Dublin restaurants

101 Talbot

100-102 Talbot Street. Phone: 874 5011. Price: £28 ($44) for two. All major cards. (B1).

A vegetarian restaurant near OConnell Street. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Ante Room

20 Lower Baggot Street. Phone: 660 4716. Hours: Closed Saturday & Sunday lunch. Price: £53 ($83) for two. All major cards. (B2).

Some of the best seafood in town is served at this rather expensive cellar restaurant in the Georgian House hotel in the main street of music pubs. The cooking is simple and solid, resulting in tasteful food when the kitchen is not overwhelmed by the arrival of groups.

The furnishings are rough and the seating is tight on bare chairs of wood, when there are groups. On the other hand this is also a romantic place for candlelight dinners. It is several small rooms which camouflage its size. Service is knowledgeable.

- Crab clams in garlic butter.

- Mussels in the shell.

- Kings scallops cooked in white wine, with cream sauce and piped potatoes.

- Pan-fried tiger prawns in garlic, with leeks and pasta.

- Boned and oven baked Dover sole with lemon butter.

- Chocolate cake.

- Ice cream with caramel parfait.

Ayumi-Ya

132 Lower Baggot Street. Phone: 662 0233. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £30 ($47) for two. All major cards. (B2).

A Japanese restaurant in a main street of central Dublin. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Bewleys

78-79 Grafton Street. Phone: 677 6761. Fax: 677 4021. Price: £17 ($27) for two. All major cards. (B2).

The inexpensive café is directly on the pedestrian Grafton Street. It has for a long time been the favorite resting place of citizens on downtown shopping visits and the favorite place for visitors reading the Sunday newspapers. It is the mother location of several cafés of the same chain, a breakfast room, a café and a lunch restaurant in one.

There is a bakery in front. Behind it and above it are three self-service places and two with service. The best place for a café with scones or muffins is at the marble tables at the first floor windows to the street. The furnishings are most beautiful in the very popular ground floor restaurant behind the bakery, with large and stained windows above thick and red sofas.

- Coffee and tea of several types.

- Porridge.

- Scones and muffins.

- Eggs and bacon.

- Lunch salads.

Blazing Salads

Powerscourt Townhouse Centre. Phone: 671 9552. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £15 ($23) for two. All major cards. (A1).

The best vegetarian restaurant is an inexpensive self-service room on the second floor of the Powerscourt shopping mall. It specializes in freshly pressed fruit juices, organic wines, several courses of the day and an extensive choice of salads. Sugar is replaced by honey, and animal broths by vegetable broths. Most of the guests are young and healthy people.

The wooden furnishings are rough, open partitions, lacquered floors, massive table-tops on lathed feet and wooden chairs with wicker bottoms. Most people opt for the offerings of the day which are chalked on a blackboard above the counter. There is also a menu with conventional items of the vegetarian type.

- Ccouscous with harissa = cooked vegetables with sweet and strong paprika sauce.

- Vegetables in seaweed.

- Tabbouleh = salad in oil with cracked wheat, tomatoes and vegetables.

- Potato salad.

- Bean purée.

- Turnip cake with whipped cream.

Casablanca

22 Temple Bar. Phone: 679 9996. Price: £33 ($52) for two. All major cards. (A1).

A Morocco restaurant in the main restaurant street. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Cave

28 South Anne Street. Phone: 679 4409. Hours: Closed Sunday lunch. Price: £34 ($53) for two. All major cards. (B2).

One of the coziest restaurants in the center, an inexpensive French bistro in a tiny cellar for up to 30 guests, just off Grafton Street. Edith Piaf and other French chansonists are softly played and French poems are read Sunday nights. This is an embassy of French cuisine, the left bank of the Seine on the right bank of the Liffey.

It is dark and red. Walls, carpets, napkins and lamp shades are red, sofas and baluster chairs are dark. The tables are clothed in white and red. The bar dominates the scene. There are lots of bread and butter. Service is quick and good, not included in the price so you have to add it to the bill.

- Tabbouleh = salad in oil with cracked wheat, tomatoes and green leaves.

- Terrine de campagne = country paté.

- Cassoulet de fruits de mer = pan-fried mussels, shrimp, squid and sole.

- Braised lamb.

- Bordalou pie = peach pie with peach purée.

Cedar Tree

11a St Andrews Street. Phone: 677 2121. Hours: Closed lunch. Price: £35 ($55) for two. All major cards. (B1).

A few steps from College Green. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Chicago Pizza Pie Factory

St Stephens Green. Phone: 478 1233. Fax: 478 1550. Price: £34 ($53) for two. All major cards. (B2).

