In July a dish from a restaurant overlooking Clonakilty Bay made it on to Michelin’s radar – not for fireworks, foam or a flashy chef, but for restraint. “Galley Head lobster, tomato water, garden herbs” was named Dish of the Month, singled out for the quality of the produce and how harmoniously the dish was constructed. Lobster landed 20 minutes away from Adrift, the restaurant in Dunmore House, was cooked gently. The meaty tail and sweet tender claw were displayed simply in a large white dish, topped with fragrant herbs from the organic garden, and a clear tomato water with just the right cut of acidity was poured tableside. The dish reads simply because it is. I had the same dish shortly before the inspectors rocked up. And I am in complete agreement with their assessment.
I had never been to Dunmore House, which is now being run by Peter Barrett, the fourth generation of his family to do so. I soon discovered that underpinning every dish on the menu at Adrift – the salad leaves, heritage carrots and floury new potatoes – is the Ocean Garden that runs the length of a sea-facing bluff below the hotel. It is impressive and beautiful. Everything is organic, most of it from seed, and fed with stable manure from the hotel’s own horses.
You can dine more casually at Boatshed Pizza on the Sea Terrace overlooking Clonakilty Bay, where you’ll find the most coveted outdoor tables in the country. Both restaurants are open to non-residents, which I sense is not widely known.
On our way to Dunmore House, we had of course made a few stops along the way. First, if you’re going east to west, is Courtmacsherry sitting on the river Arigideen, where you’ll find The Lifeboat Inn. Owners David O’Halloran and Martin Buckley have made it TikTok famous, documenting their renovation. Here you’ll find unfussy food with a focus on locally landed fish and seafood.
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Heading west brings you to Clonakilty, home to the Clonakilty Blackpudding Visitor Centre and the Clonakilty Distillery Visitor Experience, where a two-hour class lets you make and take home your own gin. Stop into Pike Deli for sourdough bread and pastries. Scannells Bar is worth a stop for fish and chips, scampi and other bar food. De Barra’s is the town’s hub for folk and traditional music – recently named by Lonely Planet in its “Best in Travel 2025” list, which placed it in the world’s top 10 music venues in the “Following the Music” category.
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If you’re in Skibbereen on a Saturday, head for the farmer’s market. Grab a coffee from O’Neill Coffee, or sit down at Riverside – run by sisters-in-law Cliodhna and Sandrine McCarthy – for a slice of tart with your cup. Stalls brim with Lisheen Greens’ organic fruit and vegetables, Gubbeen cheese and charcuterie, fresh fish, meats, bread, eggs, honey, and local art and crafts.
Following the shoreline beyond Dunmore House, Fish Basket on Long Strand Beach is a stunning place for lunch. With a bunch of picnic tables looking out at the waves, it’s the perfect place to eat Peter and Elaine Shanahan’s top-tier fish and chips and fish tacos.
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From here, the road to Baltimore runs low and green – past fields and tree-lined bends where light cuts through the canopy. On clear days the sea flashes into view before vanishing behind stone walls and hedgerows.
On a sunny day in Baltimore, you’ll be lucky to get a seat outside Bushe’s Bar. If you’ve planned ahead, you’ll have booked dinner at Baba’de, Ahmet Dede and Maria Archer’s casual follow-up to their Michelin two-star restaurant, Dede. It serves Turkish street food alongside fine-dining-level plates: an içli köfte layered with lamb ragout and yoghurt foam, an Adana kebab on charred flatbread, cheffy compositions such as squid erişte in whipped roast-pepper velouté, and simple hits such as hummus with sourdough. The 30-seat room in the old Mews site, with wines from €35, runs on a two-star prep kitchen turning out late-night classics and tasting-menu throwbacks with the same precision.
For a special occasion, book Dede – now with a smart enclosed outdoor area and, in warm weather, a terrace for pre-dinner drinks.
Before you head to Ballydehob, take the road to Union Hall, where you’ll find Glenmar Seafood, which has a retail shop as well as a large processing facility. What should you get? The local daily catch, of course, which may include lobster, megrim, monkfish or white sole.
