D One
2003-01-24
It was a momentous day, an historic day, a day that will be forever remembered
in the annals of the city; it was the day the spike was topped out. Such
is my luck when it comes to great moments of history that I didn't see
till after dark, when an unlit spike hasn't quite got the majesty that
you might hope for. There was a little red light at the top, although
that might have belonged to the crane alongside, I'm not sure, it was
dark you see. From Sarah's apartment you get a great view of the spike,
or you would in daylight, or if it was lit.
Gruel
2003-01-17
I've written about it occasionally and wondered about it a lot; why are
there no medium-priced restaurants? There's no shortage of restaurants
that are happy to take a hundred squids off you for supplying dinner for
two, but where are the cheap eateries and bistros of the kind that are
so easy to find on the continent? Nice to be able to report that I was
introduced to one this week, so they do in fact exist.
Wright's Brasserie
2003-01-10
I'm beginning to wonder a little about the competence of the people whose
job it is to make traffic flow. At the root of all discussion about traffic
there ought to be the understanding that people aren't simply out there
joy-riding, mucking about in their cars, wasting petrol and time: they're
doing something useful to the economy - either going to work, or going
to spend. Making either of these activities hard to do doesn't help anyone,
and yet perversely there are people whose job appears to be doing just
that.
I went to see 'The Two Towers' yesterday with my wife and son and chose
to see it in Dun Laoghaire because we would be out by 7.30 in the evening,
time enough to find somewhere to have an early supper. Because the expensive
multi-storey car park bizarrely closes at 9 o'clock, we had to move the
car before finding a restaurant. It's been a long time since I've eaten
in Dun Laoghaire and I thought it was time to do so again, but the ingeniously
designed one-way system had me out of the centre and on the road to Monkstown
before I knew it. You'd need to be very persistent, or a resident, to
stay in the centre, it's all designed to make it very difficult. Which
is why we ate in Monkstown and not in Dun Laoghaire. If I was trading
in Dun Laoghaire and paying rates there, I'd be angry. Driving out traffic
means driving out trade, but bureaucrats on permanent and pensionable
jobs don't seem to need to take account of the real world.
The Creel
2003-01-03
In the past ten years I've been out of the country eight times for the
New Year, so it was with a deal of pleasure that this year was spent here.
I'm convinced that there's no country in the world that knows how to party
the way the Irish do. Sure, there are some places that do a good New Year's
Eve, but no where else can keep up the party mood for two weeks. Like
any extended party season there's always a lull period, a slight dip in
the energy levels, and that tends to fall between St. Stephen's day and
New Year's Eve. Which is why an invitation to Prospect, just outside Westport,
was such a perfect way of passing those four days. There's nothing quite
like an extended house party for keeping the festive mood going, right
up to the very end of the year. Good food, good wine and good company
made it a year's end to remember.
A Year's End
2002-12-27
It's always a surprise to me when we get to the end of another year.
Another twelve months passed that seem like a blink of an eye. Five years
ago when I started doing these reviews I wondered how long it could last,
how long it would be before I'd covered every restaurant in the country.
A year? Two years? And here we are after five years and the restaurants
keep opening faster than I get to review them. Back in October 1997 when
I began reviewing, the Merrion Hotel opened for business in the same month,
so we're almost karmically twinned. Five years later and the Merrion's
an established part of Dublin's fabric as well as being my favourite city
centre hotel, while I'm still chasing that same sort of well-established
recognition.
Itsa Bagel
2002-12-20
What happened to Paul on the road to Damascus was a minor epiphany compared
to the life-style change that this Paul has undergone of late. For five
weeks now I've been living without cigarettes. To those of you who don't
smoke or who never have, that may seem like a minor event in a life of
peripheral inconsequence, but from where I stand it's pretty major. I
was a confirmed smoker, an inveterate smoker, a self-satisfied and contented
smoker. Nicotine defined much of what I did, for example I used to measure
the complexities of my articles by the number of cigarettes I consumed
while writing them, as in 'phew, that was a fifteen-cigarette article',
or 'that was an easy one, a mere six-cigarette job'. I could stop writing,
gaze philosophically out of the window and inhale deeply of my lady nicotine.
