Chef JP McMahon has the physical bearing of a pirate crossed with a college professor. As I scan the crowd at the Galway farmers market on a recent morning, he’s hard to miss: ample red beard, wire-rimmed glasses, and arms tattooed with portraits of David Bowie, James Joyce, and Samuel Beckett.
McMahon stops to chat with a couple from Texas who had dined at his flagship restaurant, Aniar, the night before, making their way through its eight-course tasting menu with lamb neck cooked sous vide and roast beets served on twigs. The Michelin-starred restaurant has run at a loss since it opened in 2011, surviving on a mix of tourist traffic and the subsidizing support of his thriving tapas bar, Cava, and its sibling, Tartare, a natural wine bar and café up the street.
“In Ireland, generally the best chefs all go abroad,” says McMahon. “We haven’t matured enough as a food culture to keep them here.” For more than a decade, he’s tackled the Sisyphean task of trying to change that. “Given a different set of circumstances, I could have easily just finished a PhD in art history and written books and probably set up a symposium in art history,” he says. “But food kept calling me back.”
*boiling pot
WHERE WAS THIS TAKE WHEN PROP OP WAS STILL AROUND, YOU CULINARY COWARDS
I personally take any food seriously
When has Irish food been delicate? It’s just a shitton of beer
Irish food isn’t a melting pot of so many different influences. You can’t even get a decent burger over there. I will say, the food in Ennis at the old ground hotel, is what dreams are made of.
Boiled meat and potatoes.