Country comforts
Waiting for them to open, I see a red deer through the trees. Then another. Then an entire herd.
Pat and Miriam Mulcahy’s family farm is one of the prime producers of venison in the country, I subsequently learn. Not only do the deer look pretty in the Cork countryside, but they taste pretty good too, dished up in one of Miriam’s one-pot wonders later that evening.
Judging by the gates, and the intercom exchange required to open them, you may think Ballinwillin is a stand-offish kind of place. Wind your way up the leafy driveway, however, past paddocks dotted with the aforementioned deer, and a rather different picture emerges.
An old white farmhouse rises up from a gravel driveway, shouldered by old trees, a modern conservatory tacked onto one wing. Pat, a former garda and recession-defying Renaissance man (more of which anon), steps out of the modest Georgian pile to greet me.
Accommodation at Ballinwillin takes the form of four rooms in a refurbished courtyard area, which Miriam overhauled with the help of designer/artist Fiona Turley.
Thick carpets, power showers and autumnal splashes of colour in the lamps, cushions and throws all nudge the luxury levels beyond your standard B&B, there’s a private kitchen and a lounge area, and Miriam has made sure modern expectations as regards flat-screen TVs, free wi-fi and tea and coffee facilities are well met.
At a time when B&Bs and guesthouses are searching for ways to distinguish themselves, Ballinwillin offers a simple and restful tonic: an Irish farmhouse stay.
Venison isn’t the only unusual animal here. Set on 80 acres of pasture in the Golden Vale, a farm tour turns up gated paddocks occupied by wild boar, a barn reverberating with the snorting of free-range Irish grazers and Iron Age pigs, and fields spotted with purebred Kerry cattle.
It’s a real insight into farming life (Pat dons his wellies to feed the deer as we’re walking about), not to mention the art of diversifying on the land. Not only that, but the couple’s farm hosts the Indiependence Music & Arts Festival, held in Mitchelstown every July.
Mitchelstown is one of the gateways to Ballyhoura, a sprawling region straddling north Cork, east Limerick and south Tipperary. Over the past number of years, this quiet little nook has turned its forests and mountains into a national brand, bundling heritage towns like Kilmallock together with a fantastic network of mountain bike trails into a new, improved ‘Ballyhoura Country’.
There’s a load to do here, from walks around Lough Gur to fly-fishing on the Ballyhass lakes, but pick of the bunch has to be the Ballyhoura mountain bike trails. Several routes are threaded together into a bone-rattling 90km single-track network, meaning first-timers will have just as much craic as full-on daredevils.
Bikes can be hired at €40 per day (ballyhouramtb.com).
Stay in an Irish farmhouse, and you’d be forgiven for expecting the food to begin and end with a big, fat fry. Ballinwillin offers that, certainly — “They’re the next rashers and sausages,” as Pat says, walking me past a pen full of gigantic saddleback pigs — but it offers a lot more besides.
For starters, there are the one-pot wonders that Miriam has made something of a speciality.
On the night I stayed, we all dipped into a venison bourguignon by the Aga in the kitchen, ladling the dark meat from a casserole onto plates layered with rice. Then there’s suckling pig, which you can book as a group (€25pp) to be baked in a clay oven in a converted hay barn.
And let’s not forget the wine. It’s no accident that Pat has a homemade cellar that would minister to the worst midlife crises. The Mulcahys own a vineyard in Hungary, and they import some 12 varieties of wine under their own Chateau Mulcahy label.
Many are available for tasting in this redbrick bunker, dished up with Irish cheeses and cured cuts of their own venison and boar.
B&B at Ballinwillin costs from €45pp. Three-course dinners can be booked in advance for €25pp, and wine-tasting sessions cost €15pp. Contact 086-2561578; www.ballinwillinhouse.com.
Irish B&Bs are working harder and harder to stand out these days, but Ballinwillin distinguishes itself effortlessly. I’d call it comfortable rather than luxurious, and the friendly farm setting won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but for anyone interested in food, farming or a good old-fashioned chat at the kitchen table, it ticks all the boxes.
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