There’s a bit of a whiff of the good life going on here! And, we’re all for it.
When we first visited their cottage by the sea in Sutton, north Dublin, last year, Donal, Sofie, Noah (6) and Oliver (4) had only recently moved in and, the best-selling author, cook and TV presenter, was still in the early days planting and tending to what he called his “rudimentary” vegetable patch. But, this time when we return, their space – outside and in – feels more lived in; they’ve grown into it and it has grown around them.
Cruciferous vegetables have now been planted in another plot, this one closer to the wooden gate which opens out onto *this* sandy beach. Here they have their salad leaves growing, like kale, radicchio and kohlrabi. Also, the last of the summer tomatoes and the runner beans. We spot some courgettes too and pumpkins peeking out from beneath verdant leaves. Recently they’ve welcomed chickens into their brood, and, these lads, when not pecking at everybody’s feet, are busy laying an awful lot of eggs. The Skehans have scrambled eggs coming out of their ears, so, we all leave later (after a crazy beach day chasing kids, dogs and kites), with half a dozen eggs each, and our bellies full with chocolate brownies which had been smothered in whipped cream with literal cherries on top. You couldn’t write it but we just have.
We think it’s not at all ironic that when we first met Donal some twenty-odd years ago he was in a pop band called Industry. This fella was always going places; he was, and still is, an industrious soul, a self-employed, self-starter. What he has built is so impressive: the 11 cookbooks (a new one incoming next year), the countless TV shows (his new series Real Time Food starts on RTÉ One at the end of the month), the meal planning web platform (donalskitchen.com), the collab with Dunnes Stores and, at the end of this month, his own lifestyle brand, bringing his love for food and home together in a unique collection, inspired by the Irish coast.
A couple of days later we meet again, this time to talk about the chaos of kids, why he wrecks his own head and how he and Sofie are living their version of the good life…
Donal, this shoot was gorgeously wild! It was a real representation of your life right now – fair?!
I think we’re just in that “phase”! We have moments when Sofie and I go, “Does every parent of boys have the same vibe going on?”! It’s chaos! And literally, as I’m saying this, Oliver has just come in holding his nose! [Donal tends to Ollie, ‘You okay, what happened?’] I have no idea what happened to the nose, but yeah, we’re just in that chapter, and it’s the acceptance of it and the embracing of it; it’s the only way through, really, because if you try and fight it, you end up miserable.
Well, these boys are far from miserable! They are lucky lads growing up by the beach. You’re giving them such a wonderful and earthy start in life.
Aw, thanks! This is the life Sofie and I wanted. We have always wanted to grow vegetables and have chickens. I think it connects you to the greater world, too. To understand also where food comes from.
Must be so lovely to have your own fresh eggs, daily.
It is! We have six chickens now. We had others originally named after my favourite Eurovision winners! But they were sadly taken by a fox. We’ve learnt not to name the new flock, just in case we get too attached! There’s one remaining one from the original batch which the kids call Ziggy. I never thought I’d be such a chicken person but they all have their own personalities! Beyond the poop, they’re great to have.
While it may all sound idyllic, it is a normal chaotic family home. And it’s a small home. We’re sure people imagine you live in a mansion!
It is small! The funny thing is, we fell in love with the location, rather than the house. And, you know, we had the opportunity, when we were in COVID, to kind of experience a whole load of different houses on our journey to find this house. In the madness of four or five house moves it really forced us to go, “What do we want and what is special and important to us?” And even, though we knew what we were getting into with this house, we were really excited to see the evolution of it. Whatever way it evolves in the next few years, I’m so glad that we’ve had, particularly at the age the boys are at, this small chapter here.
You have a tangible link to this house too, don’t you?
My art teacher used to live here and I was so into art growing up. The fact that she had been such a fabulous mentor, and, that we ended up living here in her house, I really feel a sort of legacy that adds a bit of nostalgia too.
There is a whiff of the good life though to this whole set-up!
It may look a little like the good life, but realistically we still live a very busy life and I travel a good bit. But I think, in the midst of the madness, to be able to potter around in the garden, fix up whatever we grew during the week, it is the good life. But it’s our version of it, I guess.
In one of the shots we had Sofie styled in a bit of a trad wife look. But she is so far removed from that, isn’t she, Donal?!
