to Euro-toques values: creativity, authenticity, seasonality and a commitment to the celebration of local food producers.

A baby-faced Neven (or babier-faced, to coin a phrase?)

The five finalists will be cooking up a Samhain-themed feast (for those without the cúpla focail, read ‘harvest-themed’) in Cooks Academy on Dublin’s South William Street, and Holy Mackerel has two pairs of tickets to give away to the 1.30pm–3pm slot for anyone who fancies a free, late, fabulous lunch.

Guests can visit each of the finalists at their separate workstations where you can watch them whip up  taster dishes for your delectation, each representing that finalists take on ‘the best of Irish cooking today’. Each dish has been specially created to highlight one hero producer from the finalist’s local area and all the main ingredients have been sourced within a 50 mile radius of where the chefs are based.

Last year's winner, Kamil Dubanik of Knockranny House Hotel

The young chefs come from some of the most prestigious restaurants in the country: Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud (Ciaran Elliott), The Greenhouse (Jack Moriarty), Locks Brasserie (Keelan Higgs), Springfort Hall (Jack O’Keeffe) and The Malton (John O’Connor).

Some of the treats in store include Carlingford oysters with a set leek gelée, potato cream and mignonette sauce; and Jack McCarthy fresh blood black pudding with Ballyhoura apple espuma, Ballyhoura mushroom powder, pickled carrot and Longueville cider jelly.

The legendary Jack McCarthy's legendary black pudding

So, how to win a pair of tickets for this treat of a pop-up feast?

If you’re free to come along next Tuesday at 1.30pm, simply email susie@insightconsultants.ie with the words ‘Euro-toques Samhain Feast’ in the subject bar, tell her you read about it here on Holy Mackerel, and that you’d like to go. First two emails win a pair of tickets each, so what’s keeping you?

Last year's finalists, pans at the ready... Kamil Dubanik, Knockranny House Hotel; David Magaeen, Restaurant Victoria; Kyle Greer, No 27 Talbot Street; Margaret Roche, The Cellar Restaurant; Micheal Harley, Rathmullan House & Aisling Gallagher, Ballynahinch Castle

What you leave out is just as important. We might have said the same of the four day Irish Food Trip we found ourselves at the end of last Thursday, organised by Failte Ireland for the winner and finalists of the Euro-toques Young Chef of the Year Awards 2011. Our whistlestop tour had been chock-full of visits to exemplary Irish artisan producers and meals at top-class restaurants. But for every producer we visited, there were four or five neighbouring producers equally worthy of our attention which we might have visited. And for each of the three counties of Waterford, Kilkenny and Wexford in which our travels were based, there are a good seven or eight more each to visit in this green food-rich island of ours, each with their own local food stories to discover.

Had we not had to stop eating at some point and return home to jobs and families and the likes, we could have spent another couple of days exploring the Taste Kilkenny food trail alone. I would have loved to have visited Helen Finnegan at Knockdrinna Farmhouse Cheese and pick up some of her award-winning cheese at her farm shop in Stoneyford. Or to check out Truffle Fairy’s production kitchen where chocolate truffles are infused with brilliant flavour combinations such as tequila, lemon and salt. Or to discover firsthand the 17th-century origins of Highbank Organic Orchards where one of my favourite Irish products, Highbank Orchard Syrup is produced and sold in the farm shop. Or meet free-range poultry producer Mary Walsh who leading local chef Garrett Byrne of Campagne speaks of with such respect.

Sadly we didn’t have time to visit all these producers. But we did manage to acquaint ourselves with much of their produce, thanks to a stroll around the farmers’ market and two final meals in Kilkenny city.

The first was enjoyed in Campagne, which is not only Kilkenny’s finest but also one of Ireland’s finest restaurants. Chef-proprietor Garrett Byrne headed up the kitchens at Dublin’s Chapter One for several years before returning to his native city to set up Campagne. His partner Brid Hannon leads the lovely front of house team who looked after us with charm and style from the homemade sourdough bread all the way through to the show-stopping dessert. New to the menu and one of the highlights of our whole trip, this cloud-light cheesecake of rhubarb and white chocolate was served with a gorgeously creamy rhubarb ice-cream and a baton of rhubarb with perfect bite. Clean, light and bang on in its play of flavours and textures – which is pretty much how the preceding six courses of our meal had played out too. The middle course of turbot with broad beans and Hollandaise proved to be one of the most popular dishes of the whole trip amongst the young chefs, which goes to show exactly how impressive good honest cooking can be.