Now that particular avenue of pleasure is closed off. Now I look out of
the window and twiddle my thumbs instead.
Ashtons
2002-12-13
Forty years ago I was in an English boarding school. It was deep in the
middle of the Somerset countryside and I remember it still for its corporal
punishment, its intrusive Catholicism, its eccentric monks, its occasional
flash of brilliance and mostly its grinding monotony. Even as a pupil
it was like being in an enclosed order. We were allowed out on only two
Sundays a term, when you could leave after high mass at about 11.30 and
be back again by six or seven. Since my parents were nearly always far
away, that meant my two exeats were mostly with other people's parents.
If you timed it well, running as soon as mass ended, you could make Sunday
lunch in 'The Hole in the Wall' in Bath, a classy restaurant that I still
remember with affection. This also needed a set of parents prepared to
pay 'Hole in the Wall' prices.
O Sole Mio
2002-12-06
I've been lying on my back in St. Vincent's hospital for five days now,
my constant companion being my trusty laptop. Couldn't be more apt really,
since St. Vincent is the patron saint of wine and wine-making. I've been
probed and prodded over most of my body and poked in some very surprising
places, and all to find out why I was feeling poorly. My arms look like
pin-cushions - I've even got a cannula, which is like a little valve that
gets inserted into your arm and functions as an in-out valve. Blood out,
drugs in. And pills. I had seven at one stage today, then injections in
my stomach, and later lots of little cups of a pink liquid with a taste
so unpleasant that all other hospital ignominies fade into insignificance
by comparison. They even have licensed vampires here who come and remove
your blood several times a day by the phial-full. There's a cover story
that it's for blood tests, but I'm not convinced. I just wish Buffy were
here.
The Westin
2002-11-29
What is luxury? I'd take a guess it's something different for all of
us, but if I were to win a major cash prize I do know what my luxury would
be. I've given it a lot of thought, I've mentally spent the money in advance
and I just know it would be money well spent. What I want is to come downstairs
in the morning, wander into the dining room and there I'd find the sideboard
laden with a proper breakfast. You know the sort of thing - not just bacon
and eggs, but devilled kidneys, kedgeree, black and white pudding and
kippers, as well an array of cereals, breads and fruits. I may or may
not choose to have some or none of these, but my luxury would be to find
all these things laid out and awaiting me whether I was going to avail
of it or not. Oh yes, and my newspaper ironed and stitched and left on
a handsome silver reading stand just to the right of my morning cappuccino.
Le Bistro des Grands Crus
2002-11-22
There's nothing quite like a liver-crippling weekend of food and drink
to leave a man needing nothing more than a glass of water and perhaps
a crust of plain bread. And that's especially true if the weekend in question
is in the Burgundy, a part of France that's famous not only for its wines,
but for its food as well. The few days of over-indulgence did prompt this
thought: there seems to be a general rule that every country has its culinary
capital. Most would agree that in France it's centred on Lyons. In Italy
there's no doubt it's centred on Bologna, a city whose nick-name is 'the
fat'. In Spain the northern coast, stretching from the Basque country
through Asturias is the hub of the new cuisine. In Ireland we might argue,
but once outside the capital it has to be the South-west.
QC's
2002-11-15
Last week we left Noelle Campbell-Sharpe, Susan Morley, Mary Finnegan
and me in Portmagee, about to drive to Cahirciveen. Now read onÂ…
Jam & The Moorings
2002-11-08
I've a confession to make - apart from a brief one-night stand last July
in Killarney, I've never been to Kerry. You could say that that's a elephant-sized
hole in my ship of knowledge, but I always felt sure that eventually the
squirrel of time would nibble the nuts of destiny and I'd get there. Now
it happened like this; my wife the artist Susan Morley has had a busy
time exhibiting of late - for the Friends of the Rotunda and soon at The
Royal Hibernian Academy in mid November in aid of the Special Olympics.
With classic synchronicity all this artistic endeavour produced an invitation
from Noelle Campbell-Sharpe to visit her and the Cill Rialig Project on
Bolus Head, Ballinaskelligs.
