Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall arrived into studio for a chat with Ryan Tubridy on RTÉ Radio 1 armed with a bag of colourful and juicy fresh Irish vegetables to share his passion on all things food related.
He took to the main stage at the ‘Taste of Dublin’ festival in Dublin's Iveagh Gardens over the weekend and the focus there is on keeping things local. He said, "This fantastic festival is all about celebrating the best of Irish produce so it won’t have come far I’m sure."
Ryan returned to Hugh’s "shaggy hair period", revealing that one of his most beloved Christmas traditions is to watch the ‘River Cottage’ Medieval Feast’s 10 bird roast.
That series ran for the best part of 15 years, during which Hugh moved into a gamekeeper's lodge in Dorset and brought cooking back to its roots.
"I loved every minute of it… I just discovered this little cottage in Dorset with some friends of mine and we were going there to escape from our city jobs at weekends…
"One day I just thought, well what if I could do something here, what if I didn’t have to get back on the road, and so I just chucked a one-pager into Channel 4."
TV execs jumped on the idea and it ran and ran.
Huge has used his platform over the years to promote causes close to his heart, one of which is the conservation of our fish supplies which he says is in danger due to the implications of fishing quotas.
He explained that once fishermen reach their target for a certain species, huge numbers of dead or dying fish are returned to the ocean, describing it as "the industry’s dirty secret".
"I eat fish, I eat meat but we’ve got to accept that if we’re going to do that, we’re killing animals for food… That comes with a big sense of responsibility and our responsibility when we farm animals is to look after them in the best possible way and our responsibility when we catch fish and indeed when we get meat from animals is not to waste huge amounts of it.
"It’s not respectful to raise an animal for food or catch an animal for food and the throw most of it away or in the case of these fish, tragically, all of the fish away if it’s an overquote of fish."
Hugh describes fish and chips as "a fantastic tradition" but says if we’re going to do it, we’ve got to do it responsibly.
80% of the fish we consume comes from the same 5 species and with so many options out there, we need to look at the impact of "pounding away at the same special all the time" as Huge puts it.
"From here on we have to look after the stocks in an intelligent way so that we can all go on enjoying fish and chips with a good conscience."
Click above to listen to Hugh’s interview in full.
