Cookery & Food Tourism Feature - Waterford Festival of Food

Now well established as a major player in Irish food and tourism, Waterford was blessed with fine weather recently for the 17th Waterford Festival of Food which drew some 80,000 people to Dungarvan, Waterford City and surrounding areas, to attend an extraordinary range of events (150+ running over four days) and to explore this lovely - and, for many, undiscovered - region and Ireland’s oldest city, founded by Vikings in 914AD. Extended this year beyond its established Dungarvan and West Waterford hub to include a programme of events in Waterford City, highlights included a very special collaboration dinner in House of Waterford by chef Liam Finnegan of Ashford Castle and Eric Matthews of Kickys  and their teams, including Ashford Castle Restaurant Manager Robert Bowe talking through the wines. (See also final image below, to get a sense of the finesse achieved for this challenging pop-up event).

Other highlights included a pop-up dinner at The Tannery with Paul and Maire Flynn’s favourite restaurant Uno Mas, and plenty of events and activities beyond Dungarvan and Waterford City, including tours and trails such as the Bia Bus Tour around West Waterford, the Seafood Lunch at Cliff House Hotel Ardmore (looking stunning in the sunshine that Saturday) and the unique 350 Metres & Beyond Sunday lunch at Mount Congreve Gardens hosted by CEO Sara Dolan, where chef Jean-Baptiste Du Bois  (formerly of GROWHQ in Waterford, where we enjoyed a memorable breakfast one morning) is settling in nicely a year into starting his work at the estate. Inspired by Mount Congreve’s 350-metre Estate-to-Plate philosophy celebrating seasonal produce from the estate and nearby, JB’s menu included not only an astounding variety of garden produce but also some superb bullet beef (a continental term for centre cut steak) from the sponsor of this lunch Dawn Meats - and after lunch JB was joined by estate director Ray Sinnott and locally-based American food writer (and Irish Food Writers’ Guild member) Russ Parsons, for a discussion exploring food, place and purpose in contemporary Irish cooking – with their very different perspectives producing some fascinating insights.

The sheer range of activities offered by the Waterford Festival of Food is a huge credit to its organisers and supporters and an event with a difference that I particularly enjoyed was the one that kicked off the weekend for me - the Food Sparks: Developing Food Business through Collaboration symposium, which was held at the impressive SETU Waterford Campus and (aside from the many fascinating learnings on the day) simply made me want to go back to college and be a student there, which says a lot about the place. They offer some exceptional courses and you won’t meet a nicer bunch of staff (including the popular chef and IFWG member Edward Hayden), their delicious lunch was a model of simplicity and the speakers – speaker Eunice Power, CEO Waterford Festival of Food (also an IFWG member); Professor Veronica Campbell, President of SETU; Mary Houlihan, Programme Manager, Fáilte Ireland; and Srishti Kishore, Head of Brand Development & Innovation & Client Insight, Bord Bia - were terrific. So also were the panel members - David Currid, Grantstown Nurseries, Waterford; David Dennison, Viking Irish Drinks, Waterford; Siobhán Hubbard, Newbard Farm, Lismore; and Liam Maher, Slow and Steady Eats Tramore. All spoke inspirationally in our armchair discussion about their businesses, the direction of Irish food, and the positive contribution being made by SETU, so the net outcome of the day was a great sense of optimism for the future of our food businesses. And – like the Food Festival itself – this doesn’t happen by magic, it’s down to the calibre and commitment of the SETU team. Too many to mention here, but including Jacinta Greene Beatty who has recently developed a BBS in Hospitality and Tourism Management. A work-integrated learning programme, it’s a hybrid of flexible and part-time course work, specifically co-designed with the Tourism and Hospitality sector, which is just what is needed right now.

And, hot on the heels of the recent food festival, a series of exciting announcements has already followed – there’s the 'Find Your Wild' 2026 campaign for personalised tourism experience, for example, and the 4-day Waterford Slow Travel Experience Itinerary, both of which are bang on the nail in terms of tourism trends. For details on these and much more: https://visitwaterford.com/
The notes given here are, of course, only the tip of the extraordinarily abundant culinary and experiential iceberg that is the essence of Waterford, and we enjoyed many other experiences on our recent trip that were not necessarily linked to the festival. A first visit to Dungarvan’s charming new ‘boutique hotel’ The Hat Maker, for example, also the first of what may turn out to be one of many long goodbyes to The Tannery; a delicious lunch in Dunmore East at The Strand, and another at Lismore’s lovely Farmgate… All this and much more awaits the culinarily curious visitor to Waterford – so expect more of this anon.

