A wise choice

WHILE there will always be charlatans in the restaurant trade — as in all walks of life — the huge surge in promoting local produce on Irish menus is, for the most part, genuine.

But those chefs truly embracing the concept of ‘Eat Local’ are a much rarer breed.

Last summer, I visited Sage to sample their 12-mile lunch menu in which everything bar butter and cream (from Co Cork, nonetheless) and sugar and salt came from within a 12-mile radius: seafood from Ballycotton; free range pork from the renowned Woodside Farm; Kenneally’s aged Angus beef from Garryvoe; Tom Clancy’s exquisite Ballycotton Free Range Poultry and a wide variety of produce from local growers. The execution was as sound as the ethos and I came away mightily impressed.