Casual venues that cater for diners who don't want traditional three-course meals are on the up, but restaurants are slow to respond, writes Tom Doorley
This time last year, the most talked about new restaurant in Ireland was L'Gueuleton, on Fade Street in Dublin 2. Some complained about the need to queue; others enthused about the food, the prices and the buzz. The point is, it was innovative. In the meantime, there has been nothing quite as radical, and, by and large, Irish restaurateurs seem still content to trot out an old-fashioned formula.
One exception is Boqueria, a dowdy old pub in Cork that was transformed into a tapas bar that combines plenty of Spanish originals with a celebration of local produce. True, I was served manzanilla in a tumbler there the other day. But Boqueria is an exciting example of what can be done, and it is one of the very few tapas establishments worthy of the name in this country.
The old-fashioned restaurant formula - starter, main course and dessert, with a shallow collection of wines from all over the world - is way past its sell-by date. Places such as Boqueria reflect how we live and eat these days; most restaurants seek to impose an outdated system on us.
Just as Dublin chefs were all eating in L'Gueuleton at this time last year, their new off-duty venue seems to be Bistro Sixty6, on South Great George's Street, also in Dublin 2, where, once again, the menu seems to be in tune with what people want. Several readers have been unimpressed, not so much with the service, which is friendly and charming, but with long delays between courses. Latest reports indicate that things have speeded up. This large restaurant is doing something different, providing a menu where starters merge into main courses, and where a lot of sharing goes on. This kind of informality seems to be the way forward, but few restaurants are responding to this new demand.
Mackerel, in the old Bewley's building on Grafton Street in Dublin, another 2005 opening, is a further rare exception. Not only does it do exceptional seafood - which is very thin on the ground in the city - but its menu caters for both grazers and trencherpeople. It's not surprising that Mackerel comes from the same stable as Café Bar Deli, which, although not flawless, has put the cat among the pigeons at the budget end of the market.
Despite high overheads, you could be forgiven for thinking that you can open any old restaurant in Dublin and expect it to flourish. There are simply too many places where the food is average to poor, with scandalous prices. It's not just a case of restaurateurs laughing all the way to the bank and ripping us off. The problem is bigger than that. Restaurants are expensive to run; therefore it costs a lot to eat in them. But too few restaurateurs are passionate about food. Good food for high prices is bad enough; poor food for high prices is robbery.
I have no doubt that the cost of eating out, even when you take overheads into account, is generally too high. But my real gripe with the restaurant industry is that the vast majority of the food they serve is boring, dull, poorly sourced, tarted up, pretentious and insulting to the intelligence.
Judging by correspondence from readers, it seems that a large constituency is prepared to pay high prices for really good food. What they refuse to do is pay high prices for rubbish. In addition to the usual suspects in the premier league, this year has seen Padraig Hayden's food at One Pico (5-6 Molesworth Place, Schoolhouse Lane, Dublin 2) emerge as a new draw at the higher end.Many readers also seem to believe, as I do, that most restaurants are not in tune with how we want to eat. When did you last have a three-course meal at home? Do you find the average main course just too big? Would you prefer to order three or four small dishes to share over a bottle of wine?
The meat-and-three-veg brigade will always be with us (and there are few restaurants in the country that don't offer tasteless under-aged steak in some form or other), but most of us have moved on. The average restaurateur has not.
This is understandable outside the cities. Provincial restaurants, by and large, still offer huge portions because that is what is expected of them. But even in rural towns it seems to be ethnic restaurants that are succeeding, reflecting, perhaps, a disenchantment with lacklustre European food.
The gradual shift to a restaurant model that is more in tune with how people want to eat has started, certainly in Dublin and Cork, but there is a long way to go. If I were investing in the restaurant business I would take the tapas route and insist on quality produce, simply prepared. Add a really good but compact wine list, with lots of stuff by the glass, and it would have a very grateful market.Of course, the way things are, you could probably open a tapas bar with lousy food and dire wine and still do well. But times may be about to change.
let's have less of . . .
• Chefs on television Food piled up in layers • Flavourless meat Spud, carrot and broccoli combos • Supplements on set menus • Sweetcorn and pineapple on pizza (total ban, please) • Redundant mint leaves and redcurrants • Goats' cheese • Chocolate fondant • Lines left open on credit-card slips for gratuities when service is included • Espressos that are actually Americanos • Penalties for wine sold by the glass rather than the bottle • Ostrich, kangaroo and crocodile meat • Gritty risotto • Umpteen fancy breads. How about just one good bread? • Balsamic vinegar • Raw red peppers • Stuff that looks like truffle but doesn't taste of anything • Big, boring wine lists • Waiting staff who say "good choice" when you order • Food as status symbol
let's have more of . . .
Bottarga (salted, pressed, dried roe of grey mullet) • Free-range Irish pork • Cooked radicchio • Tapas • Samphire • Decent house wines at €18 • Fairtrade coffee • Local produce • Properly aged beef (28 days, please) • Broad beans • Less basil, more summer savory, lavender, marjoram, hyssop • Heirloom tomatoes • Farmers at farmers' markets • Seasonality • Ham-hock terrine with sauce gribiche • Avocado oil • Cookbooks by people who actually write the recipes • Wine lists that encourage you to trade up • Smoked eel • Medlars and quinces • Small but perfect cheese selections • New-season garlic Jersey Royals (not too much to ask, as we already have French beans from Kenya) • Purple sprouting broccoli (not calabrese) • Mezze • Snails • Vegetarian restaurants (let's clone Café Paradiso, Denis Cotter's Cork restaurant)