Definitely very far removed from that! Sofie brings a Scandi approach to it all, that very sort of matter-of-fact approach to parenting, even to feeding the boys.
Who does the grocery shop?
Sofie does the grocery shopping, but I sometimes do the online order. And obviously, we have a very specific place we shop [Dunnes]! I’m really good at taking whatever’s in the fridge and turning it into something, whereas Sofie likes to shop for specific things and to have certain things in order for the lunchboxes. We have very different approaches, but they come together.
You’re big on the meal planning, sure you have a website all about it! But do you meal plan yourself?
I think what I would say is: we go through phases! [laughs] Like, there’ll be that back-to-school mode where you go full meal plan, maybe even Sunday batch cook! And then it goes by the wayside! Then Halloween mid-term will roll around, and
then it’ll be the back-to-school mode again! It’s the application and consistency that’s the problem. But we’re all human, we can’t be good all the time! [laughs]
Tell us, what ingredients are you pedantic about?
There are certain things that have to be really good quality, and one of them is olive oil. I am a stickler for a really good olive oil. There are things in the kitchen that if you spend good money on, the results are seen at the last moment. And extra virgin olive oil is one of those things that if you drizzle at the last moment, even on a soup or on chicken or whatever you’ve cooked, that with a little bit of sea salt is one of the finest things in the world. Also, having, a really good collection of what I call ‘flavour makers’. Because, at the core of it, despite all the cookbooks and TV shows, I am a lazy cook, so I want magic ingredients to make magic food. A good apple cider vinegar too, and never a cheap nonstick frying pan, there’s no love in that. I have a lovely, heavy-based French pan, and I’ve had it since Sofie and I started dating. And it’s the true test of buying good quality and getting use out of it, they’re lifetime pieces in the kitchen. So, between ingredients and equipment, those are the things I would spend money on.
New statistics tell us that families are not breaking bread together at the table like they used to and that many are eating dinner on the couch in front of their TV up to four times a week. Does that upset you a bit?
My mum was a stickler for us eating together growing up. And I think my love of food has come from that. I think eating together is important for a multitude of reasons, even from the social connection aspect, to sit down and break bread and talk about your day. I mean, you talk about the rising rates of depression, particularly with younger kids. And I think it is that sort of solitude you feel with the increase of technology. So I think as much as we can, it’s important to sit together and eat.
How do you manage to get the wild boys to sit?
We struggle, we fight, we coax! But we do try to sit. I always get asked for advice on kids eating, and I think having options on the table is the way. I tend not to deliver a finished plate to the table, I let them pick a bit of broccoli, or at a little bowl of raw dressed carrots. And then the main meal comes and they serve themselves. I do think there’s a control element to it and if they’re feeling that they’re deciding what they’re eating themselves, it works better.
We’re going to talk about your new lifestyle brand in a second, but first, are you fond of a tablescape?
Oh, I love a good tablescape but our table is a small canvas because our house is small, but still, I love it. I’ve always had that love for nostalgic elements that kind of flow into your kitchen. And one of those things is the kitchen table. I bought it at an auction when I was probably 22 and it has been with us since our first cottage, all the way through to now, and now the kids are doing their homework on it. It’s a really important piece in our house. When it comes to sitting down with family and friends, I love the process of setting the table. We’re a big fan of Fermoyle Pottery and Rosemarie Durr Pottery, also lovely linens with picked flowers from the garden. It’s not over the top, it’s very simple.
Okay, time now to tell us about this new venture, your very own lifestyle brand?
Years ago we had a magazine called Feast and what I loved about that was the opportunity to connect with these really passionate artisans and producers, and to be able to tell their stories. This new lifestyle brand is, I suppose, the sort of physical manifestation of that. It’s not just a food brand, it’s tableware, it could be linens, it could be stonewashed pottery, it could be a knife, it could be a frying pan. But I think in each case, it’s not en masse. It’s very much curated. It’s very much working with someone who’s passionate about what they do. We really want it to be led by the product. We want the product to be the story. The site will be live by the end of October and we’ll be delivering by November. I absolutely just loved coming up with the concept, the idea behind it, the colour palettes.
It’s interesting because there’s a real synergy between what you started out doing, and where you’ve wound up now. You’ve always been so visual. You did all the photography for your early cookbooks. You probably nearly taught yourself the cooking along the way, but it was everything else that came first.
