Culinary director of FoodSpace and kitchen sustainability advocate, Conor Spacey has been announced the 2024 Blas na hÉireann (The Irish Food Awards) Producers’ Champion.
Spacey has been involved in the food industry for over 34 years, having worked across Ireland and the UK in bistros and bars, hotels, banqueting and fine dining. He is also an industry leader in zero-waste kitchens.
For the past eight years, he has been the culinary director of FoodSpace, an award-winning and sustainable on-site food service and hospitality management company with over 20 locations throughout Ireland and the UK.
Blas na hÉireann Producers’ Champion
The Producers’ Champion is selected annually by Blas na hÉireann producers based on a survey that goes out to the entire Blas network which covers every county in Ireland with producers from all across the food industry.
Producers were asked earlier this year to nominate those who they believe are representing and supporting their produce and that of other Irish food makers and growers in an effective and helpful way.
“To be nominated by a group of food and drink producers who understand the importance of what I’m doing makes me even more proud to win this award. Thank you to all the producers and industry folk who strive to do better,” Spacey said.
Founder and chair of Blas na hÉireann, Artie Clifford said Spacey’s “determination to change the way we talk about food, consume it, and work with it to leave our planet a better and happier one, is inspiring”.
He now joins the Blas na hÉireann Producers’ Champions roster which includes Simon Coveney TD, Neven Maguire, John and Sally McKenna, Shane McArdle, Kai’s Jess Murphy, Darina Allen, Rory O’Connell, Rachel Allen, Brian McDermott, and 2023 winner Kate Ryan.
The closing date for entries to Blas na hÉireann 2024 is Thursday, May 16. Judging at University College Cork (UCC) will take place in June/July and finalists will be notified by mid-August. Blas na hÉireann 2024 awards will be presented in early October.
Conor Spacey
Spacey told Agriland that he never planned on being a chef. Emigrating to the UK at the age of 16, he got a job in a hotel washing pots. Amazed by the “buzz” in the kitchen, he quickly became keen to learn how to cook.
“It was a passion I didn’t realise, at the time, that I had. I just fell in love with food and everything about food and that got me more interested in what real food is like,” the 2024 Producers’ Champion said.
Growing up, Spacey said there was no food being wasted in his parents’ kitchen. It wasn’t until he first entered the food industry when he realised the vast amount of food waste generated in kitchens, restaurants and hotels.
“It blew my mind and I couldn’t understand why this was happening,” he said. From starting out as a junior chef, Spacey said that his experience over the years eventually allowed him to decide what is on the menu and where the food is sourced from.
“I thought now is an opportunity to showcase how you can create lovely dishes, lovely food without wasting anything and how you can turn food that is perceived as waste into lovely dishes.”
Spacey believes that consumers do not understand how much work happens before food reaches supermarket shelves. He wants to bridge that “gap” and make consumers aware of where food comes from and how it is produced.
This is also what FoodSpace is about. The company’s first contract-catering kitchen opened in Donegal nine years ago. Starting from scratch, the culinary director said it was really about supporting the food producers in the locality.
Spacey’s latest project is building a sustainable cookery school in Gambia, creating a circular economy within the villages, training people in the hospitality industry, and creating employment across the entire food system.
The idea is to teach people cookery and hospitality skills which can help them find employment and exit poverty which is present in the country, he said. The ambition is to open the school by the end of the year, starting off with 40-50 students.
Spacey said the project will be based on African cuisine and culture with food being grown at the school and sourced from local villages. The school will be a forerunner for further potential cookery schools in other African countries and India, he said.
He recently collaborated with Chef’s Manifesto, a global network of chefs driving action for a sustainable food system, and with the United Nations on their sustainable development goals for the global food system.
In July last year, Spacey published his first book ‘Wasted’ with recipes based on the three most wasted food items in Ireland, but also across Europe and most of the developed world – vegetables, bread and dairy.