It’s fair to say that McCormack Family Farm are no strangers to innovation. They started out growing vegetables and trading at Dublin’s Fruit and Vegetable Market in the early 1980s, and later diversified into growing herbs and baby salad leaves.
Last year saw the first harvest of Organic Irish Spinach at their farm in Kiltale, while 2023 brings news of their involvement in an exciting new development that sees the Japanese plant Wasabi grown commercially here in Ireland for the first time.
In a unique collaboration, McCormacks worked closely with plant-based food and crop development specialists Beotanics, to secure a supply of a sustainably grown strain of wasabi from Japanese breeding lines, which were developed to be suitable for the Irish climate.
Picture by Shane O’Neill, Coalesce.
The initiative, which took many years to get right, means that the distinctive Japanese plant will now be available from a sustainable, and quality local source for use in Irish restaurants.
The plant is generally regarded as notoriously difficult to grow, so an understandably proud Stephen McCormack is delighted to finally bring it to market here. We can’t wait to see it grace the plates of restaurants across the city.
