Celebrity chef serves up latest delights

CELEBRITY chef Conrad Gallagher is back!

Not known for staying still for long, the Donegal-born food wizard has whipped up another cookbook designed for these frenetic times. Fans of the big man will remember his first offering, One Pot Wonders, a couple of years back.

His latest, Take 6 Ingredients, is self-evident: over 100 ingenious recipes from the Michelin-starred chef that contain six ingredients or less.

"To cook is to have fun," says 32-year-old Gallagher, barely a month after a jury cleared him of theft and fraud charges.

Famously arrested outside his New York restaurant, Ireland's chef to the movers and shakers returned to native soil in handcuffs to face a six-day trial charged with stealing three paintings and of obtaining money by false pretences and intent to defraud. On July 8, a jury in Dublin Circuit Criminal Court found him not guilty.

Current gossip suggests that Gallagher, after a relaxing time in his native county, may be off to South Africa to open up a restaurant there.

At 26, he was the youngest chef ever with a Michelin Star, the speed of his rise to the top being truly meteoric. His Peacock Alley restaurant in Dublin's South William Street was the place to be seen. Gallagher had all the trappings of the top man, employing 250 people at one stage. When the restaurant moved from its original location, it was said that bookings plummeted. The Gallagher empire crumbled and he fled to the US.

Gallagher is happiest in the kitchen, dreaming up new culinary delights. But as his recipes attest, you don't need a stunning array of ingredients. Just a stock cupboard of olive oil, salt and pepper and the six ingredients for your choice dish.

Take 6 Ingredients, published in Ireland by A&A Farmars and Kyle Cathie in UK, costs €14.99.