RECIPES – a little taste of Waterford
The experiences promised are genuinely holistic, but good cooking is at the heart of the Waterford success story, so here are a couple of related recipes to try:

Helvick Fish Pie 
Eunice Power - TV chef, co-founder and director of the Waterford Food Festival, owner of the super little Dungarvan restaurant …And Chips, Irish Food Writers’ Guild member, ambassador for Irish food and ingredients and much more, has been energetically promoting the region for decades. Amongst her many other activities – which have included running a B&B, a cookery school and her highly successful catering company – she wrote a delightfully practical cookbook ‘Cook with Stanley’ for Waterford Stanley in 2009, which included the recipe below and is well worth picking up if you spot a copy. This easy to make fish pie is “a useful dish to prepare ahead and chill, ready for reheating later in the day. The fish used can be varied to suit the occasion and the season, using a whitefish or salmon as the basis for the mixed fish, and adding mussels, prawns or whatever is available at your local fishmongers”. And, demonstrating that Eunice’s appetite for simple down-to-earth dishes based on the freshest of ingredients has never wavered, a variation, Quick Fish Pie, appears in her impressive recently published cookbook, My Irish Kitchen Table Serves 4:

1¾lb/800g mixed fish
12 fl oz/350ml milk
1 bay leaf
1 oz/25g butter
1 oz/25g flour
2 fl oz/50ml white wine
2 fl oz/50ml chicken stock
Salt & pepper
3 sprigs chopped fresh dill
3 lb / 1.3kg potatoes
Butter & milk, as required

Cut the fish into similar-sized portions, if necessary, and poach in the milk with the bay leaf, until the fish is opaque. Strain the milk off the fish and reserve for the sauce. Flake the fish off the skin, check for bones and place in a pie dish.
To make a white sauce, melt the butter and add the flour to make a roux; cook over gentle heat for 1-2 minutes, then blend in the wine and chicken stock, stirring with a whisk over moderate heat until the sauce becomes thick, then add the reserved milk as required and stir to make a thick, smooth sauce. Season to taste and add the chopped dill.
Pour the sauce over the fish and allow to cool. Preheat a moderate oven, 350’F/180’C. Steam the potatoes until cooked, then peel and mash with the milk and butter until light and fluffy. Season to taste. Smooth the mashed potatoes over the fish and sauce in the pie dish and place in the preheated oven for 15 minutes, until nicely browned. Serve with a crisp green salad.

Steamed mussels with cidona, curry spice and crème fraîche 
This is from Butter Boy: Collected Stories and Recipes (ninebeanrowsbooks.com), a 2023 collection of all the recipes published by The Irish Times when Paul Flynn, of The Tannery in Dungarvan, was their regular chef contributor. Reviewing it at the time, I commented that it took me straight back to the beginning and the early years of the Egon Ronay’s Ireland Guide when Paul was leading the kitchen team at Dublin’s La Stampa, the Guide’s 1995 Restaurant of the Year. The citation referred to it as ‘a breath of fresh air’, ‘a hugely enjoyable experience’, ‘real value for money’ and to ‘the wish to return’ – all of which could equally apply to The Tannery, which Paul and Maire Flynn bravely left Dublin to establish in Dungarvan just two years later, in 1997. Which, as it happened, was also the year when Egon Ronay’s Guides (Britain and Ireland) suddenly went quiet, in a closure very similar to the demise of The Irish Press group – to be replaced, in Ireland, by GCGuides. Interestingly, this is now the time when Paul and Maire have decided to wind down The Tannery (closing 1st January 2027) “not because we have to, but because we can’, which is such a positive message to others in hospitality today. The Tannery has always been special but never stuffy or full of itself, and Paul says about this simple recipe, “This dish is a little controversial because I put Cidona in my mussels. So should you. It was inspired by Normandy, where they pair mussels with cider so beautifully. I’ve added crème fraîche to temper the
sweetness of the Cidona.” Serves 2

1kg mussels
50g butter
1 small onion, sliced
125g smoked bacon lardons
2 bay leaves (fresh if possible)
½ tsp curry powder
200ml Cidona
2 tbsp crème fraîche
chopped fresh parsley

To prepare the mussels, immerse them in a clean sink of cold water. Agitate. Debeard them one by one into a clean bowl, discarding any that are open and won’t close when you gently tap them on the counter. Drain and clean the sink, fill it with cold water again and re-immerse the debearded mussels. Agitate the mussels once more, then lift them from the water, leaving any sediment behind.
Melt the butter in a large saucepan over a medium heat. When the butter starts to foam, add the onion, bacon and bay leaves and cook for 10 minutes, until the onion has softened. Add the curry powder and cook for 1 minute before adding the mussels and Cidona.
Cover the pan and bring to the boil. Cook for 2–3 minutes over a high heat, until all the mussels are open, stirring just once along the way. Do not overcook or the mussels will be tough and rubbery. Discard any that remain closed.
Remove the pan from the heat, then stir in the crème fraîche and parsley.
Serve straightaway with crusty bread.