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Aisling Kelly Hunter studied Business & Tourism before travelling to San Francisco to see the sights and build up her hospitality skills. During her time abroad, Aisling gained invaluable experience in everything from front of house to organising group travel and educational tours.
In 2014 she returned to her roots, settling in her hometown of Sligo and opening a café named WB’s Coffee House, located on the premises of her family’s former pub, The Punchbowl, opened by her father, Kevin, in 1968. It was when Aisling met her now husband, Glenn — an oyster farmer — that she was first introduced to Sligo Bay Oysters and it is from there that she developed her love of seafood.
After almost four years in business running the café and, bringing all her experience on a professional level and her personal connections together, Aisling developed the Sligo Oyster Experience in 2018 having spotted an opportunity to carve out a niche in the market. Here, she shares her life in food…
Oysters, of course! I am not a chef, so serving our oysters, raw or cooked with different dressings is fun and I really enjoy sharing Sligo’s history with oysters. Sligo, or Sligeach in Irish, means ‘abounding in shells’, and shellfish is one of the reasons that over 6,000 years ago, people began settling in Sligo; because there was abundant food in the form of oysters, cockles, mussels, crab, and lobster. The process of shucking them adds a bit of theatre to the evening.
Neven Maguire. I was fortunate to appear on his Seafood Trails show, and he’s such a wonderful person. I find his cookbooks are very easy to follow when I want to whip up something special.
Oysters to start with Scarlet For Yer Ma hot sauce, and then surf and turf washed down with a glass of Chablis.
Pepperoni pizza.
Scrambled eggs. It’s easy, and I would add some spring onions or tomatoes. It’s delicious.
I know I am Irish, but I’m not a fan of butter. I know it’s in a lot of dishes, and I can handle it if it’s subtle, but if it’s obvious — definitely no!
A full Irish breakfast, complete with local Sherlock’s Butchers meats.
Savoury.
It depends on the occasion — I enjoy both!
Anywhere that serves top-quality shellfish is my idea of heaven, like Fish and Bean in the seaside village of Rosses Point.
Absolutely. The hospitality industry is facing significant challenges, especially with rising operational costs. Stability is needed to help businesses thrive again.
I recently collaborated with Santina Kennedy on a pairing at the Taste of Sligo food festival, where we matched our oysters with Drumshanbo pot still whiskey, and Coolattin Cheddar from Wicklow, which was voted the best cheese in the world. Santina was a wealth of knowledge, and her passion for Irish food was evident in every dish she prepared. I also learnt about many other Irish products such as Mic’s Chilli hot sauces and the gorgeous whiskey glass produced by Tuath Glass.
My husband’s mother, Violet Hunter, is always experimenting with new recipes from magazines or TV shows. Visiting her is always an adventure — one day it’s homemade gin, the next it’s a fresh blackberry tart.
Great company and an openness to trying new things.
Photography by Kirsty Lyons
