The Hedgerow, Kilshanny House, Co Clare
One of our favourite Irish Inns.
We have been lucky to enjoy Kilshanny House under the stewardship of three different sets of talents. Aidan and Mary Butler were the first owners we knew to navigate this pristine pub and restaurant, a few miles north of Ennistymon on the road to Lisdoonvarna.
You only had to step in the door to know you were in a special place, because everything gleamed, the sign not just of great housekeeping, but of meticulous care all across the board.
Matt Strefford then had charge of Kilshanny House, and he superannuated the restaurant offering, with dishes such as chicken with scorched green beans and mango, and roast hake with crazy water.
After Matt, Kilshanny lay idle for a while until good news reached us: it was to be the new venue for a fascinating and talented couple, Cillian and Sarah Hanrahan, whose work we knew from the cafe at Coole Park, further north near to Gort.
Cillian and Sarah had won a cult following when cooking at Coole, Lady Gregory’s old gaff, including many food lovers who would drive all the way out from Galway city itself to enjoy some of the best cooking and baking in the county.
This pair could bake a defining breakfast scone, then turn their hands to fashioning the perfect Cornish pastie, and then fire out an amazing lamb and harissa burger. “Inspiring” was the term we used to describe the cooking after we had made a few visits. And now there they were, in charge of Kilshanny House.
So, having given the team a few weeks to sort the kitchen and collate the menus, we jumped in the car early one Saturday morning and made the trip from West Cork up to the N67. The house is now distinguished by a striking mural which depicts graphically its new name: The Hedgerow.
Once again, you step in the door and you know you are someplace special, because everything gleams. The wellness effect which great housekeeping gifts to the customer is often unacknowledged, but it’s a vital part of the blink effect that calms and settles you after a long drive.
The menus play to Cillian’s strengths all the way, and show how The Hedgerow is the place for well-cared-for cooking: seafood chowder with haddock, smoked coley, salmon and Atlantic prawns with dill and lemon; open prawn sandwich on treacle bread with Marie rose sauce; fish and chips with tomato, coriander and lime salsa; Doonbeg crab salad with pickles and leaves; pork apple and leek sausages with caramelised onion mash and cider gravy.
None of these dishes would be out of place on any gastropub menu, but it is the care, precision and craft which Cillian brings to the party that makes all the difference.
The chowder is a 5-star production, a flavour-ferrying mirepoix of properly sweated vegetables forming a carriage for beautifully finished fish and exceptional prawns. Cillian never bigs up his dishes: they are the work of a craftsman who knows exactly how to get the result he wants, so even if you have a simple lunchtime order of seafood chowder followed by bangers and mash, it’s a marquee production. A modest marquee, mind you, but a tent of big flavours.
The Doonbeg crab was crab salad as it should be, the pillows of crab making alliance with a tiny dice of granny smith apple, with fennel fronds laced on top of the crab, and a salad of fresh leaves and pickled cucumber topped out with a pico de gallo-like tomato and red onion salsa.
It would be easy to describe Hedgerow food as classic cooking, but a better descriptor would say that this is harmonious food: each dish forming a complete circumference of tastes, from soothing to crunchy; from agrestic to sweet; from umami to bitter. Themes and variations are always beautifully resolved.
The kitchen is helped in its task by the artful artisans who make this part of West Clare the West Cork of the West Coast. So there is risotto with Killeen goat’s cheese and Moyhill garden greens with salsa verde. Kilshanny lamb has both turnips and turnip greens; St Tola goats cheese becomes a parfait with Moyhill summer beets; john dory has fresh, new potatoes and organic greens. Each plate has the taste of the place.
This is all good news for the Banner County, but it’s made even better by the fact that Kilshanny House also has rooms upstairs above the bar and restaurant.
It’s hard to think of a better place from which to explore the many treasures of the Burren and the region, knowing that you have the thrill of returning to this gorgeous space for a pint of Hedgerow Pale Ale – made by local craft brewers Western Herd – and then the roast chicken, lemon and herb kebab with mint yogurt, followed by roast monkfish with organic chard and baby potatoes.
Sarah and her team look after everyone whilst Cillian’s cooking delivers the charm, and Kilshanny House has, once again, found the artful curators this great destination demands. Together they have fashioned a place where everything is done right, to your heart’s delight.
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