When French restaurateur Patrick Guilbaud arrived in Dublin in 1981, drawn by Ireland’s abundant fresh fish and meat, he promptly introduced a foreign practice. From the first location of Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud on St. James’s Place, just behind the Bank of Ireland, he began working directly with local farmers to get products of the quality he required. “We were the first to do this kind of thing,” he explains. “In 1981, Ireland was a place where people wanted very large portions. The quality on the plate didn’t matter as much as the quantity.”
Now, of course, the booming capital of the Celtic Tiger is a changed city, and so is its once-maligned culinary culture. Ireland has gone from being the economic basket case of Europe to one of its richest countries -- and a major financial center. Likewise, Dublin’s restaurants also have undergone an astounding renaissance. What with organic ingredients, good chefs and great rooms, you may feed stupendously.
The prestigious Michelin Red Guide appears to agree, having granted three Dublin restaurants its coveted stars: two out of a possible three for Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud, two for Thorntons and one for L’Ecrivain. Among these establishments, one can get a fix on just how haute the city’s cuisine has become.
Begin with Guilbaud’s restaurant, now operating next to the world-class Merrion Hotel on Upper Merrion Street. The restaurant relocated in 1997, by which time, says Guilbaud, Dubliners were traveling more and had more money to spend. “They could afford to go to the very best places in Europe and around the world, and when they came to Ireland they expected the same,” he explains. Guilbaud was committed to meeting those heightened expectations, offering what he describes as “modern classic cuisine using Irish produce in season.” If this sounds serious, his restaurant reflects it. Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud is the sort of place where a waiter whisks a domed silver cloche off your dinner plate just as it arrives and where, if there are eight of you, enough staff will gather to do this for everybody in one flourish.
The Guilbaud menu, which I tried at lunch, is comparatively simple. Roast breast of chicken served with asparagus and morel cream sauce. Grilled loin of bluefin tuna “Nicoise.” I had a tarte provençale of vegetables, which was not really a tarte insofar as there was no crust, just vegetables. These were arranged to suggest a tiny pie: eggplant, fennel, olive and tomato gently folded together and topped with four baby fava beans, two slivers of sardine and, last, a tablespoon of parmesan ice cream, which sounds silly but nevertheless worked.
Just a five-minute stroll west of Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud is Dublin’s second two-star. Thorntons is located inside the Fitzwilliam Hotel, overlooking St. Stephen’s Green, a 27-acre oasis of ponds, gardens and pathways in the heart of the city. The restaurant opened in 1995, when Dublin native Kevin Thornton returned to Ireland after working in London, Switzerland and, notably, France, for legendary three-star chef Paul Bocuse.
Of Dublin’s Michelin-starred eateries, Thorntons takes the prize for pure culinary craft. Braised suckling pig with trotter comes with potato, glazed turnips and a light sauce flavored with poitin, an Irish home-brew-style whiskey. A ballotine of slow-cooked guinea fowl is served with a chestnut puree, beetroot dauphinoise and shallot sauce. For my main course -- a sort of master class in lamb on a plate -- Thornton laid out lamb loin, cutlet, kidney, liver and that part of the back which is the most flavorful meat and the most difficult not to turn into shoe leather. Each was prepared differently: the loin roasted to rosy perfection, the cutlet in savory breading and that bit of the back flash-roasted and then wrapped in a tiny parcel of filo.
L’Ecrivain sets itself apart from its Red Guide counterparts by taking itself a shade less seriously. Established in 1989 by chef Derry Clarke, the restaurant is on the top floor of a stone house on Lower Baggot Street, in the heart of Georgian Dublin. It’s a lively room with a hip and friendly staff. Interestingly, L’Ecrivain pulls away from Guilbaud and Thorntons by being more international (cauliflower panna cotta, pine nut tapenade and coriander chutney), while simultaneously advertising its roots in rural Ireland (goat cheese, Castletown Bere crab and crubeens -- the traditional snack of pig’s feet-- among other things). The chicken breast stuffed with black pudding farce was a wink in the direction of that more rustic Ireland. (Black pudding, not a culinary reference for everyone, is in fact a sausage of congealed pig’s blood.) Three bites into that -- a delicious, earthy, gentle set of flavors -- I was more or less sold on L’Ecrivain as the spot to which I would return most readily. This made it a shame that on my fourth bite I hit a tiny stone in the stuffing (possibly bone; there was some dispute). I didn’t break a tooth, but neither did I get an offer that the dish be replaced, much less stroked off the bill for this E45 ($55) lunch. (The headwaiter, upon being informed of my discovery looked horrified and backed away, saying, “Be careful, sir.”) All that was very disappointing in a restaurant that seemed to have such easy charm otherwise.
Charm, of course, is impossible to avoid in Dublin, and a trait hardly limited to the city’s tiny Red Guide club. Travelers should not miss what’s happening just off the Michelin grid.
Three examples, from many. First, Ely’s Wine Bar: a superb, relaxed room on Ely Place, just around the corner from Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud, has a staggering wine list and great food. Try the carpaccio, or the organic bangers and mash made with sausage from the owner’s father’s farm in County Clare, or skip dessert at another restaurant and come here for port and Irish cheeses. Second, Bleu Bistro Moderne: a modern space next to the Lord Mayor’s Manor with big-flavor dishes almost reminiscent of New World cuisine. Try the cassoulet with smoked pork belly, the chicory and blue-cheese salad or the Barbary duck breast with figs served on a chestnut, potato and bacon cake.
Third, Peploe’s Wine Bistro, my favorite of all the places I ate in Dublin. Owner Barry Canny named the place, which opened in January, for the source of its inspiration: the work of impressionist painter Samuel John Peploe. Peploe’s delivers precisely the robust and colorful atmosphere that the turn-of-the-last-century Scottish artist achieved on canvas. And on the plate the diner can discover just what good can come of marrying the noisy, unpretentious environment of a Parisian bistro with the cornucopia of new Ireland. A salad of cèpe mushrooms, arugula and tomato. Oysters on the half shell. Turbot with lobster sauce. Peploe’s may never get a Michelin star, but it doesn’t need one, either.