I know, like both my grandparents were sculptors; I think I absorbed a lot by osmosis. I credit the fact that I could take my own food photography back in ‘00 with the reason why I’m talking to you today, it literally did give me the opportunity to showcase my work. Had I not had that, who knows where I would be now. So it definitely was a big aspect, but I’ve always been very project-based as well, very project-driven. And, you know, the cookbooks are a perfect example of it. I love coming up with the concept, the visuals, the mood boards, the whole nine yards. Sometimes I kind of go, ‘I wonder if I could just be the photographer’! I really love that side of it. And I think if I didn’t have that sort of creative side to what this work is, I don’t know that I would be as fulfilled as I am.
The pop band you were in all those years was called Industry. Funny because one word we would use to describe you is, “industrious”. You must recognise that in yourself, do you?
My granddad, on my dad’s side, had a fruit and veg shop on lower Dorset Street called Dorset Stores. He used to tell us these stories of how he used to put crap-looking stuff beside really nice veggies, and charge double the price! And how he used to get two boxes of apples and get us kids to polish one box of apples and put them side by side with the other unpolished apples and sell the shined ones for twice the price! My mum and dad were, and still are, entrepreneurial, too. They’ve run a successful business [Freshcut Foods] for the last 40 years. That work ethic definitely has been passed down through the generations. I do remember as a kid, giving out, and asking my dad to come play with us. But he was busy. He was always busy. And there was always something going on, even on holidays I remember my dad having to go to the payphone in a little village in France to check back on the business to see how it was going. So it was certainly something that we grew up with.
Okay, the TV show, Real Time Recipes, tell us all….
It’s eight episodes this year and eight episodes next year, along with a new book.
What about the concept? We know you love a good concept!
Well, they are almost always kind of semi-autobiographical in the sense that it comes from my needs and from where we’re at as a family. So, the whole concept is countertop cooking. There’s no marinating, no resting. It’s literally, step into the kitchen, you have your ingredients and you’re cooking all the way through. And we’re making use of things like the airfryer that just adds that layer of convenience, and you’re not having to put on the oven at all. I know, especially with kids, that there is a need for really fast but good food. And I think that’s what I tried to nail with this series. One of my books was called Meals in Minutes, and it’s very much the essence of that. It’s literally going to have your dinner on the table in 30 minutes.
So many online foodies share viral videos these days, which you do too, on Instagram and on YouTube. Do you worry that there won’t be a place for TV cookery shows and books soon?
We all know the doom scrolling that goes on at 10 o’clock at night when we’re meant to be going to bed! But I am finding more than ever that I will take solace in picking up a cookbook or flopping in front of the TV, just because I am fed up looking at the bloody phone! I get a lot of people who go, “I love watching your show but I don’t cook”… the food genre, the TV cooking genre, is something that’s almost comforting and nostalgic and really just kind of a switch off more than anything. I think we need it.
So, godfather to Arthur Gourounlian and Brian Dowling’s baby Blu, oh my gosh! Did that come as a surprise?
It did! Obviously, we’ve such a connection with the guys from Los Angeles and we followed their journey with Blake and we knew Aoife, Brian’s sister and their surrogate, long before she was as well known as she is today. It’s such a lovely journey to have seen them go on and I couldn’t be more proud to be asked to be godfather to Blu now. It’s big shoes to fill! Simon and Pippa did the first round, myself and Aoife now.
Does 4-month-old Blu make you broody at all?
Absolutely not! You came and visited our house, you have seen what I’m dealing with! That broody feeling left me a while ago! But I have to admit when Blu came over for a visit I saw Sofie holding her and she had a broody look in her eyes! I saw the glint! [laughing]
Uh-oh, the glint! Despite the chaos in your life Donal, you are fairly chill. What wrecks your head?
Well, where do we start?! I wreck my own head, mostly! I can’t sit still, I constantly have to be coming up with plans which wrecks Sofie’s head too! Because I am obsessive about things and because I like to see a project through, I can get too intensely involved and I have to be mindful of that.
We’re gonna leave you in peace now but tell us before we go, what’s for dinner?
The fridge is teeming with leftovers so I’ve just had spiced pork with beans and lentils for lunch, and for dinner it’s a tomato-based pasta. And, a Negroni for me!