Feerick's Half Way House
2002-11-01
Since I came back from the continent this summer, where thanks to the
Euro we now have total price transparency, I've been doing a lot of complaining
about prices and general rip-offs over here. Some of our prices are unavoidable:
the high price we pay for wine is entirely down to the massive tax take
imposed on it by the government, so console yourself with the thought
that you're helping Charlie McCreevey out of an economic black hole every
time you buy a bottle of wine. We pay high prices in restaurants as well,
apart from the cost of wine. New Yorkers are reeling in shock from the
recently announced statistic that since 911 their restaurant prices have
rocketed to an average of €35 per person for dinner. Yup, that's
right; you can dine in Manhattan for €35 a person. €45 buys
you dinner in London and if you're very careful where you go, €45
might just get you dinner in Dublin.
Brasserie Na Mara
2002-10-26
It was one of those days that men need to be strong for - I was planning
to spend the evening with the three women who share my surname; my mother,
my wife and my daughter. As any will tell you, this combination can make
a formidable bloc. The occasion was my mother's eightieth birthday, which
is the sort of milestone that you really need to celebrate. As it happens
it was something of a red-letter day for my daughter as well, since she
was trying her hand for the first time at modelling clothes. This meant
that we were all in the Café Samsara in Dawson Street at midday
for Lainey Keogh's fashion show in aid of the Mayur Foundation. I'll admit
that going to fashion shows isn't very high on my list of 'things to do',
but I really enjoyed it and it raised more money for the rebuilding of
post-earthquake Morvi in India.
Dish
2002-10-25
A while ago I was interviewed under the heading 'Jobs to Die for', where
being a restaurant reviewer was described as one of those jobs. There's
no doubt that old adages and mottoes become a part of our language simply
because they describe eternal truths - the one that springs to mind in
this case is 'the grass is always greener on the other side'. It all depends
on how you write the job description. 'Man wanted to eat brilliant meal
once a week' makes it sound so attractive that I've no doubt half the
country would apply in a trice. But let's do some re-wording and see what
happens. 'Man wanted to take pot luck weekly eating food never previously
encountered' might well get a lot fewer applicants. You'd have to think
a moment or two about your immune system and your digestive capacities.
No room here for the unadventurous and lily-livered. 'Man wanted to eat
a meal once a week anywhere, anytime, all cuisines to be sampled - and
you never get a chance to go back to the places you really like' might
pull in even fewer hopefuls.
The French Paradox
2002-10-18
If you're one of those people who find it difficult to stick with a diet
that's generally understood to be a healthy one, then we have something
in common. Received wisdom is clear on this point; animal fats are Bad
Fats. They're the ones that create all that nasty cholesterol that clogs
up your arteries and then kill you. It's easy to fret and worry about
about fats - saturated, unsaturated, mono and poly - you can even buy
things off the shelves that say useful things like 'Low Fat', but there's
an inescapable fact that makes people like me find it hard to excise fat
from the diet - it tastes good.
Langkawi
2002-10-11
If you're a parent you really can't help it; you worry about your offspring.
What's worse is that it really doesn't matter what age the little darlings
are, you go on worrying. Obviously the worries change with the passing
of the years, going from 'is she late learning to talk?' or 'isn't it
time he was potty-trained?' to worries about school, staying out late,
drugs, food intake, sexual habits, clothing, money, jobs, spouses and
eventually grandchildren. Once you have a child you're signed up for a
lifetime of worry and there's no getting away from it. If you know this
already you can nod and sagely agree with me, and if you don't be warned
- that's what's in store.
The Vico
2002-10-04
Here's a thought: when you go out for a meal you're not going out to
eat. Obtaining food for the belly is not your primary purpose, because
if it was, a sandwich at home would do the trick. You go out for a meal
because you want a change from home cooking, because you want to impress
your lady, because it's a celebration, because you're with some boring
business men from Lower Saxony and you can't bear to bring their bad jokes
and lederhosen-slapping humour home, or it's maybe because you want to
eat something you can't cook for yourself. You don't go to a restaurant
because your starving - no one starves any more in Europe, we're overfed
to the point of anorexia. Eating may be a part of what you do in restaurants,
but their primary purpose is to entertain and restore you to a sense of
well-being. A restaurant is not a canteen.
