Ballymaloe Sauces Cross the Pond

by Maria Yagoda

          I knew that dismissing Irish food was obvious and slightly obnoxious, but I just couldn’t help it. Before my weeklong romp in Dublin last fall, I made sure to prepare myself for excruciatingly boring moments at the table, expecting boiled meats and uninspired iterations of potato. So I was surprised, on arriving in Ireland, to find a vibrant food scene with an earnest and oh-so-familiar farm-to-table ethos. Even in drug stores, I’d see chips, yogurts, and chocolate bars that had packages with clearly labeled pedigree --  name of the town, even the farm, where the ingredients originated.

Tomato relish jazzes up rare steak on wild greens and toast.

          Ballymaloe, an Irish, family-run peddler of mostly-jarred food condiments, considers itself a stalwart of the Irish food renaissance. Their most famous creation is Country Relish -- a rich, chutney-like tomato sauce that peps up burgers, roasted meats, and cheese. But their story begins in the 17th century when the Ballymaloe House was first constructed around a crumbling Norman castle in the Cork countryside. In 1964, Ivan and Myrtle Allen opened a restaurant at Ballymaloe, and three decades later, their daughter, Yasmine Hyde, began marketing their signature sauce. The family’s product roster has since expanded and made the trek across the Atlantic, popping up in stores such as Fairway, Dean & Deluca, and The Food Emporium.

          Ballymalloe reps showed up recently at Murray's Cheese Shop to woo the press and fromageophiles. Murray’s is expecting a shipment of their sauces in the near future.

Jalapeño pepper relish is sweet and tangy, though lacking in heat.

          The jalapeño pepper relish, a variation on their original sauce, is sweeter and spicier though hardly torrid enough for a Srirarcha fanatic like myself. I get a sense that the Irish lack a 21st century understanding of heat. Their ketchup with chilies is about as spicy as an airplane Bloody Mary -- which is to say, not at all. So I’ll stick to their phenomenal stout ketchup, a rich and thick, slightly smoky mix that consistently adds pow to my French fries.

Much to my surprise, mint jelly works, in delicate doses, on a lamb meatball.

          The ketchups and relishes are all very sweet, and may be too sweet for many American palates. I’d say dab just a bit of the sweet mint stuff on a burger or a meatball. Or balance the sweet by dribbling a bit of their jalapeño pepper relish or cranberry sauce on some warmed Brie or Camembert. Or, go full Irish with a buttery, melt-y grilled cheese stuffed with Irish cheddar and a thin smear of stout ketchup.