He appeared on some of America’s most-watched shows and enjoyed the glitzy LA lifestyle but chef Donal Skehan says he’s happy to be settled back in Ireland.
Moving house is often cited as one of life’s most stressful events, right up there with divorce and even bereavement. But Donal Skehan, Ireland’s favourite baby-faced chef, is looking well on it, even though he, his wife Sofie Larsson and their little boys Noah, five, and three-year-old Oliver have been through the arduous process no less than four times in the past four years.
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After spending almost five years in LA, the Skehans moved back to Ireland during the pandemic in 2020 and set about finding their dream home. However, the search turned nightmarish with a lot of heartbreak and disappointment, including being outbid on houses, and two further moves before they finally got their house in Howth, where Donal grew up.
It has all taken its toll, he admits, although it’s hard to tell today. He’s chirpy and energetic and clearly excited to be talking about yet another new television series to add to his repertoire, Home Cook, which starts next Wednesday on RTÉ.
Just last week he added to his swathe of cookery books with the release of Home Kitchen.
He’s as happy and enthusiastic as he was when he became a household name as our food-blogging Kitchen Hero back in 2007, and his unfussy, home-cheffing ways, combined with his entertaining nature, have won him legions of fans from the US to Britain and, of course, Ireland. Does he ever stop for breath, I wonder?
‘It has been a case of constant flight mode for a while,’ he concedes. ‘Like you get sick of living out of boxes and all that nonsense so we are very happy that’s done and we are settled for a little bit.
‘You just can’t prepare for the stress of all those moves, and also the uncertainty was the hardest part. You’d think you’d gotten one place and then that’d be ripped from under you,’ says Donal of the all-too-familiar heartache of trying to buy a house in the current market conditions.
‘We had to keep coming up with a new plan, and it was like that for the last four years.
‘Just having one place that’s our own has really just grounded us, but I’d say it’ll be next month or December before we can really take a breath and we don’t feel like everything is going to be uprooted again.’
Whereas the family have always been busy, juggling hectic work schedules with young children and multiple house moves, what’s making everything easier these days is being at home.
‘We’ve a great support system here which we just didn’t have in LA,’ says Donal, although you can tell moving back was a decision that wasn’t made lightly.
‘There’s nothing like coming home to Ireland. It’s like that feeling when you get on an Aer Lingus flight and… I don’t know what it is exactly,’ he laughs. ‘I don’t know if an Irish person can put their finger on that feeling but the first “Howerya” when you get on that flight if you’ve been away a long time, it just feels like home. I think being home, I’ve appreciated being Irish a lot more than I ever had before.’
He also has a new-found respect for people who can pronounce his name correctly.
‘No one could pronounce my name over there,’ he recalls. ‘Doh-nal was my name there. I got so sick of correcting people on it that we were over in Texas a few weeks ago filming a segment for This Morning that I actually introduced myself as Doh-nal,’ he laughs. ‘It was the only way to save time on live TV. I just gave them what they wanted.’
In fact, he says, he and Sofie, who was once involved in acting and has a background in event management, and whom Donal credits as being the driving force of the Skehan brand for many years, were lucky in that in their 20s and early 30s they were able to work from wherever they wanted in the world.
‘That was such a great thing and we grabbed that opportunity to live in different places and have those experiences,’ he says.
‘I think I would have happily stayed in LA for at least another five or six years. What is great about it is the amount of opportunity there,’ he says, referring to work on the Food Network, NBC’s Today, the Rachael Ray Show and Home & Family on the Hallmark Channel.
‘Like I was hosting with Tia Mowry of Sister Sister fame, who’s now a chef too, and in the same studio as the Fresh Prince of Bel Air was shot – that was a pinch-me moment,’ he says. ‘You’d go out to your trailer and see the Hollywood sign, so it was all what you imagined it to be.
‘It’s a city of 12 million people and so diverse, with such underrated food scenes and cultures, and we were always looking at what we were going to eat next,’ he says. ‘I loved that and I loved the heat and the sunshine and the action.’
But although there was a lot to love about the LA lifestyle, his hectic work schedule was affecting both him and his family. And also – most importantly – they weren’t in Ireland.
‘At the same time I was presenting on Saturday Kitchen in London too and it was just a case of, wait, where am I going here?’ he says of trying to do it all. ‘Honestly, I think what I lost at that time was that sense of grounding and routine that I have now.
‘It’s funny because it’s only when I got home, and while the glitz and the glamour was amazing, that I found what I was really searching for,’ before cheekily adding: ‘But at least I got a taste of it and I know what it looks like.
‘It’s a great lifestyle,’ he says of Stateside living. ‘Although there are factors to consider and even the weather. We got caught in wildfires that came within 100 metres of the house. LA is on an earthquake faultline too. But I think things like that tend to loom larger in an Irish person’s mind.’
