One of The Menu’s great comrades, the wonderful Waterford chef-turned-teacher Michael Quinn, is taking his charges, final-year BA (Hons) culinary arts students in Waterford Institute of Technology.

Don’t feel like cooking this Christmas? We’ve compiled the very best festive stays — so you can check in and chill out.

AS YOU enter the castle/hotel gates of Ballynahinch, and travel along its splendid lengthy drive, there is a sense that you will very shortly be overcome by grandiosity and an overbearing sense of self-importance. 

TWO things are hard to find in Connemara. The first is a reliable weather forecast.