Edward Joyce, The Mustard Seed

Archive - all the best places to eat, shop and stay in Ireland. A local guide to local places.

“I hear you bought a horse,” says John Edward Joyce to the jodhpur-clad man from Belgium who had just walked through the front door of The Mustard Seed.
That’s the thing about John Edward: if you’ve been out and about in County Limerick, buying a show jumper, he will know all about it.
It’s not just his instinct that gifts him with this skill: it’s a form of wise telepathy, a wisdom that let’s him know exactly where to pitch the conversational tent, every time.
And that is why John Edward Joyce’s Mustard Seed restaurant and country house, in run-down, pretty little Ballingarry, is a balm for the soul.
Mr Joyce is one of the great hosts, and he has succeeded one of the great hosts – Dan Mullane – so he was on a hiding-to-nothing if he didn’t somehow manage to have his own pouch of stardust to sprinkle on this fine house.
No worries: the man has stardust to spare, and he has gifted all his staff members with their own magic powder, so The Mustard Seed works like clockwork, bestowing calm, great food, and a sense of utter away-from-it-all. You walk through the impressive doors of The Mustard Seed, and you enter another world, and that is the world of John Edward Joyce.