Éamonn Ó Catháin

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Éamonn Ó Catháin is an Irish chef, author and journalist and broadcaster.^[1]

Career[]

Ó Catháin was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland but moved to Wales at age 18, owing to fears over the Shankill Butchers and The Troubles; his brother was murdered by the Ulster Defence Association in 1975, and a girl he met in France was killed within two weeks of arriving in Belfast.^[2] He spent four years in Wales, studying French and Celtic studies.^[2] He worked briefly as a teacher in France, at the Northern Ireland Housing Executive, and at a record shop, before opening his own restaurant, the Shay Beano, in 1982.^[2] The restaurant closed in 1991, and, having faced several gaffes, Ó Catháin later recalled it as "one of my failings and also one of my strengths."^[2]

Ó Catháin later participated in some Irish daytime television programmes, such as The Afternoon Show, conducting on Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ). One then-regular item, called "Meal or no Meal", was a spoof on Noel Edmonds's Deal or no Deal. He was better-known for his programmes on TG4, among them Nua Gach Bia, Bia's Bóthar and Cósta Uí Chatháin. was a travelogue initially of Ireland and then Europe, presented entirely in Irish with English subtitles where he cooks a meal, often outdoors, from local ingredients. It ran for five series from 2001 to 2005. The final series visited many of the 2004 accession countries then joining the European Union.

He also broadcast a radio show on world music on RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta. It was called Thar Tír Isteach and went out on Friday nights, concentrating on music from Russia, Poland, Portugal, Africa, Brazil and various other “new Irish” communities now resident in recently multicultural Ireland. Prior to that, there were long-running series on RTÉ Radio One such as Wide World Music as well as a classical series in Irish, Cartlann Uí Chatháin on RTÉ Lyric FM.

For the most part his radio shows were themed around music, with the exception of Love Bites for RTÉ and The Global Gourmet for the BBC.

Personal life[]

He speaks Irish, English and French fluently. He has authored three books, The Irish Folk Music Guide (1981); Around Ireland With a Pan - Food, Tales and Recipes (2004); and The Hard Times Cook Book (2009).

References[]

External links[]

• https://web.archive.org/web/20110713204734/http://www.libertiespress.com/cartage.html?main_page=product_book_info&products_id=103&zenid=4k92haaf6ta9chpmn7980kn7j2&cartage_alias=cartage
• http://www.rte.ie/tv/theafternoonshow/2009/1110/mealornomealmorrocan808.html
• https://web.archive.org/web/20100322232032/http://www.tribune.ie/archive/article/2007/oct/28/feature-1980s-it-was-acceptable-in-the-80s