Continuing west is the small but vibrant town of Ballydehob, where one-Michelin-star Chestnut balances the energy of Levis Corner House, one of Ireland’s top pubs. The default stout here begins with an “M”, and it’s cash only. Run by Joe O’Leary and his partner, Caroline O’Donnell – O’Leary took over from his mother and grand-aunt, Nell and Julia Levis – the pub has always been in the same family. It’s a celebrated music venue, often hosting surprise big-name acts, and in summer welcomes food-truck pop-ups such as Spice Genie Caitlin Ruth and Doxy & Dann.
For a casual bite, Budd’s across the street is a bright, relaxed cafe-deli run by Emma and Jamie Budd since 2015, serving daily specials alongside staples such as quiche. Bread is baked in-house, including a standout buttermilk soda loaf, and there’s strong vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free cooking. Claire Arnold of Lennox Street Grocers in Portobello ran a summer pop-up in the former Yay! Burger premises but has since wound it down. Ballydehob always has something on – I’ve seen Halloween here in full pagan glory and St Patrick’s Day parades with St Patrick himself putting in an appearance.
Rob Krawczyk and Elaine Fleming opened the Chestnut in 2018, and won the Michelin star the following year. The €120 tasting menu is the headline, but the €75 four-course at 5.45pm is the canny way in – starting with their brown soda bread and house-smoked cultured butter.
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From there, chilled native crab came with broad bean salsa, garden herbs and nasturtiums, with a smoked mackerel royale alongside – rich and direct against the crab’s freshness. An egg baked in brown butter followed, its yolk soft, lifted with citrus and trout roe, the sauce vivid with chives and flanked by seaweed-cooked potatoes. Then a golden-crusted fish cake, loose-crumbed and folded with tarragon and chive. Dessert was pared back to vinegared strawberries over cultured cream and yoghurt, just sweet enough to keep their edge.
Accommodation in Ballydehob itself is in short supply, but more recently, Native opened, a high-end, design-led accommodation just a one-minute walk from the village. It was founded by Didi and Simon Ronan and offers Irish-made luxury with a focus on local materials, including a guest house, garden suites and communal spaces.
I based myself in the recently refurbished Schull Harbour Hotel, which is owned by the Blue Haven Collection. Their ambitious new restaurant, Alaria, helmed by chef Ciaran Tedford, is focused on fish. The menu includes Roaringwater Bay oysters, west Cork scallops with Gubbeen, black sole, and specials such as lobster with fregola. For something more casual, there’s The Gracie Blu Bar with its enviable outside dining area. The menu here is straightforward and has broad appeal with chowder, chicken wings, fish and chips, burgers and steak options.
The Country Market on Sundays remains a huge draw, with families heading into the hot food stalls – crepes, burgers, falafel and lobster rolls – Gubbeen cheese and charcuterie, Belted Galloway organic beef, local honey and organic vegetable growers such as Crooked Boot Farm.
As we head west out of Schull towards Mizen Head, the weather is clear, with a solid blue sky and the occasional white cloud, lighting up the pale rock and intensifying the contrast with the green surroundings. The terrain becomes rockier and more open, with hillsides dotted with limestone, heather carpeting patches of ground, and the occasional gorse beginning to bloom in yellow beneath it. Black mineral markings in the stone are visible in places,
The sea views along this part of the drive are striking, with long coastal stretches and clear water.
At O’Sullivan’s Bar in Crookhaven, I will never tire of their wonderful crab sandwiches. It’s such a joy to have lunch and an outside table by the harbour. For a more extensive menu, particularly for families, Nottage’s is a popular spot.
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North of Schull, heading out on the Sheep’s Head peninsula, you’ll pass Arundel’s by the Pier, Tom and Michael Moloney’s pub, in Ahakista. It has a hugely atmospheric bar, where you’re likely to find a trad session in full flow downstairs, while upstairs is a smart diningroom with a broad accessible menu.
Farther north still, back from the Sheep’s Head peninsula and then north from Bantry, is Manning’s in Ballylickey. It’s a deli, wine shop and restaurant where you can order anything from their very good toasties – Durrus cheese, Gubbeen, ham and caramelised onion – to their evening tapas, Thursday to Saturday.
If you’re covering off the peninsulas with intent, you may find yourself in Durrus, at the head of Dunmanus Bay, where the Sheep’s Head and Mizen Head peninsulas meet. Here you’ll find, not just a good cheese shop, but great pizzas at family-run Cent’ Anni pizza.
