Mary O’s Magical Irish Scones

Mary O’Halloran and daughter Erinn

Just about one year ago, I read a story about Mary O’Halloran who is the proprietor of Mary O’s Irish Pub in the East. Village. Under the restrictions required during the height of the Covid lockdown, her income was frozen and the bills piled up quickly. To make matters worse her husband, a longshoreman, was stranded on the Aleutian Islands, off Alaska, for nine months, when air travel was suspended. So, in addition to worrying about holding onto their business and putting food on the table, she was raising 6 children who required home schooling.

Mary O’s Irish Pub, on Ave. A, East Village

As a way to bring in some much needed cash, she started a small catering business and began selling her own home-baked Irish soda bread scones and homemade blackberry jam on the internet. They were reasonably priced for a homemade delicacy prepared from her mom’s recipe, so it was more of a way to pass the time than a real money-making proposition.

But her plight was first publicized by a reporter for NY1 TV and then came to the attention of Humans of New York (HONY), a photoblog and book series celebrating everyday New Yorkers, published by photographer and journalist Brandon Stanton. He publicized O’Halloran’s story and suggested she double the price of the scones – his thinking was many people who weren’t struggling would be happy to provide assistance by purchasing her scones.

At first Mary resisted as she was uncomfortable taking charity but soon realized that she was providing a service that would require hard work on her part and was well appreciated.

The HONY story about Mary O’s Irish scones quickly went viral on social media. I read about it on Facebook and was intrigued. They sold over a million dollars worth of scones virtually overnight! Mary was initially overwhelmed by the outpouring of support and then had to figure out how the heck she would be able to bake more than 200,000 scones to fill so many orders without the requisite oven capacity and other bakery equipment. Fortunately, friends and loyal customers at Mary O’s volunteered to help and she was able to use large commercial ovens in the kitchen of her son’s Catholic school.

Mary O sent out an email last August to every single customer shortly after receiving the deluge of orders, thanking them and asking for their patience while she got them all filled. She said it may take a while but gave us her word that her scones would eventually be delivered.

Mary O’s Scone with Blackberry jam

Sure enough, ten months later, a package shows up at our front door. Not only did it contain a half dozen of the most delicious Irish scones I’ve ever eaten, but the homemade blackberry jam was divine.

As a bonus, Mary’s young daughter Erinn sent a hand drawn card as a thank you.

Hand-made card from Erinn O’Halloran

Each box also includes “an invisible Irish blessing that will be passed down through the generations to all of your descendants until the end of the time.”

I immediately went back on line to see if I could order more but was greeted with an apology that new orders are temporarily suspended until the initial batch are filled. I will keep my eyes open and hope to stop by the pub at some point to congratulate Mary O and wish her the best of luck. Hopefully, she’ll find a way to turn this enterprise into gold (or at least a profitable and sustainable business) so we’ll be able to enjoy her magical Irish scones ’til the end of time.