Chef Nico Reynolds: ‘I've been spat on, jeered and beaten up, but I don't think Ireland is a racist country'
I began playing around with food from a young age. Growing up in Sandymount in Dublin, my house was where my friends and I would hang out and eat fried chicken, but it was more about bringing people together than the food itself. I didn't grow up in a big family – my mum died when I was 10 so it was just me and my dad – and I think the company was something I craved deep down.
At 22, I travelled to South America. I had originally planned to do the classic year away in Australia, but I wanted something more open-ended. I travelled first to Buenos Aires and about three days into the trip, I thought, you know what, this could be me. I don't know many places in the world where you could be having a conversation with someone in a bar, park or cafe one minute and then be meeting their extended family for an asado (barbecue) the next. I stayed in South America for six years, visiting Uruguay, Colombia, El Salvador and Brazil.
I began hosting supper clubs and pop-ups and people just kept coming back. Food was a way of honouring a part of my heritage. I've never considered myself as anything other than an Irishman, but there is another side to my history, and cooking seemed like the best way to honour that. My grandmother used to visit us in Ireland from Jamaica, and she'd arrive with this flavour of food that awakened something in me. She cooked Jamaican beef patties, salt fish fingers and rice and peas, and she'd bring bottles of hot sauce that would last for months. Those flavours remained in the house after she'd left.
I like to mix a bit of Jamaican with a bit of Irish, like Jamaican shepherd's pie or salt fish and chips. I wouldn't describe my food as fusion; people throw that word around a lot. It sounds very mechanical, and when you see a word like that slapped on a pizza box, it loses all meaning. I've never tried to describe my food as anything other than Caribbean cooking via Ireland.
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It's a big bad world out there; I've been spat on, called everything, jeered and beaten up, but I've never had any perception of Ireland as a racist country. I believe if the only thing you have in your hand is a hammer, everything will look like a nail. If you think everyone is out to get you, they will be. You create your own reality. You've got to stay positive.
It's a shame to watch Dublin decline. We should have a sense of pride in our capital city
I think I got my outlook from my grandmother and from my dad. I couldn't be happier that he's my father. When I think of everything he's done for me, getting me to where I am today ... We both went through my mother's death together so there's always been an emotional understanding between us. I have a lot of great memories of trips to Italy with him, and of driving to Roscommon, where he's from. When I was young, I didn't enjoy spending time there as much as I do now, but it's a nice thing to walk the path of your ancestral land.
I live in London these days and moving home isn't on the cards right now. I fall in and out of love with Dublin. It must be the only city in Europe that doesn't have a public transport system connecting to the airport and it's been culturally castrated over the past eight or nine years. Nightlife has fallen off and small restaurants are closing – like Borza's chipper on Sandymount Green, which was always the taste of home for me. What do you do in Dublin if you don't drink?
It's a shame to watch Dublin decline. We should have a sense of pride in our capital city. There have been investment decisions to 'glass up' the soul of the city with hotels and office blocks, but a neglected city will wither away, especially when city planning becomes about short-term profit and short-term business interests. But Ireland is still one of the best places I've lived. We're a nation of moaners and sometimes we don't know how good we have it.
I used to think I'd hate to live in London, but when I moved over I thought, yeah, I get it now. I love to just walk around the city. I do a lot of bits on TV, food media in whatever form that takes, pop-ups and events. I'll be busy for three or four months and then immediately afterwards I panic.
London is not forever, but it's good for me right now.
In conversation with Marie Kelly. This interview, part of a
series
, has been edited for length and clarity
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