Happy at home

Saul O’Reilly, who looks after the kitchens at the brand new Bullitt Belfast, spent years working in pubs before he realised that his true talent lay in cooking…

It’s been a busy time lately for Armagh’s Saul O’Reilly, as head chef at Belfast’s hottest new property, the uber-cool Bullitt hotel.

But to be fair, it’s not the first time that Saul has been busy in the kitchens on opening night for a plush new property – he went through the same experience three years before, just around the corner at the National Grande Café.

In fact, it’s par for the course in a career that has seen Saul (44), involved in hospitality pretty much since the age of 15, when he began lifting glasses at his local golf club in Armagh.

Although he comes originally from the Orchard County, Saul spent around 20 years of his life in Liverpool since going there to study IT at university. He successfully completed his degree, but never really managed to adapt to a career in the field.

“I think I was always more interested in hospitality,” Saul tells LCN. “My parents had owned a bar in Burtonport in County Donegal when I was very young, The Harbour Inn, and so pubs always felt like a part of my life.”

Even throughout his time at university, Saul was working part-time in bars around Liverpool. By the mid-1990s, he was working full-time in the trade and he continued with that until around 2000, before moving out of his customer pub accommodation into a flat of his own.

That development led to a renewed interest in cooking which, in turn, convinced Saul that his future lay in the kitchen rather than behind the bar. Eventually, he secured a position with Italian restaurant and bar, Est Est Est in Liverpool, but the bulk of his development came from 2004 onwards, when he worked first as a sous chef and later, as head chef at Delifonseca in the city.

Saul married Ann, from Armagh, in 2009 and a couple of years later, with a second child on the way, the couple agreed that the time was right to consider a return to Northern Ireland:

“The party years were over for us in Liverpool, I think,” says Saul. “Ann wanted to come back home, I was after a change and so we made the move.”

In terms of work, Saul had no definite prospects back in Northern Ireland. He hoped that his background in restaurants would stand him in good stead and he worked briefly in Tony O’Neill’s Il Pirata and in the Bread and Banjo Bakery on the Ormeau Road, reflecting his growing interest in artisan baking.

From there, he took a job in the kitchens at the new National Grande Café when it opened its doors in 2013. Then, he took the post as head chef at the new Bullitt Belfast when it opened in October:

“The hardest part of the job so far has been the change in hours for me,” he confides. “It’s back to the long hours and with three kids at home, it can be hard to stay in touch….But it’s early days, it’s still hard to put your finger on things, everything is still very much up in the air.

“What we are trying to do is develop some consistency, that’s something we need to get right, we’re doing our best to respond to customer feedback at this stage and get as much right as we can going into this busy Christmas period,” adds Saul. “The team here is great and I want to make sure that they are in great shape and happy to move forward.”

As for the future, Saul is happy just to take a breather:

“At the moment, working at this level in this hotel is great for me,” he says. “Every time you do something with this company, it feels like a step up and so I’m happy to work with them and there will be other opportunities down the line.

“I’ve always felt like I’d like to do something on my own, but there’s something to be said about the security of working for a good company and that’s important to me.”