Green Barn Restaurant and Garden Centre along East Cork ‘foodie trail’ has all the right ingredients

Will the East Cork ‘foodie trail’ stretch to producing a new owner/operator for the entrepreneurially-developed Green Barn Restaurant and Garden Centre near Youghal?

Built as an off-farm enterprise by the local Browne family, who have considerable dairy interests in Killeagh with a 800-strong herd plus the award-garlanded Ballymakeigh House B&B, Green Barn is described as a quality-developed lifestyle restaurant, garden centre/showroom and gift shop, on five acres by its selling/letting agent David McCarthy of Lisney, Cork.

He describes the setting as quite high profile, just off the Cork/Waterford N25, about 7km on the Cork side of Youghal, and states: “It would be ideal for a lifestyle/food operator, keen to take advantage of the large volume of daily passing traffic.”

And, with its mix, it could attract the eye of a Ballymaloe cookery school graduate, keen to stay in the ‘food basket basin’ of East Cork, an Avoca-style operation or other home and garden-type operators such as Ballyseedy, Edinburgh Woollen Mills, or Kilkenny, Mr McCarthy suggests.

Green Barn was one of the ventures initiated by the late Margaret Browne of Ballymakeigh, who passed away in 2010 and who had won awards such as Farm Guest House of the Year, Landlady of the Year, and another for ‘Breaking the mould of Irish Baking’.

It is now offered for sale as an entire at €500,000, or for lease at €30,000 pa for the restaurant and a further €28,000 pa for the garden centre/retail section.

Green Barn was created in 2006 by the Browne family who successfully ran the restaurant and garden centre until 2013, and leased it for the past two years, serving passing traffic and now set to benefit from Fáilte Ireland’s Ancient East trail.

Green Barn comprises a 4,000 sq ft restaurant in a single storey detached property with patios, fully fitted and laid out for 110 diners.

The adjacent garden centre/showroom has a further 10,800 sq ft, in a mainly single storey building with mezzanine, warehouse storage, enclosed yard to the side and canopy, extending to 8,000 sq ft, plus parking for up to 115 vehicles.

DETAILS: Lisney 021-4275079