EATING OUT: You can shop till you drop in Dundrum Town Centre, but you have to hunt for good food, writes Tom Doorley
Dundrum Town Centre is not a man's natural habitat. The place is crammed with clothes shops, shoe shops and accessories shops. And if you look carefully at the map of the shopping centre you will find that a whole section of the development, called Fashion Avenue, has yet to open. Clearly, that's what the place needs. More fashion outlets. It has only, oh, several dozen at the moment.
Actually, what Dundrum Town Centre really needs is more places to eat. There's a constant queue at Paul Rankin's sandwich bar, and come 12.30pm every other food outlet has one, too. Mao and Dunne & Crescenzi have yet to open, but even then it's going to be every man for himself - or, much more likely, every woman for herself - when it gets to lunchtime.
On the third level there's a vast feeding operation that rejoices in the slightly unlikely name of Frango's World Cuisine (frango is, at least, Portuguese for chicken). Here you can queue up for various forms of stir-fry (all a rather unattractive beige when I called), grilled meats, salads, pizzas and tapas.
Frango's may be the new Restaurant Patrick Guildbaud for all I know, as I didn't taste a morsel of its grub. I'm afraid a quick trot through the victuals on offer put me off my feed. But I paused to marvel at the, er, tapas. These included that staple of fashionable Jerez tables, pickled onions. And those little pastry cases filled with piped pâté that were big in Goatstown in 1968. And sun-dried tomatoes (ah, how often we find ourselves yearning for a sun-dried tomato) and chorizo and ham and, er, what was this: small white cylinders marinated in oil?
The woman in front of me actually asked the question. The bloke behind the counter remained silent for just too long, his expression a picture of mental turmoil. "I'm going to find out for you!" he announced with knightly gallantry. He then saw me peering at the display and raised a helpful eyebrow.
"Are these your tapas?" I asked, still amazed that such a weedy selection could claim the name. "Yes," he snapped, like a starting pistol, clearly having been interviewed by other sceptics on the same topic. I think the white things may have been palm hearts, by the way.
Anyway, the solution to eating problems at Dundrum Town Centre is quite simple. Go early and make your way to Café Mimo, on the top floor of House of Fraser. The food is decent and unpretentious, the staff are outstandingly cheerful and friendly, and the prices are keen by Dublin standards.
Our family outing descended on Café Mimo with hearty appetites; the parents were also in need of a glass of wine, which was administered swiftly. A panino of lemony, marinated grilled chicken with crunchy salad was first-class and, at €7.90, a very decent lunch.
Even better were the steak sandwiches consumed by father and youngest daughter. At €9.75, these comprised a big chunk of ciabatta sliced in half and filled with slices of pink meat that were pepped up with pesto and caramelised onion. The pesto was not perfect: the Parmesan or the olive oil had oxidised. Perhaps they need a sharper palate in the kitchen. These chunky and pretty substantial sangers came with chips - oh, all right, French fries - which youngest daughter described, rather aptly, as "like McDonald's, but they taste better".
There was also a deep bowl of very good vegetable soup, which had the gentle spiciness of parsnip and the sweetness of swede and carrot. And a large feta salad, with lots of young rocket leaves, caramelised walnuts and dried cranberries, was funkily attractive, right down to the very fine and very fresh slices of red onion. I am always astonished at how many restaurants don't understand that an onion, once cut, is already going off.
With one Coca-Cola, a hot chocolate and a bottle of red wine (at €25.50), the bill for this pretty substantial lunch for five came to €76.80. And there's no charge for the impressive view if you manage to get a table on the higher level.
WINE CHOICE The Oxford Companion to Wine says that less than 3 per cent of wine from Spain's Empordà-Costa Brava region is exported. Café Mimo is unlucky enough to have some of it in the form of Espelt Sauló (€25.50), a very tannic red that is simply not worth the money. Of all the wines in all the world, how did they choose this one? The list of 10 wines includes the pleasant enough Norte Chico, from Chile, both Merlot and Sauvignon, at €21.50; an unspecified Pinot Grigio (people drink this ultrafashionable grape, not the producer, I suppose) at a steep €28; and, unusually, a ripe claret-like Pecharmant for €29.50.