Rob Krawczyk plans to keep things pretty simple when he returns to his native county to cook for The Taste of West Cork food festival this September. Well, simple for him.

“Maybe five courses?” he proposes for the “Sing For Your Supper” event in Levis’ Corner House Pub in Ballydehob.

As the name suggests, diners will have the opportunity to literally sing for their supper, with the winner eating for free.

However, the two-time winner of best chef in Leinster for his work in Tankardstown House near Slane in Co Meath won’t be doing a Simon Cowell on the night: for him, the local produce is going to be the star of the show.

“I have never really cooked in west Cork,” he smiles, “so I’m really looking forward to it.”

Heritage

As you might have gathered, Krawczyk is not the most common of west Cork surnames, but Rob’s is a west Cork story in the tradition of many of the region’s most influential food families.

His paternal grandparents fled Poland in Stalinist times, with his father, Frank, born in Uganda but raised in the UK. His mother, Anne, is from Cork city but met her future husband in London.

“I think my mum was on her way to Paris or something,” Rob smiles. “It’s a hippie story!”

With a shared dream, the couple decided to settle in Schull with the John Seymour Complete Guide to Self-Sufficiency as their bible – even if many of Rob’s childhood memories involve chasing after polytunnel plastic whipped away by the west Cork winds. But long before pop-up restaurants were a trend, his parents ran a supper club at their house, while Frank was also a pioneer in producing charcuterie for the farmers’ markets.

“At the time when you’re a kid, a lot of it kind of washes over you,” Rob acknowledges, “it’s only when you grow up and you realise that this is what they were doing and what you want to do.”

Indeed, Rob originally followed a different career path, studying model making and special effects for TV and film, before he “fell into” making architectural models. Before long, however, he realised it wasn’t for him.

“So I just packed it in,” he says, “with no plan.”

What he did have, however, was a passion for food. So, with the help of his father, he secured a job in the kitchen of Richard Corrigan’s restaurant in London, despite having no formal training.

“I’ve always gone in the deep end,” he acknowledges. “Like, I’ll always sink or swim. I’ll always throw myself in there. If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work, but I’ll always give it my best shot.”

As it turned out, it proved the perfect university for the young Krawczyk, who made every second of his experience count.

“I used to get up at five in the morning. I’d be in work at six in the morning – you’d be leaving work at two the following morning and that’s all I did, just work,” he recalls.

“You’d be getting the night bus home with people coming home from nightclubs.”

If you immerse yourself in good places, you’re not seeing any of the badness

Rob showed similar drive to secure a stage at Chez Panisse in California – a major influencer in the farm-to-fork philosophy – which had a year-long waiting list of people who wanted to work there.

“I just kept emailing,” he says. “I ended up just saying: ‘Look, I’m coming over anyway. I’ll contact you when I get over.’ And I got over and emailed them and said: ‘I’m here now.’ They said: ‘Come in for a day and see how you get on.’”

While Rob worked for free during his stage, the team at Chez Panisse did offer him a job. However, he turned it down to return to Ireland, with stints in the Cliff House Hotel, The Chop House and Dunbrody House, where he continued to learn while refining his own style.

“If you immerse yourself in good places, you’re not seeing any of the badness. That’s what I always say,” says Rob. “Don’t go to a bad place, because you’ll just pick up bad habits and you’ll become lazy. Then when you come to a good place, you won’t know what’s going on.

“I’ve always worked in the best of places, purely because I’ve been driven and I want to, and it pays off because I don’t know the bad way of doing anything – and I don’t want to.”

Gut instinct

Rob was actually due to go to Belfast to sign a contract for a new job three years ago when a friend in the industry advised him to detour to Co Meath to meet Trish Conroy of Tankardstown House, who was looking for a new head chef.

“I was like: ‘I don’t know, I’m going up to Belfast, I only have a day free,’” he recalls. But the “gut instinct” he got after driving through the gates convinced him this was where he was meant to be.

“It’s been very good of the owners to let me have full rein and do my thing and they’ve trusted me to do it. There’s a lot to be said for that,” he says.

One of the main draws of Tankardstown was its abundant garden, with whatever is in season informing the menu.

“Everything is based really around the garden,” Rob says, “if I don’t have something, I don’t sell it.”

High-quality Irish produce also features, whether it’s Dexter rib-eye from Killenure Castle in Tipperary, sheep’s yoghurt from Velvet Cloud in Co Mayo, or game, like pigeon and rabbit, caught just down the road. In keeping with his own family tradition, Rob makes all his own charcuterie with a smoker on site, as well as foraging, fermenting and pickling.

“Fine” dining

Dining at Tankardstown ranges from Sunday lunch (typical offerings include roast butternut squash soup, roast striploin of beef with beef dripping potatoes and Yorkshire pudding and chocolate pot with Chantilly cream) at €25 for two courses/€30 for three courses, right up to the €70 “Taste of Land and Sea” seven-course experience for the more experimental palate: think combinations like chicken, cauliflower and summer truffle; pork, burnt apple and cabbage; champagne and rhubarb and sheep’s yoghurt soufflé, presented with an artist’s eye.

That said, Rob is not interested in fuss and favours casual over “fine” dining.

“I think people might feel a bit intimidated and they shouldn’t do,” he says. “It’s just food.”

When it comes to employing staff, he is not necessarily swayed by qualifications either. Instead, he looks for a good work ethic, willingness to learn and personality. Indeed, his advice for any young chef looking for a break is to take the initiative and approach their chosen restaurant in person to show their passion.

“It’s all grand sending in a piece of paper, but I tell you, half the chefs just look at it and flick through it and think: ‘I don’t really have time to ring,’” he says. “It means an awful lot more if someone walks in and goes: ‘I’d like to come and work here,’ and you kind of go: ‘Yeah, come in tomorrow and we’ll see how you get on.’”

Wise words from the man who has won best chef in Leinster two years running. What’s his secret?

“I don’t know,” he laughs. “I wonder that myself!”

Still, he’s looking forward to bringing it all back home this September to Ballydehob.

Get practising that party piece...

For further information, visit www.tankardstown.ie