It’s one of the biggest prizes in Irish television history – €100,000 and getting your new food product on the shelves of over 140 Lidl stores.
And tonight on RTÉ One, after eight long weeks, Limerick’s Padraig McCarthy was declared The Taste of Success winner with his product – Irish Beef Short Ribs with a Pancetta and Cider Sauce.
Padraig had to abandon a glittering career as a chef to battle cancer. But his health problems didn’t end there. He’s now on kidney dialysis and was recently put on a transplant list. Winning The Taste of Success will change everything for him.
‘It’s fulfilled my passion to work with food,’ said Padraig. ‘It’s all I ever wanted to do. I never thought when I started this journey 7 months ago that I’d be here tonight. It’s amazing.’
Runner up Creagh Moore’s Health Potion product – a high protein, low fat Chicken Broth – ultimately lost out in the tense series finale which was broadcast tonight on RTÉ One. Creagh developed his product to help entice his mother to eat while she was receiving cancer treatment.
‘I’m very disappointed,’ said Creagh, ‘but I’m very proud of how far I’ve come. It’s a fantastic product and I can hold my head high.’
A stellar line up of TV culinary talent was recruited to judge, help and mentor the contestants who hailed from all over the country for the eight part RTÉ One series.
‘We wanted this to be an All-Ireland competition and we trawled the country for what’s out there,’ says TV chef Paul Flynn, who was The Taste of Success chief mentor.
So Fishy Fishy’s Martin Shanahan looked after Munster, Italian food expert Catherine Fulvio took charge of Leinster while Irish Times cookery writer Domini Kemp took care of Dublin and 5 Star Lough Erne Executive Chef Noel McMeel headed up Connaught/Ulster.
‘We got a huge response from people all over the country”, says Paul Flynn, “I was genuinely impressed with how innovative some of the products were.’
Colm Crowley, Head of Production, RTÉ Cork said ‘RTÉ are delighted with the reaction that Irish viewers have had to the first series of the Taste Of Success with an average of over 340,000* people tuning in to each of the first six episodes.’
Liam Casey Associate Director of Purchasing from Lidl says, “When we set out on this journey we wanted to find a really creative and innovative product for our shelves and we are fully confident, that in Padraig’s beef ribs, we have the right product. It tastes fantastic, is made with quality Irish beef and we have no doubt that this will be a fantastic addition to our Heat Eat and Enjoy range.”
-Ends-
Date: Tuesday 9 December 2014
Images available here: http://presspack.rte.ie/2014/12/09/limericks-padraig-mccarthy-wins-rte-ones-the-taste-of-success/
Further information: Fergus McCormack, RTÉ Television, 01 208 3117 / 086 8674751. Email: Fergus.mccormack@rte.ie
*Consolidated figures from Tam Ireland/Neilsen