By the time you reach the end of the Mizen, the map feels finished – nothing ahead but ocean. You could turn back, but the pull of one last stop is hard to resist. Sally Barnes’s Woodcock Smokery is tucked into the wilds of Gortbrack, where she has built The Keep – a semi-outdoor space for masterclasses, coastal foraging and skill-sharing events. Everything ends with a table laid in the open air, her smoked fish in the centre, and the best of west Cork gathered around it. It’s the sort of place that reminds you why you came all this way – and why you’ll start plotting the next trip before you’ve even left.
Past the last villages, the road threads between stonewalled fields and crooked signs pointing to nameless harbours. Atlantic light pools in hollows, flashes off wet rock, and slides across the water. The sea is a vivid, deep blue; small lanes drop into coves where fishing boats knock against the pier. Along the verges, purple wildflowers grow between ferns and sprays of white woodruff, sweet-scented in the warm air. It’s a patchwork – rock, heather, blossom – stitched together by salt and wind.
September is when this coast is at its best. The pace drops and the tables are easier to come by – from a barstool in Baltimore to a seat in Adrift’s calm, glass-fronted diningroom. The light over Clonakilty Bay turns the water silver as the Galley Head lobster arrives – the same dish that caught Michelin’s eye. Tail, claw, herbs and tomato water. A reminder that simplicity, done right, travels farther than any season.
Corinna Hardgrave was a guest of Dunmore House Hotel and the Schull Harbour Hotel
West Cork notebook
- Dunmore House, Clonakilty, P85 HC03; dunmorehousehotel.ie
- Boatshed Pizza, Clonakilty, P85 HC03; dunmorehousehotel.ie/sea-terrace
- The Lifeboat Inn, Main Street, Courtmacsherry; lifeboatinn.ie
- Clonakilty Blackpudding Visitor Centre, Western Road, Clonakilty, P85 V966; clonakiltyblackpudding.ie/visitor-centre
- Clonakilty Distillery Visitor Experience, The Waterfront, Clonakilty, P85 N403; visitclonakiltydistillery.ie
- Pike Deli, 22 Connolly Street, Clonakilty. instagram.com/pike.deli
- Scannells Bar, 5 Connolly Street, Clonakilty, P85 FE48; scannells.ie
- De Barra’s Folk Club, 55 Pearse Street, Clonakilty; debarra.ie
- The Fairfield (Skibbereen Market), Bridge Street, Skibbereen, P81 TH68
- O’Neill Coffee, 64 Townshend St, Skibbereen; oneillcoffee.ie
- Riverside Café & Restaurant, North Street, Skibbereen; riversideskibbereen.ie/
- The Fish Basket, Long Strand Beach, Castlefreke, Clonakilty; thefishbasket.ie
- Bushes Bar, Baltimore, P81 F623; bushesbar.com
- Baba’de, The Mews, Baltimore, P81 TC64; babade.ie
- Dede Restaurant, Baltimore, P81 K291; customshousebaltimore.com
- Glenmar Shellfish, Main Street, Ballincolla, Union Hall, P81 X272; glenmarshellfish.com/fish-shops
- Levis Corner House, Main Street, Ballydehob; leviscornerhouse.com
- Budds, Main Street, Ballydehob, P81 HP92; budds.ie
- The Chestnut Tree, Staball Hill, Ballydehob, P81 X681; restaurantchestnutwestcork.ie
- Schull Harbour Hotel, Main Street, Schull; schullharbourhotel.ie
- Schull Country Market, Pier Road Car Park, Pier Road, Schull; schullmarket.ie
- O’Sullivan’s Bar, Crookhaven; osullivanscrookhaven.ie
- Nottage’s Bar & Restaurant, Crookhaven, P81 T883; nottages.ie
- Arundels By The Pier, Reenacappul, Ahakista, Co Cork; arundelsbythepier.com
- Manning’s Emporium, Ballylickey, Bantry, P75 CX86; manningsemporium.ie
- Cent’ Anni Pizza, Mainstreet, Carrigboy, Durrus, P75 AW08; instagram.com/centanni_durrus
