{"id":181228,"date":"2025-11-15T00:54:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-15T00:54:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/181228\/"},"modified":"2025-11-15T00:54:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-15T00:54:09","slug":"owners-of-il-valentino-bakery-buy-honey-truffle-cafe-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/181228\/","title":{"rendered":"Owners of Il Valentino Bakery buy Honey Truffle Caf\u00e9 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The popular <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/restaurant\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/restaurant\">Honey Truffle Caf\u00e9<\/a> on Pearse Street in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/dublin\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/dublin\">Dublin<\/a> has been taken over by the owners of the Il Valentino Bakery in nearby Grand Canal Dock.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The new owners are Ken and Graham McDonnell, the proprietors of the Il Valentino Bakery and Cafe at Grand Canal Dock in Dublin 2. The pair also <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/property\/commercial-property\/2022\/11\/09\/queen-of-tarts-acquired-by-owners-of-il-valentino-bakery\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/property\/commercial-property\/2022\/11\/09\/queen-of-tarts-acquired-by-owners-of-il-valentino-bakery\/\">acquired one of Dublin\u2019s best-known patisseries and cafes, The Queen of Tarts<\/a>, in 2022 when its owners, sisters Yvonne and Regina Fallon, decided to retire.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The former owner Eimer Rainsford said, in a statement on social media, \u201cAfter almost 9 years, the time has come for me to part ways with Honey Truffle.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cRest assured, our wonderful, creative, hardworking and supportive team are all remaining,\u201d said Ms Rainsford, who is the formerly head chef of Avoca and the Pink Ginger cookery school, noting it is \u201ca time of mixed emotions\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cHoney Truffle has been a creative food passion, of which I am very proud. Not least of all because of our returning customers, many on first-name terms, who have frequented Honey Truffle over the years.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The deal to sell the Honey Truffle Caf\u00e9 was completed swiftly taking \u201cjust a couple of months\u201d with the previous owner noting that the time \u201cfelt right, for various reasons,\u201d she said, thanking the cafe\u2019s customers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Honey Truffle Ltd, the company behind the Pearse Street bakery, made a small profit in 2024 of \u20ac33,677, on top of a similar \u20ac38,790 profit in 2023. The cafe had an average of 13 employees during the year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The new ownership, McDonnell Core Hospitality Limited (MCDH), is behind the Il Valentino Bakery and Cafe and had an average of 56 employees in 2024. The company made \u20ac477,000 in post-tax profits in 2024, with lifetime profits of \u20ac1.77 million.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">A spokesman for MCDH said the Honey Truffle branding would continue to be used and it is expected to be \u201cbusiness as usual\u201d at the venue.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Ms Rainsford was contacted for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The popular Honey Truffle Caf\u00e9 on Pearse Street in Dublin has been taken over by the owners of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":181229,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[79,52,18,19,17,5281],"class_list":{"0":"post-181228","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-dublin","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-restaurant"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115550988697112035","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181228"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181228\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/181229"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}