Garrett clearly knows that half the battle is in sourcing great ingredients to begin with, which is perhaps why he began our meal with cured Clare Island salmon, one of Ireland’s few products to enjoy PGI status. He knew too to keep the flavours of the cure simple so that the character of the salmon could shine through. The presentation was far from simple, but a carefully constructed play of colour and form featuring tempura of oyster with forest-green samphire, pink-rimmed radish and purple leaves.

Samphire reappeared later in the meal on a beautiful plate of rump and breast of Comeragh mountain lamb and what were possibly the tastiest carrots I’ve ever enjoyed. It was a fitting final main course in a trip which had begun with Monday morning’s visit to the wilds of the Comeragh mountains to meet the black-faced ewes about to give birth to  next season’s lambs. We also got to taste local cheesemaker Helen Finnegan’s Kilree, a washed rind goats’ milk cheese that wowed the judges at the recent British Cheese Awards into awarding it Supreme Champion.

Our final meal was an Irish tapas-style lunch at Zuni on Thursday. We had just been to see Goatsbridge Trout Farm (see yesterday’s blog post for details) so were delighted to tuck into Goatsbridge smoked trout scotch eggs topped with Goatsbridge trout caviar and horseradish cream as one of the first round of delicious dishes that Euro-toques chef Maria Raftery treated us to. Zuni was a participant in last year’s innovative Blasta trail, which encouraged visitors to graze their way around the city, enjoying small plates, sharing bowls and grazing boards along the way. It’s a great way to take a little mini tour of local flavours. Other hits on Thursday’s menu included a warm chilli chicken salad featuring Mary Byrne’s Shellumsrath free-range chicken with cashews and root veg crisps; and fluffy fresh Knockdrinna goats’ cheese sandwiched between slivers of beetroot with a raspberry dressing and carmelised walnuts. Clever and gorgeous.

Of course, a great meal is about more than the food on the plate and the service supporting it. The company plays an integral part too. The conversation over that final meal of our Irish Food Trip was spent teasing out the journey we had made together, analysing the favourite meal experiences and what made them work, and picking out the highlight dishes of the trip. These included (but were not limited to) Waterford Castle’s oxtail croquette; Ardkeen’s pork-filled blaa; l’Atmosphere’s fresh blood black pudding; The Tannery’s rabbit, wild garlic, turnip and barley stew, and their braised lamb with ribollita; and Campagne’s turbot and Hollandaise, and their rhubarb and white chocolate cheesecake.

Some of the conversations during the trip had clearly made an impression on the five young chefs too, most particularly the characteristically grounded advice dished out by Paul Flynn during his masterclass demo. Remember that there is room in life for all sorts of good food; that a well-made sandwich can be a thing of beauty too; and that many chefs have sacrificed their lives – some literally – in pursuit of the holy Grail of Michelin approval. Don’t forget to ask yourself what food you’d really like to cook; that no-one else is going to plan your life or career for you; and that without a work-life balance you’ll burn yourself out and be left with nothing. He encouraged the young chefs to take the time to go check out what other chefs were doing; to find and follow their own food heroes; and to never lose the freedom and joy to be found in cooking, even under the immense pressure of getting it spot on for 300 plates a night, six or seven nights a week.

All of his advice was aimed at the young chefs for whom the trip had been designed. But much of it was applicable to so many of us. Don’t forget to look up every now and then from the close-up focus on our own lives and have a look at some of the brilliant stuff going on around us, maybe in our very own village or town or county. Take time out to enjoy some of the joy that great food shared with like-minded folk can bring. Remember what an enormous amount of work goes into producing good food, but that fine food is not necessarily about fine dining and a special sandwich can make for a memorable meal experience. What better way to remind yourself of all of that than to jump in a car and go explore what great food your local area is producing.

Failte Ireland wanted to introduce these young chefs to a taster of what local Irish food can offer. The result of the trip is five new disciples who have gone back to their respective kitchens newly inspired. I was blessed to accompany them on this four-day Irish Food Trip but even a few hours is long enough to curate your very own.

See you on that road sometime?

