Soup’s up – Glasson restaurants unite in generosity

Community spirit is alive and well in Glasson, as local restaurants united this week to provide delicious free food to their customers, neighbours and passers-by.

In the midst of the new ‘social distancing’ norms, The Villager Bar and Restaurant and Grogans of Glasson, located almost directly across the main street from one another, found a way to spread kindness by offering free soup to take away from outside their premises. 

Owner of The Villager Bar and Restaurant, chef Cathal Moran, said his motivation at first was simply to keep busy.

“Last week we opened as normal, and then the schools closed on Friday and I felt that would be the beginning of the end for us. Over the weekend business was okay, but by Sunday it had almost died off and by that night we decided to close,” explains Cathal.

“On Tuesday morning I just thought: I’m used to working 12-14 hours a day cooking in the kitchen. So I went to the fridges and I used what we had there to make soup, and decided to put a post on Instagram offering it to anyone who wanted some. Because of social distancing concerns, we just left it on a table outside in tubs, with a sign.

“We live on-site over the pub, and have a full professional kitchen downstairs at our disposal. No one is really thinking straight, and it was my natural reaction.”

Cathal made around 50 litres of vegetable and mushroom soup in total, which he says disappeared quickly once word of the offer spread.  He also did a few home deliveries, and says a lot of the soup went to elderly people or grandparents who were at home on their own.

Inspired by The Villager’s offer, neighbouring Grogans decided to get in on the act and make a similar offer the following day – leading to some friendly rivalry as the two businesses compared offerings on social media!

Miriam Grogan says that in spite of the difficult times, neighbours can still come together to help one another.

“We jumped on Cathal’s bandwagon and our head chef Rosie Connaughton made a batch of soup on Wednesday morning. We messaged a few of our customers and neighbours to come along and pick some up – we had about 25 portions and some chocolate puddings and sticky toffee puddings,” says Miriam.

“We are feeding a few people every day – we are all keeping our social distance but we can still help people. It’s a time when the Irish spirit really shines. We’ve had several calls from neighbours and customers; no one was banging on the door for a pint, everyone was on board once the closures were announced.”

Both restaurants are planning further initiatives in the coming days. Cathal is considering holding a charity pizza evening, whereby customers can collect their order and donate money to charity. Meanwhile, Miriam is planning to give away another batch of soup, and will continue to check in with locals.

“We can all do something,” she says. “Thank God we have fresh air, we live in the country, and we can still call and check on people.”