Mercy Fenton won the Roux Scholarship in 1994 Trained with Bernard Loiseau at La Résidence de la Côte-d’Or, in Saulieu, France. Mercy is now director of Wicked Desserts in Cork, Ireland.

Born in County Cork, Ireland, Mercy grew up on a farm which instilled in her a passion for growing food. She trained at the Institute of Technology in Tralee and then Birmingham College of Food. Her first jobs was in a hotel owned by her mother's cousin in Kerry, from there she worked at Clifford's, the renowned Clonmel restaurant, and then spent six months in Germany for six months before a friend recommended her to write to Morel's, the then-Michelin starred Morel’s in Haslemere in Surrey. In 1993, she won Young Chef of the year, before wowing judges again to win the Roux Scholarship the year after.

After Morel’s was sold, she moved to London and took a job as sous chef in Dell Ugo in Soho, her first experience of working in a restaurant with a large number of covers. Following that, she moved to Stephen Bull in Blandford Street for her first head chef role. Here, she gained experience running a fine dining kitchen in the heart of London with superb produce on our doorstep.

Following her stint at Stephen Bull’s, Mercy went travelling for a year, visiting South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Asia and India. The exposure to different cultures and cuisine filled her with enthusiasm, which she took to another head chef position at Jacobs on the Mall, in Cork, which she ran for 11 years.

In June 2013, Mercy set up a dessert catering business in Cork called Wicked Desserts, after she noticed a lack of restaurant-standard desserts available for home consumption. The company supplies both the trade and general public with hand-made, luxury desserts with natural ingredients, such as Irish unsalted butter, free range eggs, Irish cream and Belgian chocolate.

Mercy writes a recipe column in the Cork Evening Echo, with original photography.