Cork: Exotic, exquisite
They have near made a virtue of the restricted space in Orso. With Moorish-style tiling and soft twinkling lights, it is akin to stumbling on a narrow little old-town bar in southern Spain. Picture: Denis Minihane
WERE an estate agent to set about flogging the merits of the premises that house Orso, you can be sure b, i, j, ó and u would be plucked out of the Scrabble bag once again. The same little site has seen several food ventures stumble fatally in the past but this one comes with the Market Lane imprimatur, a mightily efficient restaurant machine operating successfully around the corner ón Oliver Plunkett St and in the Castle Cafe in Blackrock Castle, not at all inclined to dally with failure. But while those two focus on a cuisine more familiar to native Irish punters, Orso has plumped for immersion in the more exotic realms of ‘Middle Eastern’ cookery, enjoying something of a revival at the moment. It is difficult to pin down precisely what that is but it does include a shared palette of hot climate, spices and lots of yoghurt. Orso give themselves further wiggle room by adding in southern Mediteranean influences as well.
