Drogheda restaurants


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Last Saturday, Mountaineering Man and I had our usual almond croissants from Morgan, the French Baker, and flat whites from Revolution Bakery at St. Anne’s Park. Afterward, we stopped by the Organic Delights veg stall and got a few things – spinach, courgettes, onions and potatoes. Normally I would’ve gotten some flowers at the florist’s stand, but all of our vases were already packed.

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This has been our routine every Saturday morning for at least the last few years now, and though I’m sure there are farmers’ markets where we’re going, Morgan (bread/croissants) and Denis (veg) won’t be there. It’s going to take some getting used to.

There are so many places that we frequent in Dublin and beyond that we will miss. So in the interest of passing on the scoop on some great places, here’s a list of our favourites. I hope you’ll check them out, if you haven’t already.

Clontarf Wines: Ronnie & Helena are passionate about wine and we love popping into their shop to talk about (and taste!) their most recent discoveries. There’s no snobbery here, so even if you know nothing about wine you’ll feel welcome. The shop sells nice nibbles too, like charcuterie and cheese, so you can pick up a lovely little spread of treats and vino for an evening when you’re too tired to cook. We often do.

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Brown Hound

Before Mountaineering Man, before The Coombe and before Raheny, there was Drogheda. As many of you know, that’s where I first landed after leaving Los Angeles for a new life in Ireland.

Though I eventually moved south to the Big Smoke, I left a part of my heart in Drogheda. In part it’s because my friends live in nearby Collon, but it’s also due to a few places I fell in love with during my year-long stay there. Thankfully for me MM also took a liking to these places during his many visits to me during our early dating days, so he’s always up for taking a quick drive up north to Co. Louth.

Mos Fish

We recently spent a weekend visiting all of our favourite places and even added a new eatery to our must-go Drogheda stops. After arriving around mid-day on a Saturday, we visited Brown Hound Bakery, the gorgeous, glass-encased bakery owned by Jeni Glasgow & Reuven Diaz, the duo behind the Eastern Seaboard Bar & Grill next door. As you’ve read many times on this blog, we are HUGE fans of Eastern Seaboard. Jeni & Reuven just get food – it’s as simple as that.

After picking up some chocolate banana bread at the bakery, we ventured next door to the latest Glasgow/Diaz venture, Mo’s takeaway. Named after Jeni’s mum, this takeaway isn’t like any you’ve experienced in Ireland. It’s freshly made, locally-produced food that’s as good as what’s served in the Eastern Seaboard. Scanning the menu, we had a tough time narrowing down our choices so we over-ordered: Two corn dogs, one order of onion rings, a side of carrot salad and an order of popcorn shrimp.

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“Don’t you regret moving away?”

As I stood in the new Brown Hound Bakery, co-owner Reuven Diaz’s words hung in the air along with the luscious buttery scent of just-baked biscuits, cakes and scones. My senses were overloading at the scene: stacks of perfectly-crisp cookies under sparkling glass domes; steam whistling from the shiny espresso maker working overtime to fill coffee orders; and  piles of crusty breads peeking out of woven baskets.

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I didn’t say it out loud, but in that moment I did feel a pang of regret that I had upped sticks and moved to Dublin a few months ago, away from this haven of homemade goodness so sleek and gorgeous it would fit right into Greenwich Village. But Brown Hound Bakery is in unsuspecting Drogheda, next door to Reuven and wife Jeni’s *other* foodie show-stopper, the Eastern Seaboard Bar & Grill. Damn you, lucky residents of the Drog!

Though it opened only four weeks ago, Brown Hound Bakery is already causing a stir in this relatively quiet northeastern town. Rumour has it people line up in the mornings for BH’s fresh-fried pumpkin doughnuts and perfect coffee, a special blend made just for the bakery. So it was only natural to gather a group of Irish Foodies – cameras in tow – to take a look and investigate further, and last Saturday we met up with Reuven and Jeni for a first-hand tour of their new baby.

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