Having 5 girls under 6 is no picnic, especially when 4 of them are quadruplets. How many more life-changing events would you like after that? How about the non-quadruplet daughter is diagnosed with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis? That’s what happened to Alicia Murphy.

Alicia’s husband (and her +1 guest on tonight’s show) is Matt Murphy, owner and chef at Irish pub and restaurant, Irish House.

So when their daughter wasn’t responding well to traditional medication, Alicia turned to long nights of research and days experimenting with diet. From that dedication a new diet began to rule the Murphy household (and will soon creep its way on to the Irish House menu too, but that’s a story for a little later that Matt announces for the first time, on this show.)

Seeing a phenomenal success in their daughter’s quality of life, Alicia and Matt started eating healthy too. The result? Matt lost 35 pounds and Alicia opened a bakery and healthy food store on Magazine Street which she has called Fare Food Apothecary.

What began as a practical joke in a Dublin restaurant where Matt was a chef and Alicia a waitress, involving Matt making chocolate covered goat cheese balls and passing them off as truffles, turned into a date which became a marriage and now a partnership in every sense of the word. 

This is a story about love and food and the power of both to change lives. It could change yours.

The photos on this page were taken by Midnight Menu +1’s sometimes underwater photographer Douglas Engel.