News

August date for Taste Fest

The 15th annual Taste of Dublin event is scheduled to take place from August 6 until August 9 in Dublin's Iveagh Gardens. tastedub0320

Taste of Dublin was originally scheduled to take place in June, but has been postponed to August due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The event will feature food from a variety of Dublin restaurants and established Irish chefs as well as a lineup of entertainment.

Taste of Dublin 2020 will also celebrate up and coming Irish culinary talent, and showcase Irish ingredients.

Lisa Jameson, the Teeling Whiskey Distillery General Manager, has been honoured as the World’s Best Distillery Visitor Centre Manager at the Icons of Whisky Awards. This was announced during the live streaming of The World Whiskies Awards where the Teeling Whiskey 30-Year-Old Single Malt was also honoured as the World’s Best Irish Single Malt.

The honour for Lisa Jameson follows on from a very successful 12 months for the Teeling Whiskey Distillery, which has continued to establish its world class reputation with a whole host of international honours over the last year. This included Teeling Whiskey Distillery winning ‘Best Visit’ in Ireland at the CIE Awards in January, the Distillery winning a Gold Medal at the 2019 Distillery Awards run by the Spirits Magazine, The Award for Excellence at the 2019 Travel and Hospitality Awards, being nominated as Europe’s Leading Distillery Tour at the World Travel Awards as well as receiving for the 4th year in a row, a Certificate for Excellence from TripAdvisor.

Restaurants rally to 'Feed the Heroes'

A fundraising campaign to feed hospital and emergency workers in Ireland has raised more than €330,000 in just ten days. heroes0320

The 'Feed The Heroes' GoFundMe page was set up on 15 March.

Donations from the public are being used to pay restaurants and kitchens to deliver meals to frontline staff who are putting in extra hours during the coronavirus crisis.

The 'Feed The Heroes' GoFundMe page was set up earlier this month.

Founder Cian O Flaherty said: "It was a very small, bright idea to maybe reach €1,000 and drop some food into some of the heroes working in hospitals and on the frontline. But the people of Ireland had a completely different response.

"We have been inundated with over 7,500 donations, which has allowed us to deliver 4,500 meals to the frontline. The public's response has been one of the most humbling experiences of my life."

'Naomi's Kitchen', an events catering company in Glenageary, south Co Dublin, is one of the 300-plus food operators who have signed up to help.

Statement on B and B status

Following An Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar’s Post Cabinet Statement on the 24th March, the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport has made a statement in relation to B&B’s and Self Catering Accommodation:

'The NPHET recommendations approved by Cabinet on the 24th March state that ‘all holiday/caravan parks are closed’ and ‘all hotels are limited to non-social and non-tourist occupancy’. While this doesn’t explicitly specify self-catering parks/facilities and B&Bs, our understanding is that they would be included under this, especially given the direction from An Taoiseach that “no unnecessary travel should take place within the country or overseas”.

Spike in meal deliveries

Online food delivery service Deliveroo has seen an 80% spike in the number of restaurants using the platform in the last two weeks in the wake of the coronavirus crisis. deliveroo0220

More than 100 restaurants have signed up to the Deliveroo service as they transition from dine-in to delivery-only in a bid to keep their businesses going during the pandemic.

To manage this increased demand, Deliveroo has re-assigned teams of people across the business to onboard new restaurant partners and support restaurants who want to carry out deliveries but have no previous experience. The company has also dropped its new-restaurant onboarding fee.