Lunch at Frances Walsh’s cottage in Danesfort, Co Kilkenny, is certainly a treat; minus any connotations of guilt sometimes associated with that word. There’s sweet potato and beetroot salad sprinkled with toasted sunflower seeds; avocado prepared simply with olive oil, pepper and salt; lemon and coriander hummus with roast chickpeas; homemade flaxseed crackers... even a white chocolate-inspired bar to nibble on afterwards.
Lunch at Frances Walsh’s cottage in Danesfort, Co Kilkenny, is certainly a treat; minus any connotations of guilt sometimes associated with that word.
There’s sweet potato and beetroot salad sprinkled with toasted sunflower seeds; avocado prepared simply with olive oil, pepper and salt; lemon and coriander hummus with roast chickpeas; homemade flaxseed crackers... even a white chocolate-inspired bar to nibble on afterwards.
And it’s this style of cooking that the food blogger fell in love with after being diagnosed with cancer in 2013, and which she now hopes to share as she makes her debut at the Savour Kilkenny Festival of Food next weekend.
A solicitor by profession, Frances spent most of her career working in Dublin, but admits she found “a lack of fulfilment” in her day job, yet she did not know what else to do.
“I guess when you have trained so long to do something, you feel like you don’t want to throw it away,’” she explains.
“And stopping and starting something from scratch is quite a risk because you’ve got a good job, you’ve got a good salary, you’ve got your friends in Dublin – it’s expensive to live in Dublin – you’ve got a big social scene; and you’ve nearly trapped yourself.”
Forced to face her mortality in February 2013, however, proved a catalyst in more ways than one. Having felt sick for up to a year, and after undergoing numerous tests, Frances was told she had cancer in her liver and lung.
However, she was determined to stay positive and actually refrained from asking too many questions about her prognosis as she did not want to be “told” what her chances might be.
“I felt like I had some power over what was going to happen to me – and I didn’t want to be left powerless,” she says simply.
Chemotherapy was gruelling, though Frances has nothing but praise for the health system. From the time of her diagnosis, however, she started to experiment with cooking from scratch using fresh, wholefood ingredients and writing about her exploits in the kitchen, which she found “very therapeutic”.
Fortunately, Frances finished treatment in May 2014, but having moved home to Kilkenny to be with her family after her diagnosis, she was reluctant to return to the long hours and stress she associated with life in Dublin. Getting the all-clear gave her the courage to leave law and in 2015 she launched The Honest Project blog to share her passion for working with wholefood ingredients.
“You don’t want to spend your time in a career that you don’t enjoy or working very long hours and thinking about it then when you get home at the weekends or at night. I think that’s where it reassesses your priorities,” says Frances of how surviving cancer made her change her life for the better.
The Honest Project focuses on plant-based cooking, from soups, salads and smoothie recipes to sweet treats. While Frances describes her own diet as primarily vegan, she hopes her blog will be of interest to anyone who simply wants to add more wholefoods into their meals, and that even the most committed carnivore might find inspiration there.
“The worry I had when I started the blog was I didn’t want to be preachy because I’m not a doctor, I’m not a nutritionist, I’m not a chef,” she says. “It’s more this is what I do and I hope people like it and want to try it out.”
As well as writing her blog, Frances hosts private supper clubs and demonstrations and hopes to teach classes in Kilkenny in the near future. However, having contacted the Savour Kilkenny Festival of Food to enquire about being a volunteer, she was offered two cookery slots on the programme and is “nervous but excited” about her debut.
You can catch The Honest Project at The School of Food pop-up on The Parade in Kilkenny city, where Frances will a create a three-course meal during her raw food demo on Saturday 24 October at 11am, and share her favourite breakfast recipes with her brunch club demo on Sunday 25 October at 11am. Both events are free.
See www.thehonestproject.com
Lots To Savour At
Kilkenny Food Festival
With a packed programme, including Feed Your Mind with Bressie, meet-the-maker opportunities, and appearances from celebrity chefs such as Neven Maguire and The Happy Pear, there’s lots to savour at the Kilkenny Festival of Food.
Now in its ninth year, the festival kicks off on Tuesday 20 October at the Set Theatre with Feed Your Mind and Eat Yourself Calm, with speakers including musician and mental health advocate Niall Breslin (Bressie) exploring the link between a healthy diet and mental wellbeing.
“The aim there is to get 250 young people into the room and to hear somebody like Bressie talk about mental health, talk about his struggles and realise he has overcome it and that food is really important in your mental wellbeing,” says festival manager Marian Flannery.
During the festival, the Kilkenny School of Food will host workshops on everything from foraging to beekeeping and brewing, there will be a young producers’ market at McDonagh Junction, a bloggers’ breakfast at Ryeland House, discussions ranging from sustainable farming to superfoods, a buzzing food market with over 80 stall-holders, demonstrations from well-known chefs and partner events ranging from a taste and tour at Highbank Orchards to a murder mystery dinner at Shankill Castle.
For a full programme of events, see www.savourkilkenny.com
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