The best pizzas in the center are in a rather inexpensive cellar restaurant near the corner of St Stephens Green and Grafton Street. These are thick pizzas in the Chicago way. It is a family place where children are cosseted. They get large balloons and their favorite food, from pizzas to ice-creams. Pizzas at £4 for one, £8 for two and £ 12 for three are quickly devoured.

The main attribute is a large glass partition between restaurant and bar, with 700-800 bottles of spirits. The restaurant is tall and wide, with American posters and traffic signs on red walls. The table-clothes are in massive red and green colors. And there is a nice parquet on the floor. Service is very friendly and rather unschooled.

- Mushrooms filled with butter, grated bread, cheese and garlic.

- Greek summer salad, with iceberg lettuce, olives, feta-cheese, cucumber and tomato.

- Chocolate cake with chocolate sauce.

- Several varieties of pizza.

Commons

Newman House, 85-86 St Stephens Green. Phone: 475 2597. Fax: 478 0551. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £65 ($102) for two. All major cards. (B2).

A smart restaurant at St Stephens Green. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Cookes Café

14 South William Street. Phone: 679 0536. Fax: 679 0546. Price: £84 ($131) for two. All major cards. (A1).

One of the most fashionable restaurants with gourmet pretensions in town is a small and simple restaurant corner with elevated prices. It has enormous windows in front of the entrance to the Powerscourt shopping center. The guests are talkative and devour olives while waiting for the food. They do not linger as there are several sittings each night.

Mediterranean landscapes are painted directly on the walls. Venetian blinds make the windows softer. The kitchen is in plain view. The customers sit tightly on hard chairs at linoleum table-tops on a tiled floor. This succeeds in conveying a Mediterranean atmosphere. The cooking is Italianate Californian, good cooking with Hollywood headlines. The bread is home-made.

- Smoked cod roe paste from a commercial tube, with crème fraiche.

- Red pepper soup with feta cheese.

- Pan-fried sea bass with pepper, tomato, white wine, olive oil and spices.

- Grilled partridge with lemon thyme butter.

- Blueberries with whipped cream and vanilla sauce.

Cornucopia

19 Wicklow Street. Phone: 677 7583. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £22 ($34) for two. All major cards. (B2).

A practical restaurant in the very center of Dublin. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Dobbins

15 Stephens Lane, Upper Mount Street. Phone: 676 4679. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £50 ($78) for two. All major cards. (B2).

A wine bistro a few steps from Merrion Square. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Eastern Tandoori

34-35 South William Street. Phone: 671 0428. Fax: 677 9232. Hours: Closed Sunday lunch. Price: £45 ($70) for two. All major cards. (A2).

A few steps from the charming Powerscourt shopping mall. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Elephant & Castle

18 Temple Bar. Phone: 679 3121. Price: £48 ($75) for two. All major cards. (A1).

A fashionable, youthful and lively place with superior cooking at medium prices, sitting directly on Temple Bar. It is always full, new guests immediately replacing those who leave. Tables are not booked and guests wait at the opposite pub for a vacant table and are then fetched by the waiters.

The furnishings are informal, with bare table-tops, tight chairs and lots of conversation noise. Men take off their jackets. The service is quick and to the point, perfectly fitting the clientele. The cooking is first class, reminiscent of the Hard Rock Cafés. The produce is well chosen and the kitchen is in the hands of young chefs on their way up.

- Corn chowder.

- Mexican chili soup.

- Guacamole sandwich.

- Fettucine with chicken.

- Beef, grilled to order.

- Hamburgers.

Flanagans

61 Upper OConnell Street. Phone: 873 1388. Price: £25 ($39) for two. All major cards. (B1).

An economical restaurant on the main street north of Liffey. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Fréres Jacques

74 Dame Street. Phone: 679 4555. Fax: 679 4725. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch and Sunday . Price: £54 ($84) for two. All major cards. (A1).

Top gastronomic grades go to a rather expensive French restaurant opposite Dublin Castle and City Hall. The entrance is from an alley leading off Dame Street. It is a long and narrow room with a bar in the middle and seating at both ends.

The furnishings are French and the table service is elegant. Service is French and courteous, softened by Irish conviviality. This is such a cozy place that many clients come and dine alone to catch a glimpse of the real atmosphere of gastronomy. The cuisine ranges from classical to nouvelle.

- Mussels in tomato sauce.

- Duck liver in port sauce.

- Lamb liver with chanterelles.

- Mussel and fennel soup.

- Sea trout with ham.

- Chicken breast with curry and mango sauce.

- Warm rice pudding with apricots.

