Let's be honest. You hurtle through Co Laois and snort incredulously at any suggestion of a food stop. And you'd be nearly right. It's not what the Michelin connoisseurs would recognise as three-star territory. And please note before the lynch mob arrives that this is not just the view of a sniffy outsider.
When a local resident, Blathnaid Bergin, first mooted the idea of a food fair in Abbeyleix, of all places, they questioned her sanity. When she said: "The day will come when they're going to say first, Abbeyleix, then Kinsale," they fell about laughing.
But when she decided there would be a food fair five weeks hence, called a committee together and then disappeared for three weeks, they got up off the floor and got serious. A coffee morning raised £250, and the Abbeyleix Food and Wine Fair was in business. That was two years ago.
Next Sunday sees the third fair, with Abbeyleix playing host to some 70 purely-Irish food and drink producers from all over the country, a magnificent 10 per cent of whom hail from Laois-Offaly.
These include Miriam Chadwick's spectacular decorative cake work trading as Sugarcraft; the little-known coffee and spirit liqueurs of Abbeyleix's own First Ireland Spirits (little-known because they are mainly for export); the famous Abbey cheeses (now featuring a goat version) from Ballacolla; the infant Bally Sheil Toffee from Tullamore; the spring water of Celtic Crest from Vicarstown; the delicious preserves of Slieve Bloom Foods from Birr; the warming spirits of Cooley Distillery, Kilbeggan; the fresh fruit and preserves of Granston Apples; and the luscious and rare treat of fresh Irish blueberries from John Seager's Derryvilla Farm near Portarlington. Also on the list is Jimmy Tynan's The Kitchen restaurant from Portlaoise town, one of Co Laois's brightest stars.
So look to your laurels, Kinsale. No one is laughing now.
It hasn't been easy. Sure, the fact that Blathnaid's sister happens to be Darina Allen is a help. As is the fact that Blathnaid herself is a Shannon-trained hotel and restaurant consultant, passionate not only about good, locally-produced food and drink but also about transforming them into well-marketed, commercially-viable enterprises.
Thus the fair's emphasis on small producers. But this of itself creates a difficulty. No huge exhibition fees can be billed to the participants - £50 is the charge, £25 to the stout Temple Bar open-air market band who are prepared to brave the elements by taking a stand under a canopy - and therefore no vast profits to plough back into the fair. So in its first year, even after Odlums stepped in with generous sponsorship, there was a deficit of more than £8,000. The committee learned some hard lessons.
Between catering for 100 guests and a one-off agreement to feed the hundreds who also descended on the Heritage Centre's coffee shop in the town, Blathnaid lost three-quarters of a stone in a few weeks. On top of that, they were nearly run out of town for daring to levy a £3 admission charge to the fair.
Last year they got sense, says Blathnaid, and invited as guests just the sponsors and local volunteers. They also raised the admission charge to £4, upon which, she says, there was nearly a march on her house. But she looks not at all contrite. For £4 (where it remains for this year), people get a full day watching some of Ireland's greatest chefs demonstrating their skills and sampling the wares of the specialist producers. For £6 they get admission to one of the two wine tutorials to taste 16 wines and two champagnes. Last year's fair was held on the worst day in living memory, when the heavens deposited two inches of rain with some spectacular thunder and lightning as a garnish. And it was the day the Princess of Wales was killed. Nonetheless, 3,000 people turned up, some from as far away as Donegal, Mayo and Sligo. This year it could be 10,000 rolling up to enjoy what the Irish Times food critic, John McKenna, has described as the best food fair in the country.
That's quite a feat for a tiny committee comprising Blathnaid as chairwoman and secretary along with other busy people, such as treasurer Mary White (a.k.a. Laois Person of the Year); Alison Dowling, of Preston House restaurant and upmarket B&B on Abbeyleix's main street; Tom Lalor, of Norfield House, which offers gracious accommodation just outside the town; Jimmy Tynan, of The Kitchen; Erwin Mahon, area sales manager of Horgan's Fine Foods; Marty Phelan, who provides farmhouse accommodation nearby; Dick Wellwood, an organic grower; and Frank Harding, of the local Hibernian Hotel.
Treats in store for visitors include An Bord Bia's chefs' theatre, this year featuring masters Derry Clarke, of L'Ecrivain in Dublin; Pierse McAuliffe, of the Ballyhack Cookery Centre in Co Wexford; Nevan Maguire, from McNeans Bistro, Blacklion, Co Cavan; Adrian Roche, from Jacob's Ladder in Dublin; Seamus Cummins, from Muscat in Dublin; George Smith, from the Golf Club restaurant, Kilkea Castle, Co Kildare; Sheila Kelly, from Bord Bia; and Fergal O'Donnell, from the Wine Port in Glasson, Co Westmeath.
As well as that, Darina Allen and Derry Clarke (current commissioner-general of Eurotoque) will be judging the five finalists in a competition for best new food product in Co Laois. The prize is £1,000 and a bursary of £5,000 to help get the winner into production. And there will be an ice-cream parlour, starring Rose Burnet's products. For anyone seeking a niche, here's a tip from an expert: try ice-cream.
"There are only three small producers in the country that we know of," says Blathnaid Bergin. "It's wide open."
