Jacinta Dalton, Brid Torrades, Gabriel Faherty, Tom Flavin, Aine Maguire, Chris Molloy and Ruth Healy were named as Wild Atlantic Way’s Food Champions by Failte Ireland today. Photo: Pat Moore.
Fáilte Ireland has announced the names of 16 new emerging food champions and a Donegal chef in amongst them.
Christopher Molloy from The Lemon Tree in Letterkenny, will represent the importance of food to tourism and visitors to Ireland.
He will join twenty-one food champions located in the Wild Atlantic Way, Ireland’s Ancient East and Dublin as part of the Food Tourism Network Development programme.
The group will work together with their local community to help build Ireland’s food tourism reputation, sourcing and activating ideas to encourage visitors to stop more, spend more, and stay longer.
These new food champions were chosen from over 400 nominations following a selection process. The tourism authority had sought nominations for emerging food champions with a resounding passion and belief in Irish food who actively influence and shape the future of Irish cuisine and food tourism in their region.
The focus for the initiative in 2016 is on individuals located in particular from within its two newest brands Ireland’s Ancient East and Dublin – A Breath of Fresh Air with an addition of four new food champions located along The Wild Atlantic Way.
Christopher said he was delighted to have been selected as a Food Champion said:
“I was shocked to be chosen as a Fáilte Ireland food champion, but am over the moon. I am so passionate about Donegal and its food community. My goal is to keep promoting Donegal and Ireland for not only i’s stunning scenery but as an emerging, global culinary destination.”
“Everyone knows about the scenery in Donegal, it is sensational, you would be in pure awe of it. But we also have incredible raw materials and an amazing food community. Letterkenny is a great base or jumping off point for travelling on the Wild Atlantic Way and certainly has all the ingredients to emerge as a global culinary destination”.
About Christopher and the Lemon Tree…..
The set-up at the Lemon Tree Restaurant in Letterkenny sounds like a recipe for disaster. Three brothers, plus one other chef, in the kitchen working together; no titles, no hierarchy, no head chef! Front of house, their two sisters and a cousin. All of them have been there from the very beginning, when the restaurant was opened by Christopher’s parents, two decades ago – and it works.
Christopher started his career on wash-up aged 13 and went on to train in professional cookery at Killybegs college. His father had been a cook in the army, his two older brothers were chefs; he never questioned that this was also the path for him.
Apart from some time spent working and travelling in Australia and regular travel centred around ‘food experiences’, Christopher has made the decision to stay put in Donegal. Faced with the option of taking a job in Dublin a couple of years ago he looked around and thought “why would I move to Dublin when I have the best of everything here”. This realisation gave him a renewed determination to promote native Donegal; its beauty, its produce, its food landscape, and he has since become active in events and media eagerly showcasing the food of his county.
Christopher is passionate about the community that exists around food, and for him in Letterkenny this community is particularly tight-knit; with, for example, meat being sourced from his Uncle’s farm and mussels from “a guy I play football with on Saturdays”. Christopher wants to build that sense of community and also put these people he knows ‘on the map’. Naturally he has a strong sense of how central the family business; whether farm, retail, hospitality, is to Ireland and Irish tourism and he wants to showcase this. He wants visitors to realise that this is a place to come to not only for the breath-taking scenery, but also the food, and he wants young chefs to realise that there is plenty to keep them here or to bring them back.
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