- Raspberry mousse Romanoff with strawberries and redcurrants.

Gallaghers

20-21 Temple Bar. Phone: 677 2762. Price: £43 ($67) for two. All major cards. (A1).

Irish peasant cooking is best represented at this popular place of medium prices, in the midst of the Temple Bar restaurant area.

The place is dark and tight, with old walls and floors of wood, really comfortable. Irish ballads are played softly and the fireplace is in constant use, also at lunch. The reception is Irish and congenial and the room is full most of the time. You can wait in the opposite pub to be fetched by a waiter when a table is ready.

- Irish clear soup.

- Butter bean paste with thick rye bread.

- Lamb boxty with yogurt and mint sauce with red cabbage, cauliflower and turnips.

- Beef boxty with horseradish sauce.

- Bean boxty.

- Irish stew.

- Cauliflower with bacon.

- Bread- and butter pudding with raisins, whipped cream and egg whites.

Boxty are thick and leathery pancakes, made of potato dough. Formerly poor people ate boxty as they were, but now they are used with variable fillings. Formerly no wheat was used, as it was scarce and expensive, but now it is mixed in the dough.

Gastrognome

4 Nassau Street. Phone: 679 5123. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £30 ($47) for two. All major cards. (B1).

A few steps from Trinity College. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Good World

18 South Great Georges Street. Phone: 677 5373. Price: £22 ($34) for two. All major cards. (A1).

The best Chinese restaurant in town, an inexpensive place on one of the major traffic streets in the center, just east off Dublin Castle. This is a happy restaurant for whole families, liveliest at Sunday lunch, when Chinese extended families are dining out on various dim sum. At than occasion everyone seems to know everyone else.

It is rather well designed by Chinese standards, with solid furnishings and a floor carpet. There are few of the Chinese decorations that dominate lesser places of the kind.

Won Ton = deep-fried and crisp. Cheung Fung = rolled pancakes of rice floor, filled with pork. Char Siu = deep-fried meatballs.

Dim sum arrive in towers of steaming metal pots. Some dim sum are steamed, others are deep-fried. Some are soft, others are hard. Some are sweet, others are sour. Some are strong, others are mild. The guests chose from the arriving food, building up a variety of courses on those tables, where there are many people. Rice and jasmine or green tea accompany the dim sum.

Gotham Café

8 South Anne Street. Phone: 679 5266. Price: £44 ($69) for two. All major cards. (B2).

An American style in the Grafton Street pedestrian area. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Grey Door

23 Upper Pembroke Street. Phone: 766 3286. Fax: 676 3287. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch and Sunday. Price: £60 ($94) for two. All major cards. (B2).

One of the noblest restaurants in the center, a rather expensive hotel dining room in a quiet district of 18th C. houses between Baggot Street and Leeson Street, specializing in Russian and Finnish cooking.

The restaurant is in three parts on the first floor, a red, a blue and a green room. Old paintings decorated the walls, chandeliers in the ceiling, thick white linen on the tables and comfortable, blue chairs. Downstairs is the more informal Blushes, using the same kitchen.

- Blini = Russian pancakes with smoked salmon, sturgeon caviar and salmon roes.

- Calf liver paté with raspberry jam, toast and salad.

- Salmon soup with onion, cucumber and capers.

- Lightly smoked salmon, oven-baked under a roof of cheese, crab and herbs with crème fraiche and dill.

- Braised leg of lamb in garlic fumé with new, unpeeled potatoes.

- Beef and salmon slices with mustard and mushroom sauce.

- Desserts from the trolley.

Imperial

12a Wicklow Street. Phone: 677 2580. Fax: 671 9127. Price: £36 ($56) for two. All major cards. (B1).

A good and inexpensive Chinese restaurant a few steps from Grafton Street.

It looks modern and Western, almost devoid of Chinese decorations. Still, many of the customers are from Canton or Hong Kong, especially at Sunday lunch. The menu concentrates on Canton cuisine, including almost 40 different Dim Sum lunch snacks.

- Steamed prawn butterflies.

- Deep-fried oxtail dumplings.

- Rice in lotus leaves.

- Bean paté.

- Boiled beef.

Kilkenny Kitchen

6-10 Nassau Street. Phone: 677 7066. Fax: 677 7066. Hours: Closed dinner & Sunday. Price: £10 ($16) for two. All major cards. (B1).

A first floor restaurant overlooking the Trinity university. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

King Sitric

East Pier, Howth. Phone: 832 6729. Fax: 839 2442. Hours: Closed Sunday, and in winter for lunch. Price: £60 ($94) for two. All major cards.

