The owner of one of Galway’s newest restaurants in the west of the city has been welcomed to one of the most prestigious culinary organisations.
For her contribution to local food, and her dedication to sourcing local produce, Jessica Murphy from Kai Café and Restaurant on Sea Road is the latest addition to Euro-toques.
Established in Ireland by Myrtle Allen of Ballymaloe House in 1986, Euro-toques is an exclusive list of the industry’s elites.
Membership is composed of almost 200 of Ireland’s leading chefs and cooks, who support the philosophy of buying quality, fresh, local, and seasonal ingredients to serve to their customers. All chefs must aim to protect and promote flavour, authenticity, and provenance.
Murphy, a previous winner of Best Chef in Connaught, established her own restaurant on Sea Road four months ago, and it has become a hub of culinary creativity. All menus change daily based on what suppliers have in stock, and what is fresh.
Kai Café and Restaurant has brought a new dynamic to the city’s food lovers and Ms Murphy says she is committed to being an intricate part of the food world in Galway. “I am delighted to have been nominated to join Euro-toques,” she said. “I was raised on a small farm in New Zealand where we had to make everything from scratch. This kind of grassroots cooking has always stayed with me and is what I love to do.”
It is for this same reason that Euro-toques was set up by Ms Allen. She had a quest to protect and pass on to future generations a respect for culinary traditions and best principles of cooking.
The group is also committed to working with and lobbying on behalf of quality producers to ensure that foods with real flavour, texture, and taste are available now and in the future for chefs and customers.
All Euro-toques chefs must conform to the Euro-toques code of honour and work with the objectives of the organisation in mind, which is seen as a badge of honour for chefs, and a quality mark for consumers.
