As she ponders the topic at hand, Claire Byrne makes clear that she prefers the sharp to the plain. “You need a little bit of bite,” the presenter opines on Tuesday ( Today with Claire Byrne , RTÉ Radio 1, weekdays), while expressing her disappointment that much of the fare under discussion is “sort of bland”. Now, in case anyone think otherwise, Byrne is not critiquing her own show, even if that does tend toward the solid rather than the piquant.
Instead she’s weighing the merits of mayonnaise and salad cream with home economist Agnes Bouchier-Hayes, rating the “thinner tang” of the latter over the mildness of the former. It’s testament to Byrne’s style that even this ostensibly saucy item ends up as a sensible if still enjoyable discussion, with her guest laying out the history of the two condiments while sharing recipe tips. But while the host isn’t one for dressing up stories, it equally means she eschews exaggeration.
So when, on Wednesday, Byrne observes that “yesterday was a particularly sad day for this organisation”, you know she isn’t spreading it on thick. If anything, she’s understating the case. Certainly, Byrne takes a low-key approach to the previous day’s news that “we’d lost two of our greats”, with the deaths of celebrated GAA commentator Micheál Ó Muircheartaigh and former RTÉ journalist Tommie Gorman .
The host remembers the indefatigable Gorman by playing a clip of his famous interview with Roy Keane following t.
