As a coda to our short hymn to a mother’s influence on chefs and restaurateurs, I turn to Cathal Armstrong, chef and owner of this year’s Best Restaurant.

Here’s what Armstrong had to say about his “mam”:

My father usually did most of the cooking. But when my mother made her pies — that rocked my world.

She would send us out to pick the ‘blackers’ blackberries from the side of the road. My brothers and I would eat most of them before we even made it home. Mam would have the pastry ready to go — one of my fondest memories of my mother cooking.

Eve and Eamonn have taken up the tradition back in Dublin, picking ‘blackers’ by the roadside.