The city railway track ends at the boat harbor of Howth, immediately north of Dublin. At the northern end of the pier is an old-fashioned and excellent seafood restaurant, rather expensive, but worth the price.

It is small and tight, with heavy curtains, as if in pre-war Middle Europe. A very civilized inspector welcomes the guests and takes care of everything. The cooking is old-fashioned, but the material is fresh, as a lot of fish is landed here. The inspector knows what to recommend each day. The wine list is one of the best in the country.

- Smoked Ireland salmon with capers and onions.

- Wild mushroom purée.

- Poached skate with capers.

- Scallops with nectarines and herb sauce.

- Ice-cream with meringue and chocolate sauce.

LEcrivain

112 Lower Baggot Street. Phone: 661 1919. Fax: 676 7488. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £50 ($78) for two. All major cards. (B2).

A classic French restaurant in the main pub street of Dublin. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Leo Burdocks

2 Werburgh Street. Phone: 454 03306. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch & Sunday. Price: £6 ($9) for two. No cards. (A2).

A seafood take-away. You just walk to the garden of nearby St Patricks to enjoy your lunch. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Lord Edward

23 Christchurch Place. Phone: 454 2420. Hours: Closed Sunday-Monday and at lunch Saturday. Price: £55 ($86) for two. All major cards. (A1).

A traditional seafood restaurant with medium prices opposite Christ Church, at lunchtime resembling a lawyers club, partly because of the short distance from the Four Courts palace. The bar is on the first floor and the restaurant on the second in a narrow house with steep stairs. For decades this has been the established seafood restaurant in town.

The tables are of sand-blown wood. The carpet is beautiful and there are sofas under the oriel windows. Service is old-fashioned and good, using plate service in the pre-war manner. The cooking is a little overdone but otherwise simple, concentrating on good products which arrive twice a day. The menu is mainly based on six types of seafood and three or four cooking methods.

- Prawn bisque.

- Avocado stuffed with shrimp and crab.

- Grilled sea-trout with lightly steamed vegetables and mashed potatoes.

- Grilled turbot with lightly steamed vegetables and mashed potatoes.

- Meringue with ice-cream, fruit and whipped cream.

- Crème brulée with fruit and whipped cream.

Old Dublin

90-91 Francis Street. Phone: 454 2028. Fax: 454 2330. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £14 ($22) for two. All major cards. (A2).

Near St Patricks. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Omar Khayyam

51 Wellington Quay. Phone: 677 5758. Fax: 679 7560. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £35 ($55) for two. All major cards. (A1).

A Middle Eastern restaurant on the Liffey bank. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

Patrick Guilbaud

46 James Place / Lower Baggot Street. Phone: 676 4192. Fax: 660 1546. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £89 ($139) for two. All major cards. (B2).

The best restaurant in Dublin and one of the most expensive is in a specially designed house in a small street behind the modern Baggot Street building of the Irish Bank. The net result of the design is to convey a certain coolness in spite of the mild and yellow colors. There is a bright bar in front and a dining room with a glass roof in back.

This is a working place for real professionals, even if rather impersonal professionals. Every thread from the design through the cuisine to the service is meant to support the notion of a temple of gastronomy. This is a temple of French cooking, where the exact organization serves the art, not the other way round. The chef-owner is Patrick Guilbaud.

- Chicken liver and shrimp paté.

- Scallop pot.

- Black sausage.

- Steamed sea trout with piped potatoes and saffron, red-pepper sauce.

- Wild goose breast with figs.

- Grilled beef with glazed turnips.

- Pear pie.

- Chocolate and raspberry cake.

Periwinkle

Powerscourt Townhouse Centre. Phone: 679 4203. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £8 ($12) for two. All major cards. (A2).

A quaint little seafood corner on the ground floor of the Powerscourt shopping center offers some of the freshest fish in town.

Diners sit on high and low, wooden taborets at narrow and lacquered wooden wall-tables in a few vaulted nooks on tiled floors under obvious external piping. The catch of the day is chalked on a blackboard above the counter. There are always some varieties of shellfish.

- Fish chowder with home-made rye bread.

- Crab claws, shrimp and mussels with home-made rye bread.

- Fish salad with shrimp, mussels and cod.

- Fresh sole in cheese mousse casserole.

- Crab claws in garlic butter.

Pigalle

14 Temple Bar, Merchants Arch. Phone: 671 92262. Hours: Closed Saturday lunch and Sunday. Price: £46 ($72) for two. All major cards. (A1).

One of the few top-class French bistros in Dublin is exactly on Temple Bar, in a rustic first-floor room, with variable furniture and table-service. The French cuisine specializes in game and unusual products. This place tickles the taste-buds.