Da Pino
2002-09-27
I had a meal this week that'll make you jealous. It was in the excellent
L'Ecrivain restaurant and it was hosted by Dillon's Wines and Eurotoques,
an organisation dedicated to putting the best possible ingredients on
a plate. Seeing the Eurotoques plaque outside a restaurant should encourage
you to enter it. What was out of the ordinary about this meal wasn't just
the wonderful food, it was that three of Dublin's best chefs prepared
it: Derry Clark of L'Ecrivain, John Howard ex of Le Coq Hardi and Ross
Lewis of Chapter One. It was a gourmet's delight and there were fine wines
to accompany it, but sadly it wasn't the review meal.
That turned out to be rather different. My old friend Dillie Keane is
back in town doing the Vagina Monologues in the SFX hall. 'Come and see
the show,' she said, 'and we'll go out to eat after that.' Which is how
I found myself in an audience of several hundred women and about five
men, of which I was one. 'Sit near the front,' Dillie had said, 'and then
we can pick on you from the stage.' Yeah, right. Get picked on in front
of a load of women. Very attractive proposition. I sat far away from the
front and hoped she wouldn't spot me, rehearsing my repartee in case she
did, saying over and over to myself 'pick on someone of your own sex.'
Little Caesar's
2002-09-20
Something of a gourmet week, this. It started with a dinner in the Merrion
Hotel's Wellesley Room, a dining room that has been restored to its Georgian
grandeur with great care and skill. Ed Cooney, their Chef de Cuisine,
strutted his stuff with aplomb and we tasted Ireland's own Chateau Fieuzal,
which accompanied the stylish food. A few days later I was down in Wexford
enjoying wonderful Italian food in Roberto Pons' 'La Dolce Vita', where
Roberto and I got into a mutual rant about the lack of Italian food in
this country. A cursory glance through the Golden Pages might leave you
with the impression that about half of all the restaurants in this country
are Italian - there are so many that describe themselves as just that
- but if you get that impression, trust me, it's not backed up by the
reality on the ground.
The Greek Vine Bistro
2002-09-13
It's not always the food that attracts me to restaurants. That's not
to say I don't care about the cooking, it's just that there are other
parts of the equation of eating out that appeal to me, like a buzzy atmosphere
and a sense of fun. I'd expect the food to be good no matter where I go,
but my expectations vary. In happy-go-lucky bistros I expect decent food
at reasonable prices, in a two-star Michelin I expect to pay a lot of
money and get excellent food. Sometimes all I want is a pizza, and again
I'd expect to find one good enough to eat at price that doesn't hurt.
These expectations affect how I enjoy a meal; if the expectations aren't
at least partly met, then the experience of eating out has been a failure.
Continental Travels
2002-09-06
There's nothing quite like a visit to the continent to put a lot of things
back home into sharper focus. Driving through Italy and France has become
slightly more of a pleasure than ever before, since now there's no need
to share your holiday money with a series of banks and bureaux de change.
God bless the euro, I found myself chanting like a mantra at several borders.
As never before we can make price comparisons, since everything is priced
in the same currency and you don't need a mind like a calculator to notice
the differences. After France and Italy you begin to realise what an advantage
it is to be an Irish holiday-maker: everything you want to buy is cheaper
than it is here, some things by huge margins, so everything seems like
a bargain. But before I get too carried away with eulogies to continental
prices, I'll limit myself to hotels and restaurants.
Plaza Cafe & Actons
2002-08-30
& Macreddin Village.
The Courtyard Cafe
2002-08-23
Occasionally I get an irate letter from a restaurateur claiming that I've
shut their restaurant down by having written a less than favourable review.
Having owned several restaurants myself I'm acutely aware that publicity
has an effect and I'm always careful to bear that in mind. After all we're
talking about people's livelihood here. But the more I think about it,
the more I'm convinced that neither me nor any other reviewer has the
power to close a restaurant. Restaurants close themselves. Serve enough
below par meals to enough people and you'll soon have no customers. It's
possible that reviewers might hasten the process, but we don't set it
in motion.