Did Los Angeles living influence his little boys? An American twang, perhaps?
‘I’d love to think they have adventurous palates at least,’ he laughs.
‘They both eat mussels,’ he says, trying (and failing) to keep the pride from his voice. ‘We were out at a restaurant recently and they were chowing down a bucket of mussels. But I look like this obnoxious parent who is encouraging their notions,’ he laughs, joking that his children’s impressive culinary antics are perfect fodder for any naysayers who might like to take a dig at their dad.
God, Donal, moules frites? My children won’t even eat salmon!
‘My go-to tip for parents trying to get their kids to eat something new is don’t put it on their plate, put it on the table and let them help themselves or be part of that conversation,’ he says.
However, refreshingly, Donal advises against cooking with children.
‘It’s a recipe for disaster,’ he says, while I nod wholeheartedly in agreement. ‘Like I have moments where if I have the time I’ll say, “come over here and I’ll show you how to chop this,” but invariably when you’re trying to get the dinner on the table you just need to crack on and get it done.’
Hacks include letting your child taste a sauce, and letting them add some seasoning, so they feel more involved. ‘You want to include them but you have to remember, especially if you’re dealing with toddlers, they are not in their right mind,’ he (sort of) jokes.
‘Whatever you try to tell them will go out the window.’
One look at Donal’s Instagram shows that despite his family dinners, no children have been pawing at his picture-perfect dishes. When it comes to who wears the apron in their household, it’s very much 50/50.
‘Sophie is the planner and organiser, and I’m the executioner I suppose,’ he says. ‘She even texted me this morning and suggested we make one of the new recipes from the new book. So she’ll prep it and I’ll put it together.
‘She concedes that I’m the better cook,’ he shrugs. ‘So I will bring it to life better than she might but she will literally get the dinner to the table. I’m just there to flounce around and sprinkle things in at the last minute.
‘She keeps the boys going and when things get busy she keeps the house moving,’ he says.
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It’s clear that behind this very busy man is an equally busy woman. Swedish-born Sofie has been by his side since they met in 2006.
‘All through our 20s she worked with me and managed it all, and then when the kids came around she took a back seat,’ he said. ‘As time has gone on, it’s kind of been important to have a little separation from being together all the time too,’ he reasons, when I ask what is the secret to both living and working together, almost 20 years, as it happens.
Is a big celebration on the cards for an anniversary party perhaps? Donal laughs and appears to do some mental arithmetic before answering.
‘Jesus, yes, not far off… You know, we always said we might have another wedding. We kind of got married in the middle of madness,’ he says, in reference to their wedding in June 2015.
‘We always said we’d like to go back and do it in a calm, non-pressured way, without the expectations of what a wedding is supposed to be. So that might come and a 20-year milestone would be a great time to do it!’
Uh-oh, I may have inspired Donal to undertake yet another big venture, but I get the feeling this is what he thrives on.
‘Oh, I’m a project-based person. You’ve got to challenge yourself and dream big,’ he says, and sure that’s exactly what he’s done from the very start of his career when stars instead of steam were in his eyes as a baby-faced member of pop band Industry.
‘It was a lovely creative outlet but my days as a singer were numbered from the start,’ he smiles. ‘But hey, we had two number one singles, supported the puss*cat Dolls in Wembley… sure aren’t they great stories for when I’m in a retirement home!’
This 37-year-old is a long way off that yet, and while he admits he would have ‘loved’ the Late Late Show gig, ‘although I’m still a little young for it’, realistically, a dream job would be his own live show on home soil.
‘I love presenting on BBC Saturday Kitchen, so something like that in Ireland, whether it’s food or entertainment-related. I really enjoy live TV,’ he says, adding how much he enjoys his work as brand partner with Dunnes Stores too.
Plus he’s a bit of a dab hand on social media, with over a million followers on online platforms. Then again, he was food blogging back in 2009, before most of us even knew what the word meant.
‘The beautiful thing about food on social media is that tends to be quite a safe space,’ he muses.
‘I still get the odd a***hole chef having a dig at me for whatever but those are not the people you will have at your dinner table. They are not people who will ever be in your home.
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‘I have a lovely community now,’ he says, adding that over the years it’s become easier to detach emotionally from online negativity. ‘I think in the early days it affects you a lot more and my advice to anyone trying to carve out something online is to stick to what you know, be consistent and remember that oftentimes your critics are the ones doing less than you, and they are usually jealous.
‘I think it’s when you get a little bit older and you know what’s important in life, and it certainly doesn’t begin and end on Instagram, it’s something you find in yourself,’ he says.
Wise words indeed.
Donal’s new series Home Cook starts Wednesday, November 1 on RTÉ One. His book, Home Kitchen, is available in hardback, published by Yellow Kite and priced at €25.
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