It’s not often you get to pack your wellies and your favourite high heels for the same trip. But tomorrow’s road trip is no ordinary road trip, taking in everything from farm and fishery visits to some of Ireland’s finest dining in the likes of Kilkenny’s Campagne and Dungarvan’s The Tannery. I’m packing my Berocca too, cos I’ll need all my energy for the busy itinerary lined up which involves three and a half action packed days around Waterford and Kilkenny. I’m packing my laptop so I can blog daily about the visits to bakeries and breweries, meetings with fishermen and cheesemakers, tastings of Ireland’s first caviar and one of it’s few PGI status foods, not to mention the likes of a Nose to Tail masterclass with Michael Quinn of Waterford Castle. And I’m bringing my pen and notebook, dictaphone and camera so I can log all the insights into everything from the growing production of oysters and conservation of lobsters to the History of Food in Ireland’s South East. I’ve even downloaded Instagram to my trusty iPhone4 so I can pretty-up all my amateur photography and share it with anyone who fancies following the Twitteraction on #IrishFoodTrip and a new Facebook page for Holy Mackerel if you want to follow me there.

And how, you might well ask, does it come to be that I have such a delicious week lined up?

In a joint effort by Failte Ireland, BIM and Euro-toques Ireland, this week’s Food Tourism Road Trip in Ireland’s sunny South East was designed to educate a handful of talented young Irish chefs about the availability, range and quality of regional food produce and producers in Ireland. They’ve chosen to bring the six finalists from last year’s Euro-toques Young Chef Competition on this whirlwind feed-fest in order to foster them as food ambassadors within the industry.

And you would be right in thinking that I am neither young (well, not in my early 20s as this crew are) nor a chef nor a finalist of last year’s competition, as are Kamil Dubanik (23) from Knockranny House Hotel, Westport; Aisling Gallagher (24) from Ballynahinch Castle, Co Galway; Kyle Greer (24) from No 27 Talbot Street, Belfast; Micheal Harley (22) from Rathmullan House, Co Donegal; David Magaeen (24) from Restaurant Victoria Belfast and Margaret Roche (23) from The Cellar at The Merrion Hotel, Dublin.

But in their generous wisdom, the brains behind the trip thought they had such a good itinerary lined up that it’d be a shame not to bring a blogger and journalist along to document the experience. I heartily agreed.

And so, as promised yesterday, herein my list of some of the highlights I’m most looking forward to visiting, or Five Foods Worth Travelling The Country In Pursuit Of:

• Waterford Blaa: a simple bread roll with legendary status in the Waterford region to which it is unique. Both grandparents on my maternal side hailed from Waterford city, so it’s slightly alarming that I’ve never tasted one of these bundles of floury fluffiness before. We’ll be visiting both M&D Bakery & Barron’s Bakery both of which are famous for their blaas.
• Goatsbridge Trout: Not all farmed trout can be classified as a gourmet product but not all farmed trout is produced by Margaret Kirwan at Goatsbridge Trout Farm near Thomastown, Co Kilkenny. I love her smoked trout, and can’t wait to try her brand-new trout caviar.
• Dungarvan Brewery: It doesn’t seem like long ago since Dungarvan Brewing Company was the new kid on the block in what was then a very nascent local micro-brewing scene. How much can change in two years – the beers produced by these brothers-in-law and their wives looks positively old guard on the fridge shelves today. Looking forward to seeing where the magic happens in their Dungarvan Brewery.
• Comeragh Mountain Lamb: The general meat-eating Irish public is slowly but surely starting to realise that Irish meat, whether it be beef or lamb, is some of the best in world – and that what makes it so are the 40 shades of green available in their natural grass-fed diet. Some smart producers are a step ahead in further reminding us that if the particular grazing area of a particular herd is unique, the resulting flavours of its meat will be unique too. The place name Comeragh derives from the Gaelic ‘Cumarach’ meaning ‘abounding in hollows and river confluences’. That the land itself is lush and remote and has never been intensively farmed will has a direct influence on the lamb’s particular flavour.
• The Truffle Fairy: I can’t decide which I’m most excited to try – their Guinness truffles or their goji berry, ginger and pink peppercorn truffles… or maybe tequila, salt and lemon will be my favourite? Or chilli, ginger and orange? Ooh, or what about Jameson whiskey, clove and lemon?!? Tell you what, let me go do my research and get back to you on it. (The things I do for you eh?)

Right so. See you on the road?