Pat Lalor's Kilbeggan Organic Porridge has just gone global.

Kilbeggan porridge now available in NYC

Published: Thu 26 Jan 2012, 5:30 PM

A Kilbeggan man is doing his bit to ensure that New Yorkers get to enjoy a taste of all-natural, all-good and all-healthy Westmeath-grown porridge oats.Pat Lalor's 'Kilbeggan' porridge has just gone global, having been taken up by the prestige grocery chain, Dean & DeLuca, which has 13 outlets across the US, including one in New York's SoHo district.Not just that, but fans of the Kilbeggan porridge brand can also now buy it online on the Dean & DeLuca website, which delivers pretty much all over the US fine foods, fine wines, and kitchenware.The Dean & DeLuca website describes Kilbeggan as 'the most delicious oatmeal we have ever eaten', and sells 35 ounce packs for $10.As revealed in the Westmeath Examiner in September, Kilbeggan porridge is the purest porridge available, grown on Pat and Lily Lalor's farm at Ballard, Kilbeggan, on land that has been in the Ballard family for five generations, and that has been organic since 1999.Pat admits he finds it kind of exciting to think that as well as the 140 stores around Ireland selling the porridge, there are 13 in the US - but he hasn't had time to start looking online to read the reactions it's been getting, where there have been dozens of tweets, all positive.Pat sends the porridge to a warehouse in Dublin from where it is shipped to the US; and about three weeks later, it is ready for American customers.It was actually Dean & DeLuca that approached Pat about supplying the porridge - not the other way around. "They actually found me, last June, and I told them we couldn't supply it at that stage but to come back to me after the harvest."The firm followed through, and since November, they've been selling Kilbeggan porridge - and showing on their site a video showing Pat harvesting his oat crop.Pat has never been to New York, but he's been to the US, and has two brothers based there.While a long way from New York, as they're both in the Missouri area, Pat laughs that he hopes they are buying porridge online from the home farm back at Ballard.