Irish cuisine in Kingston
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When Gerry and Orlagh Lyons emigrated from Ireland to Kingston three and a half years ago, they found there were few places to eat in the city that offered an affordable lunch or breakfast that wasn't a part of a restaurant chain.
So they opened their own, Madigan's (Orlagh's maiden name), at the corner of Earl and William streets, right in the heart of Sydenham District.
"We saw a niche for breakfast and lunch where it's fresh food, from scratch cooking, not everything from a bucket," Gerry said, adding that freshly made, locally sourced food is what defines Irish cuisine.
Like the food they serve, the Lyons started the restaurant from scratch.
"We wanted to achieve something that you can bring your family, have really good fresh food, and you're not going to walk out the door feeling fleeced, you know what I mean?" Orlagh said. "That's what we're trying to achieve, but it's tough."
The restaurant has, over the nine months since it opened, managed to build a steady clientele, drawing patrons who work at the hospitals and university nearby, along with residents of Sydenham District.
The day I lunched there, on a Tuesday, the eatery was full and only a single table open. I tried the Guinness pie, a rustic dish featuring short ribs braised in the porter, peas, carrots and potatoes, and topped with a flaky biscuit with which to soak up the broth. It was an uncomplicated dish, and a tasty one at that.
I opted for the fries as my side dish, too. They were thick -- about the size of a Jenga block -- and are indicative of the care the restaurant puts into preparing its food. The potatoes are par-boiled with garlic and thyme, and then dried for half a day before being fried.
"People keep saying, 'What's the secret?' OK, we have an outstanding chef, but it's fresh, fresh food," Orlagh said. "As (chef) Brendan (McAleer) says, 'Keep it as simple as possible, and don't mess with the ingredients.' That's what it is."
And it's local ingredients that are key, they agree. When they lived in County Clare, the couple ran a grocery store, which -- thanks to regulatory changes made after the onset of foot-and-mouth disease -- offered customers "traceability" of their food.
"You go to the meat section of our supermarket, we could tell you where your beef came from, what farm, where your chicken, where any of the meat came from," explained Gerry, adding that even the name of the abattoir was included.
Chef McAleer, whose resume includes a stint working at a Michelin three-star restaurant in England. He employs the sous-vide method of cooking he learned there, which sees the ingredients placed in vacuum-sealed packets and then cooked on low and slow, retaining the colour and nutrients of the food. McAleer, whose grandfather had made cakes for the Royal Family, does the bulk of the baked goods, too.
Everything is made on the premises, Gerry said, and the restaurant. Orlagh goes into the walk-in fridge and pulls out a side of bacon, which they cure for a week in a marinade that includes maple syrup, herbs and spices.
When Madigan's first opened, it had a deli counter at the front, and it was self-service. Trouble was that, sometimes, all of the tables were taken and there was no place to eat by the time you got your meal and paid for it. So they removed the deli counter and brought in serving staff. And they've also changed up the menu since they opened.
"The great thing is you're not a franchise," Gerry said, "so you can play around."
For now, Madigan's is open every day but Sunday from 8 in the morning until 3 in the afternoon. They would like to expand their hours, but have had trouble finding kitchen staff who could meet the chef's high standards.
Part of the problem may have been that, as the new restaurant in town, cooks were reluctant to leave their current jobs for fear of the new Irish restaurant failing.
Gerry and Orlagh -- who moved to Canada in the first place because it was a safer place to raise their children, Gerry and Anna -- are now readying their restaurant for St. Patrick's Day, a holy day in their homeland. They will be holding a food festival featuring a variety of different Irish dishes starting Monday and ending on the 17th.
In addition to the two full-sized flags proudly hung behind the front counter and in the main dining area, the wood-trimmed rooms -- meant to connect the two rooms together and evoke the feel of the pubs back in Ireland -- are festooned with small Irish flags.
"A lot of people come in and say, 'Where's the football match?'" Gerry joked.
The couple knew it would take a while for their venture to take hold in the city's culinary scene.
"We had to get people in Kingston to trust us," Orlagh said.
"It took a long time to build up the trust that what we're doing here is genuine and now they can taste the difference. They can now taste who did the soup today and we find that fantastic. To us, that's a great achievement."
peter.hendra@sunmedia.ca twitter.com/petehendra
ESSENTIALS
From March 9 to 17, Irish restaurant Madigan's Cafe, 175 Bagot St., will be holding a food festival featuring a different dish from their homeland every day. Here's a sample of some of those dishes:
• Galway style cabbage and house bacon: House-cured bacon, cabbage with creamy champ.
• Dublin coddle: A medley of house-cured bacon, pork sausages with potatoes and onion in a creamy broth.
• St. James Gate Guinness pie: House-made, braised beef cheek and Guinness pie with hand-cut fries.
• Madigan's green salad: Frisee lettuce, roasted apple, green beans, honey mustard dressing, black pudding with a poached egg.
• The Burren cod: Roasted cod with mint crushed potatoes.
• The Quite Man Burger: A six-ounce burger topped with Irish-style bacon and cheddar cheese, served with hand-cut fries.
• The Irish jig sample platter: Cashel blue cheese and walnut terrine, black pudding, house-cured ham, salmon horseradish pate served with chutney.