The ceiling is black and the walls of brick are white, Heavy curtains are on the outside and a dark pine wall on the inside. Plants are hanging from the ceiling. The tables are decked out in white. The service is knowledgeable, with Irish warmth and conviviality adding to the sensitive cooking. The menu price is fixed, with a choice of starters, main courses and desserts.

- Crème de carotte a lOrange = cream soup of turnips and oranges.

- Salade tiede de calamares = octopus salad with melted butter.

- Caille rotie aux poivre vert = Roasted quail with green pasta stripes.

- Supreme de pintade duxelle de champignons et vin blanc = slices of guinea hen with mushroom and white wine dressing.

- Sorbet aux fruits rouges = red fruit sorbet.

- Mousse aux framboises = raspberry mousse.

Rajdoot

26-28 Clarendon Street, Westbury Centre. Phone: 679 4274. Price: £48 ($75) for two. All major cards. (A2).

The main showcase of Indian cooking is at a medium-priced restaurant in the Westbury hotel complex, a few steps from Grafton Street. The leading Indian restaurants of London are no better than this one, specializing in Tandoori cooking.

It is very much a designed place. Guests enter a bar level with deep chairs and heavy paneling, pewter and brass on the tables, before they step down to the carpeted restaurant level with carvings on the walls and beautifully laid-out tables. The menu is extensive, offering most of the well-known Indian dishes. There are also some fixed offers.

- Shis kabab = lamb on skewers.

- Prawn kabab = prawn on skewers.

- Lamb korma = lamb in yogurt.

- Tandoori chicken = chicken, coated in curry and yogurt, baked in a Tandoor oven.

- Pillau = cooked rice.

- Biryani = rice in saffron.

Russell Room

Westbury Hotel, Grafton Street. Phone: 679 1122. Price: £55 ($86) for two. (B2).

The luxury restaurant of the Westbury hotel, with elegant carpets, lots of flower arrangements, chandeliers and beautiful chairs.

It is one of the most beautiful restaurants in Dublin and rather expensive, though not as expensive as could be expected. Service is good and the atmosphere is light in spite of the subdued elegance of the room.

- Foi de canard = duck paté.

- Prune soup.

- Grilled beef with cauliflower and vegetable threads.

- Crusted duck with lemon, lime and coriander.

- Sea trout with hazelnuts and honey sauce.

- Strawberry pastry with strawberry sauce.

Sandbank

Westbury Hotel, Grafton Street. Phone: 679 1122. Price: £39 ($61) for two. (B2).

The medium-priced and popular restaurant in the Westbury hotel, a few steps off Grafton Street is a busy and a beautiful place.

Stained glass in windows and partitions, as well as illuminated mirrors enhance the decorations. Green sofas are supported by heavy, carved furniture of wood. The naked tables are also made of heavy wood. The waiters wear straw hats and long aprons. The atmosphere is animated and relaxed, especially at busy times which are common.

- Vol-au-vent = seafood in pastry.

- Oak-smoked salmon.

- Liver paté of the house.

- Gratinated seafood.

- Wild Ireland salmon.

- French mousses, cakes and puddings.

Stampa

35 Dawson Street. Phone: 677 8611. Fax: 677 3336. Price: £67 ($105) for two. All major cards. (B2).

The most beautiful dining room in Ireland is at this French restaurant with an Italian name in a street parallel to Grafton Street. The prices are as high as the ceiling in this singular room. A permanent commotion reigns, combining the chatter of the guests and the resonance on the wood-floor from quick steps of the busy waiters who gradually lose control of the situation.

The place is spacious and there is an immense ceiling window. Giant mirrors on both sides multiply the space. The pilaster between the mirrors are continued in red ribs in the ceiling. Plants and flowers abound, and an ocean of candles increases the romantic atmosphere. Service tries its best to cope, but does not quite succeed. The elevated cuisine fits the surroundings.

- Marinated mushrooms with parmesan flakes and olive oil on salad.

- Fettucine with tomato sauce, Toulouse sausages and coriander.

- Lobster soup.

- Rib of lamb with piped potatoes and a big tomato filled with spinach purée.

- Baccalao on piped potatoes surrounded with bacon.

- Thin melon slices with mint-flavored créme fraiche.

- Caramel pudding.

Unicorn

12b Merrion Court / Merrion Row. Phone: 676 2182. Hours: Closed Sunday. Price: £18 ($28) for two. All major cards. (B2).

A low price restaurant for trendy people. (Shortlisted for evaluation and inclusion)

1996

© Jónas Kristjánsson