DOMAINER CHEF PATRICK TV

‘This was towards the end of the Celtic Tiger boom so we’d do a hundred covers on a Monday lunch and these businessmen were just throwing money around.’ After spending three years at L’Ecrivain and working his way up to the position of junior sous chef, Patrick decided it was time to leave Ireland. ‘I suddenly went from this small seaside place to a very intense Michelin-starred kitchen,’ he says. Collins soon sent him away to gain experience in the one-star kitchen he’d formerly been in charge of. His break came when Seamus Commons, the former head chef of the Michelin-starred Dublin institution L’Ecrivain, took over the kitchen in Ballina and took Patrick under his wing. ‘It was by no means a high-end place and because it was a rural sort of area you’d get these very rogue chefs, but I just loved it.’ ‘The restaurant was on the way back from the beach so in the summer it was just wild,’ explains Patrick. Aged fifteen he got a job as a pot wash at his cousin’s seaside restaurant in Ballina, County Mayo and over the next five years began to actually prepare the food. ‘We didn’t have loads of amazing food growing up it was just sustenance really, all very Irish with a lot of carbs.’ It was when his sister began going out with a chef, who would lend Patrick various cookbooks, that he truly began to get the cookery bug. ‘I just loved watching Ready Steady Cook,’ he laughs.

DOMAINER CHEF PATRICK TV

This culminated in him opening his first restaurant Allegra in 2019, where he is currently dazzling diners with his seasonal British menu.īorn in Ireland, Patrick’s interest in food was first piqued by watching daytime cookery shows on TV as a teenager. But rather than getting too comfy in any particular kitchen, he’s always followed his instinct and moved on to better his career. Over the course of his career Patrick Powell has found himself climbing the ranks in many of the best restaurants in London, Ireland and further afield, working for some of the most respected chefs around. Carving out a career as a successful chef isn’t just a case of being talented, it’s about taking risks about being driven and knowing when it’s time for a new challenge.

Domainer chef patrick