Food & Drink
The food at Ballyvolane House is best described as country house style — generous, seasonal, and deeply rooted in place. Everything is meticulously prepared by our House Chef, who crafts daily menus featuring comforting roasts, fresh and saltwater fish, and game in season, all supported by home-grown vegetables and fruit from the walled garden.
We are fully committed to a Climate Conscious Food ethos — making thoughtful food choices with sustainability in mind. This means understanding where our food comes from, how it’s grown, and choosing options with the lowest possible carbon footprint. We consider not only packaging but also farming methods, production practices, and animal welfare.
Locally Sourced Slow Food
We try to use ingredients from here — from Ballyvolane’s walled-garden, farm, river, and the local area. Our rare-breed pigs are reared on the estate, and we’re fortunate to be in the heart of County Cork, surrounded by some of Ireland’s finest artisan food producers.
Our beef, lamb, and mutton come from Fitzgerald Butchers in Fermoy. Fish and shellfish is supplied fresh from O’Connell’s Seafood in Cork’s English Market and from Ballycotton Seafood in Midleton. Pork products — bacon and black and white puddings — are sourced from Caherbeg Free Range Pork Ltd in Rosscarbery — sausages are from O’Flynn’s Gourmet Sausage Company. We serve artisan cheeses from across Cork, Waterford, and Tipperary (with the occasional gem from France), and smoked fish from the brilliant Frank Hederman.
From the Walled-Garden
Justin’s father, Jeremy, grows an astonishing variety of vegetables in the old walled garden — a true labour of love. You’ll find everything from sea kale, Tuscan kale, asparagus, and globe artichokes to heritage potatoes, salad leaves, spinach, courgettes, chard, cabbages, beetroot, and Jerusalem artichokes.
Seasonal fruit includes loganberries, figs, pears, apples, and raspberries, while the greenhouse produces cucumbers, chillies, and tomatoes. Our orchards are abundant each autumn, providing fruit for our own pressed apple juice and ingredients for Bertha’s Revenge Gin infusions, including sloes, damsons, and crab apples.
Foraging and the Wild Larder
We are enthusiastic foragers, and much of what we serve is gathered from the estate and its surroundings. In spring and summer, you might find wild garlic, wood sorrel, lady’s smock, hairy bittercress, meadowsweet, and elderflower on the menu; in autumn, wild mushrooms, damsons, sloes, blackberries, and elderberries feature prominently.
From the nearby seashore, we gather rock samphire, sea rocket, and sea spinach when in season. Feathered and furred game, appear on the menu when the season allows.
Homemade Goodness
All our breads, pastries, and cakes are baked in-house. We make our own jams and marmalades. Guests enjoy complimentary homemade elderflower cordial, or our own version of Ribena, and a jar of chocolate biscuits in their rooms.
Our menus change daily, shaped by the seasons, the weather, and what’s best from the garden or the river that day. We’re always happy to accommodate special dietary requirements, and high tea and children’s menus are available for younger guests.
Dinner
Evenings at Ballyvolane House are wonderfully relaxed and sociable. Each night at 7:30pm, we serve a four-course tasting menu in the grand dining room, celebrating the best seasonal and local produce. We’re happy to cater for all dietary requirements.
Whether you prefer to join fellow guests for communal dining or enjoy a table to yourselves, dinner at Ballyvolane House is at the heart of the experience — a delicious ritual not to be missed.
View some sample dinner menus here (PDF) ›
Pre-Dinner Cocktails
Bertha’s Revenge Gin – A Ballyvolane Story
Bertha’s Revenge Gin was born at Ballyvolane House, distilled in small batches in our farmyard distillery. Named after Bertha, the world’s oldest cow, this award-winning gin blends Irish whey spirit, our own spring water, and locally and sustainably sourced botanicals for a flavour that’s is much loved and playful as its story.
After ten unforgettable years of creativity, triumphs, disasters, giggles, and tears, the distillery closed in the summer of 2025. We are actively looking for a new owner for Bertha’s Revenge Gin and we are hopeful that Bertha may live on under new stewardship, but Ballyvolane will no longer be its home.
We do have plenty of stock stashed away in our cellar and pre-dinner cocktails feature Bertha, ensuring her spirit — and ours — lives on in every bottle.
Wines
We have an extensive and eclectic selection of wines available and we have gone to a great deal of trouble to select high quality wines offering excellent value for money.
View our Red Wines here (PDF) ›
View our White Wines here (PDF) ›
View our Champagne and Sweet Wine here (PDF)
A Hearty Breakfast
Breakfast is available in the dining room from 8am until 11:30am – ‘The Full Monty’ or continental.
Picnic Lunch
Picnics can taken with you on day trips or can be eaten in the house or on the grounds, advance booking is required. We do not offer a sit-down lunch option at Ballyvolane.
Afternoon Treats
Residents can enjoy our selection of loose leaf tea, herbal infusions, homemade cakes which can be enjoyed in the hall, drawing room or, weather permitting, out in the garden.