Denis Cotter

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The world of cheffing is obsessed with hierarchies, and competitiveness, the race to be “the best”. Hierarchies are irrelevant, and competition is dumb. What counts is originality and creativity, and on that score, Denis Cotter of Café Paradiso is tops. His cooking is not like anyone else's, and no one has ever managed to replicate what he does. Many chefs have worked with him and made his food, but away from CP they revert to convention, whilst Cotter has never even come close to convention. His brand of meat-free cooking has evolved from another way of thinking about food and cooking.

Fortunately for us all, Cotter has the intellect to explain what he does and why he does it, and has done so in three of the finest volumes ever written by a working cook. So, the domestic cook can get close to CP food, but close is no cigar, so Café Paradiso remains the most unique of Irish – and European – restaurants: you cannot get food like this anywhere else. Cotter cites Deborah Madison's ground-breaking work at the Greens restaurant in San Francisco as being amongst his primary influences, and Ms Madison's sparky, contrary, left-field intelligence matches Cotter's own. Cork is lucky to have had him at the stoves since 1993: in San Francisco, he would be a legend.

Cafe Paradiso, Lancaster Quay, Cork,  
021 427 7939
http://www.cafeparadiso.ie