Picado Mexican is run by husband and wife team,Lily Ramirez-Foran & Alan Foran. Alan is Irish and Lily is Mexican and they met in Japan during their first year in college. It was love at first sight.
Lily is the founder of Ireland’s first Mexican boutique grocer and cookery school, Picado Mexican; she’s also the author behind the popular food blog ‘A Mexican Cook’. Lily has been living and cooking in Ireland for almost 19 years . When not busy with work, Lily can be found in her kitchen experimenting with recipes or in her tiny urban garden learning to grow some food. Shop keeper, food writer, story teller, mad dreamer and lover of all things Irish. She is a chef member of Euro-Toques Ireland, and passionately believes in the Slow Food ethos of good, clean and fair food. She comes from a long line of Tortilla bakers by trade, so she knows her tortillas really, really well.
Alan is a college lecturer by day and a renegade theatre reviewer by night. He’s also chief recipe taster when it comes to cooking and strict quality control ‘jefe’ when it comes to baking. He does all the heavy lifting and the long term thinking for the business. Always there as a rational thinker, twitter sensor; making things go smooth and keeping Lily on track and on time (the most difficult task of them all). Head pot washer in the kitchen when needs be and general strategist of the business.
They both share a passion for good food, travel and cooking. When not busy running their business and carrying out other work endeavours, they can be found in their Dublin kitchen, cooking (mainly Lily) and eating (mainly Alan) all sorts of yummy food. They enjoy growing food in their small garden and would absolutely love to have chickens! Alan’s mad about music and reading and Lily is addicted to cookery books and kitchen gadgets, you name it, she has it.
In 2011, frustrated with the lack of choice for Mexican ingredients, they founded My Mexican Shop.
They spent six months of evening work to create Ireland’s first dedicated online Mexican grocer.They took their first online orders in May 2012.
To promote the shop, they took a ‘temporary’ stall for a couple of weeks at the popular Honest2Goodness food market in Glasnevin; they loved it so much, they ended up staying for one and a half years! The market was tough work, but gave them the tools and drive to take the next step.
On a sunny afternoon walk in the Portobello area, in Dublin 2, Lily spotted an empty shop on South Richmond Street. It was a small but cozy space and her head went spinning! One thing lead to another and three weeks later, they had taken the plunge and gotten keys. They were on the way to give their online shop a bricks and mortar home!
With the help of interior designer friend, Alex, and the branding talents of the folks at OVO, they spent 2 weeks living and breathing the Picado Mexican Pantry concept.
Together they cleaned, painted and sanded, drilled, hung and put together their new shop. It was a big step for two DIY virgins.
Lily wanted a space to sell all the items from the online shop with an area where she could teach people how to use those ingredients. A space where food minded folk could come tougher and share food knowledge and some good, honest and authentic Mexican food. Not a burrito in sight!
Picado Mexican is both a retail space and a kitchen where people gather in small groups to learn about Mexico and Mexican food in a relaxed and friendly environment.
A space where bread… well tortillas really… is broken and shared, where learning happens while tasting and where complete strangers come together to share the common interest of a Mexican meal.
Every item sold in Picado Mexican has been carefully selected, sampled and tried by both as they pride on supplying only the best and most authentic Mexican ingredients to the Irish market. Their mission in life, to get Ireland cooking and eating real Mexican food.