Wineport Lodge
2002-08-16
Maybe it's the mountainy man in me that accounts for it, but there's
something that divides my wife's tastes from mine. She loves the sea and
all its humours: she loves to swim in it, paint it, breathe its air and,
given the chance, she'd live beside it. Me, on the other hand, I'd prefer
fresh water. It's rarely as violent and you can drink it. At home, in
the rare event of a few hot days, I swim in our river and lake. I like
drying off in the sun without a residue of salt on my skin. I enjoy everything
about water that my wife does, but I prefer it without the salt. Which
is why a trip to Wineport was such a treat for me.
O'Connor's
2002-08-09
My offspring have already been ridiculing me over this, so I'm innured
now to the sneering looks and the incredulity that go with saying 'I saw
an Elton John concert.' I mean, can it really be any worse than saying
'I've just seen another theatrical extravaganza with music by Andrew Lloyd
Webber'? Obviously to the young much of what pleases their parents is
ineffably naff, but playing my old Stones albums, or Dylan or Hendrix
or J. J. Cale or Ry Cooder doesn't get the same response. These old masters
are still accorded respect, whereas whatever cred Sir Elton may have possessed
evaporated totally when he played at the British Queen's jubilee concert.
And yet I still have a regard for an old trooper, someone who can stand
in front of a rain-drenched GAA pitch in Killarney on a bleak, windy,
wintry summer's evening and play for over two hours to an appreciative
crowd. True professionalism.
Baan Thai
2002-08-02
The advent of the Euro has had a number of obvious effects, the most
obvious being an increase in prices. It occurred to me that restaurants
may also have increased their prices so I thought I'd check. It's been
a bore and time-consuming, but I've gone through all my receipts from
first six months of last year and those from this year over the same period
just to see what difference there was. Here's the surprise; there's a
difference of about 1.5%, which is a good deal less than inflation. I'm
not a statistician, and perhaps six months isn't a large enough sample
to balance out the expensive and the cheap meals, but I was expecting
a much greater increase than that. Maybe I'll try the exercise again at
the end of the year.
Vino Pasta
2002-07-26
The Romans had a phrase for it: 'de gustibus non est disputandum', which
translates as 'you can't argue about taste'. The idea crops up in other
axioms: 'one man's meat is another man's poison', or more simply 'there's
no accounting for taste'. You could argue that if that's true, the job
of a restaurant reviewer is largely irrelevant. And perhaps it is. No
one person can be a final arbiter for the tastes of everyone. But this
much is true; bad food is bad food even when it isn't recognised as such
by everyone. The fact that there are people who buy industrial pork pies
doesn't make them good, it only shows that there are consumers out there
who really don't care what unmentionable bits of pig have been minced
up and sold to them.
Kevin O'Neill's
2002-07-19
We were in the Beara Peninsula, outside Castletown Bearhaven, looking
across to Bear island and sipping a morning coffee when it happened. The
most unusual meteorological phenomenon occurred; suddenly a cloud moved
and a huge ball of fire appeared in the sky unleashing a terrifying brightness.
Not only that, but it radiated heat as well, bringing temperatures soaring
to nearly twenty degrees. Motorists were forced to turn off their headlights
and windscreen wipers, I could feel my sinuses beginning to dry up, a
strange warmth permeated my damp clothes. It seems that this event was
observed over the entire peninsula, wreaking panic everywhere. People
caught outdoors had to abandon their umbrellas - although some seemed
to think they made a good defence against the searing light - others even
removed overcoats in their panic.
Pacific
2002-07-12
Maybe it's ennui or weltschmertz, maybe it's no more than a palate that's
had more than its fair share of dull and pedestrian food, but it's rarely
that I get the urge to enthuse whole-heartedly over a meal. Even when
I'm happy with a meal, there's often some small niggle that takes the
edge off the pleasure. But for once I had a meal that was unrelentingly
excellent, from start to finish.
