Emily grew up in America understanding that food is how people take care of each other. She came to the Emerald Isle, fell in love with this corner of the island and never left.

The real beginning was 2015.
A health crisis that made Norman and Emily stop and look honestly at how they were living. Overstressed, undernourished, running toward the wrong things. They chose a different direction, resolved to build something that might offer others the same, and Lo & Slo began to take shape.

Emily had spent a lifetime in kitchens. Her family spoke food as a first language, and America gave them plenty of dialects to learn. With a deep love for the long, patient art of BBQ, the fire was always where she was headed.

And the deeper she went, the more she found. Ireland's Bronze Age fulachtaí fia showed her that the instinct she was following was ancient, rooted in the very land now beneath her. An anthropological curiosity took hold and Wild & Fired followed naturally behind her.

In 2023, by invitation, Wild & Fired found its home in the walled garden at Brook Hall Estate on the banks of the River Foyle. Now in residency and quietly proud to be recognised by Tourism Ireland, Tourism Northern Ireland, the Independent Cookery Schools Association and Slow Food.

The people who find their way here tend to know why they've come. Curious, unhurried, they want to understand the fire, not just stand near it, and to leave carrying something they didn't arrive with.