Dublin: Chapter One, at the heart of Ross Lewis's kitchen
ALL of the best restaurants have an air of mystique. From the delicious alchemy through which ingredients are elevated to more than they are, to the emotional click of plates and place, a restaurant’s X-factor is essential to its aftertaste.
But what if you could go behind the scenes, and eat in the kitchen?
That’s the tantalising offer at Chapter One. Its chef’s table places six people in the inner sanctum of one of Ireland’s greatest restaurants. The table is glazed volcanic rock; the seats a chocolate-brown banquette, and the ringside position puts you right at the heart of Ross Lewis’s award-winning kitchen.
It’s a breath-taking mix of food and theatre. Lewis and Martin Corbett (proprietor and maître d’) have poured heart and soul into Chapter One since 1992, turning an inauspicious northside basement into a Michelin Star restaurant that John & Sally McKenna dub “primus inter pares” (first among equals) in Ireland. “To eat here is to eat in one of the greatest restaurants in Irish gastronomic history.”
Chapter One: An Irish Food Story (Gill & Macmillan, €39.99) is the latest string to its bow — a beautifully produced tome that honours its suppliers as much as its dishes. It has brilliantly been dubbed “the source code” of contemporary Irish cooking by Irish Examiner writer Joe McNamee.
No restaurant has done more to elevate Irish artisan producers — from Dermot Carey’s potatoes and Jack McCarthy’s pudding to a charcuterie trolley made from Irish walnut.
And now we’re at the heart of it, sitting at the kitchen table.
It’s a show from the get-go, as we’re introduced to our waiter (James), chef (Andy), and menu (an eight-course taster that promises to showcase the full talents of the team). Stainless steel gleams. Chefs stir and taste. Service staff ferry trays towards the dining room — it’s an enthralling mix of romance and routine.
First up is a burnt onion broth — a variant on French onion soup given a sweet-and-sour kick with the addition of pickled mushrooms and broccoli rabé (a bitter, green-leaf vegetable). Next is a plate of pickled winter vegetables, a tickle of textures ranging from cauliflower, radish and caper sprouts to the salty surprise of smoked almonds and the wintry warmth of a spiced pumpkin puree.
There’s creamed tapioca with spinach and a salty Knockdrinna cheese. There’s also a carpaccio of Tom Durcan’s spiced beef, arranged in velvety petals beneath an arrangement of shave winter vegetables, pickled quail’s egg and chestnut mushrooms. It’s my favourite dish of the evening, and a wonderful palette of Irish artisan producers.
The most substantial dish of the evening sees a superbly tender duck breast served with burnt lemon puree, roasted root vegetables and a crust of caramelised sesame seeds cleverly infused with the flavour of smoked bonito (the tuna fish, whose smoked flakes are a common ingredient in Japanese cooking).
Not everything clicks.
Scallops served in a citrus and vegetable broth are perfectly cooked, for example, but the combination of citrusy broth and diced, crunchy vegetables doesn’t appeal to any of us.
At times, visits from the maître-d and others feel a bit forced. It’s fun being told that Al Pacino sat in our nook, for instance, but some of the one-liners lobbed in by passing staff feel tired and cringey. It is what it is, I guess (and other diners do enjoy the schmoozing). For me, Chapter One is a restaurant I respect more than I love. It’s never pretentious, but I sometimes find the senior service hard to enjoy.
Taken as a whole, however, the backstage experience makes for a fun, indulgent and very educational evening in a restaurant at the top of its game. Each dish arrives with an explanation from the chef, there’s a lovely rapport with a dedicated waiter, matching wines are impeccable, there’s a tour of the stations after service winds down, and we even get to watch the pastry chefs craft their dessert — a decadent composition ‘Flavours of Irish Coffee’.
This is an expensive, once-in-a-lifetime experience, but one Irish foodies will treasure.
The chef’s table menu costs €87pp, with matching wines at €45pp.
Food: 8½/10
Ambiance: 9/10
Value: 8/10
Service: 8/10
Wine: 9/10
