FOTE AMBASSADORS 2023 #FOTE2023
Blatnaid co-founded the Galway Wool Co-op in 2019 to restore the cultural integrity of our, very rare (<3500 globally), Indigenous Irish Sheep, ‘Galway’. She sought to establish a route to market for their unique Báinín Wool, which has been replaced the world over by Merino Wool. As her flock grew she began to plate her surplus males & discovered the succulent Native Irish Lamb. In the 70s & 80s much of our grass-fed meat were channelled towards industrial-scale abattoirs. Shortly afterwards, the drive was on to import faster-growing, leaner sheep breeds from the UK & Europe. ‘Our lovely Galway Lamb was about to become extinct as the impetus to produce meat faster became the primary focus with little to no value placed on taste, succulency, farming with nature & our heritage’. Today the Galway breed, reared in tandem with nature is again available, for those who cherish a tasty, slow-grown cut with succulent marbling & a gentle footprint on our lowland family farms.