Kinsale, the Food Town

Kinsale is a small harbour town south of Cork city that built a food reputation from the 1970s, when a group of its kitchens began promoting themselves together and the phrase gourmet capital stuck to the place. The reputation has outlived the era that created it, partly on merit: the town sits beside a working fishing harbour, west Cork producers are a short drive up the road, and the density of kitchens in a town this small remains unusual for Ireland. A gourmet festival in October is the fixed point of the food year. The town itself is narrow-laned and steeply built, painted in strong colours, and walkable end to end in twenty minutes.

What you actually see

• The harbour - a working fishing and sailing port at the mouth of the Bandon.
• The October festival - the gourmet weekend the town's food calendar is built on.
• West Cork produce - cheese, fish and beef from the country immediately west.
• The painted lanes - narrow streets of strongly coloured houses above the water.

When to go

May to September for the town at full strength, with the harbour busy and everything open. October brings the gourmet festival and better value than high summer. From November to March many kitchens close or drop to weekends, and the town is genuinely quiet. Book tables well ahead at summer weekends; the good ones fill weeks out.

Honest expectations

It is expensive, and the gourmet reputation is now several decades old, with other Irish towns quietly matching it. In summer the streets fill with coach visitors and the harbour car parks are gone by mid-morning. In winter half the town is shut. It is a weekend rather than a week, and there is little to do beyond eating and walking.

Nearby

Cork city is half an hour north; the west Cork coast road starts here.