Ashdown Park Hotel In Gorey Serves Up A Wonderful Treat!
At the end of today’s very enjoyable 42km run Siobhan approached Paul Finnegan General Manager of Gorey’s 4 star Ashdown Park Hotel to see if they would be interested in sponsoring us for a stay to recharge our very weary batteries. Paul said they would be delighted 
Thank you everyone so much!
Two world runners Tony Mangan and Jesper Olsen check into the Ashdown Park Hotel in Gorey
Over dinner the hotel’s duty manager Stephen Larkin told us about the hotels enterprising farm which provides the deliciously fresh food we sampled.
The Ashdown Park Hotel is proud of its locally produced food on the Redmond Family Farm in Craanford is approximately five miles outside the market town and supplies much of the beef, salads and vegetables that are used in the hotels, under the watchful eye of Group Director of Kitchen Operations Chris Farrell.
Redmond’s currently supply a large portion of their hand reared beef, naturally grown
pesticide free vegetables and salads into both hotels. It is the hope that by 2014, all beef eaten in a Redmond hotel will be supplied by the Redmond Family Farm.
On the farmland in the parish of Craanford, some 500 head of free range grass fed Angus Beef cattle are being reared. ‘For us provenance is key,’ said Tommy Redmond. ‘Customers need to know the origin of the excellent quality of food we have on offer. It’s an exciting project and one we are very proud of.’
Hughie and Nicky work the farm and deliver the produce daily to the hotel. ‘The phrase farm to fork really applies to Redmond Hotels,’ said Hughie. ‘It isn’t unusual for us to pick in the morning, deliver to the hotels to have it plated and served that evening.’
‘Many times I have been working in the field to receive an email order for ten heads of Cos Lettuce,’ he added. ‘It can be out of the groundand down to the hotel within 20 minutes, so it really is farm to fork.’
Chris Farrell has his agenda mapped out. ‘Quality across the board is vitally important,’ he said. ‘Menu variety, premium flavours, and honesty in the food, allowing the ingredients and meal to speak for themselves are key for us, whether it is a mixed leaf salad, an a-la-carte main dish or fresh pastry – the taste of farm on a plate.
October 23rd, 2014 at 7:38 am
tony, its not too often a fella gets to run with 2 world runners. the stories and friendship are amazing. tell Jesper to try to keep up today!!!! see you tomorrow and welcome to Wicklow. kevin
October 23rd, 2014 at 11:05 am
Great that Jesper is also sampling the Redmond’s farm fresh food. Nearly there now