Donal SkehanPop wannabe (23) and food writer talks to
Eoin Butlerabout music and meals
You have an unusual combination of careers, Donal. As well as being a food blogger and author, you’re also an aspiring pop star. Well, I’ve always loved music. But the performance side of things is a relatively recent development. My interest in food and my love of cooking, though, is something I’ve had all my life. My parents run a fruit and vegetable distribution service, so we always had a fridge full of fresh produce.
The conventional route would be to become a huge rock star, develop a debilitating drug habit, enter rehab ... and then write the healthy eating cookbook. But you’re coming at it the other way around. Yeah, it’s strange how it all happened. I signed on to do the book and shortly afterwards my band, Industry, took off.
The holiday season is over. People are feeling fat, bloated and remorseful. What would you recommend? My best healthy eating tip is to avoid combining protein with carbohydrates. If you’re having chicken or fish, have it with vegetables or a side salad. I find the best way to keep track of how well you’re eating is to keep a well stocked kitchen. That way, when you get home from work you have the ingredients there to put together a healthy meal, so you aren’t tempted to get a take-away.
For a lot of Irish men, putting a pizza in the oven and remembering to take it out before the house burns down is the best they can manage in the kitchen. That’s changing though. I think Jamie Oliver deserves a lot of the credit for that. He made cooking cool. I think there has been a cultural change, too. I don’t think there are many families left where the wife does all the cooking and the husband comes home expecting his dinner. The best feedback I got for the book has been from people who hadn’t cooked before but were inspired to get into the kitchen after reading it. That makes me very proud.
You mentioned keeping a well stocked kitchen. When I was a student, I was lucky if I could afford a tin of beans. When I moved into my apartment, the first thing I did was go out and stock up on the basics. I’m talking about good quality olive oil, balsamic vinegar and sea salt. It only costs about €50 to stock your pantry with the essentials. If you’re eating on a budget, the thing is to plan ahead. Don’t go into the shop and just throw things in a basket.
I have to ask you about Eurovision. You’ve been a huge fan all your life. Absolutely. But I’ve never been one to just go with the flow and, luckily, I had a partner in crime in my best friend Jonathan. I wasn’t completely alone in the whole thing!
You entered the National Song Contest last year. I put absolutely everything into my entry. I remember going to meet the composers and the choreographer in Sweden and trucking a big camera with me for my submission video. I did it all off my own bat and I think we ended up with a great final product.
What comes across in the submission video is the amount of hard work and research that went into your song. Just how disappointed were you to be beaten by a turkey? I think even Dustin himself would look back and say his entry might not have been the best option. It was the essence of how Irish people felt about Eurovision at the time. But I think it’s coming back around now. Because as much as Eurovision is a bit of fun, we do have a really great tradition of doing well in it. There’s no reason why someone shouldn’t stand up now and say ‘I’m going to put a really good song together and I’m going to do well for my country’. And maybe it took Dustin to do that.
