Cork: Living the high life in El Vino
El Vino is a nice place to idle away an evening and it has cheery, helpful staff, which is always a plus, but never guaranteed. Picture: Denis Minihane
THE restaurant El Vino is pinned under the gargantuan Elysian Towers, just as I imagine dinosaur eggs might have nestled under their mammoth, scaly mothers — glazed like skyscrapers — hundreds of millions years ago.
A relatively tiny, pulsing thing, almost crushed by the great mass of glass and concrete above, it hardly seems proportionate to its setting. If it was indeed an egg you’d cock your ears waiting for the any-minute-now crack.
The Elysian mother ship dominates its space like few other modern buildings in Ireland and it has, sadly, become an icon for our wild, build-it-and-they-will-come years.
The grandeur of its ambition is matched — and very often surpassed — by the scepticism it provokes, but it is a pity that it fell victim to The Catastrophe, because it could have redefined Cork City and the communities at its heart. Who is to say it may not yet do that?
That is the ubër romantic view; a hard-nosed one might be less forgiving especially as the building just recently ticked another set of the boxes needed to make it a gold-standard Celtic Tiger white elephant when loans associated with it were sold by Nama to the US investment firm, Blackstone.
El Vino is a mid-range restaurant, pleasant, high-ceilinged, all wood and glass, and shelves of shining wine bottles calling like the river Sirens who lured so many Greek sailors into the kind of fantasy that prevented them reaching the afterlife’s Elysian fields.
It offers a menu aimed at lubricating and supporting a social evening rather than one that might define the experience.
It is a place where, and this is not in any way derogatory, friends first come to meet, and then eat and drink. After all, what could be a better way to spend an evening?
This was confirmed on the night DW and I visited, as there were two parties of old friends, a generation apart — one, I imagine, dependent on babysitters, the other brought their children — but the dining room was not full and the upstairs tables were not needed. Elysian occupancy levels, as it were.
DW began with butternut squash and chickpea falafels, which were utterly harmless and unchallenging, though they had a lovely texture.
I chose mussels with coconut, coriander and spring onion.
As is so often the case, the idea of mussels — salty, sea-fresh globules of zing — was a fathom or two better than the reality. Nothing wrong; just dull, dull, dull.
For her main course, DW chose pan-fried Barbary duck breast with beetroot gratin, spinach and a port jus.
Though we were promised it would be medium, not pink, it was as well done, to the point that it took on that dry, we-surrender texture and taste that should not define a piece of meat taken from a bird’s breast.
My main course — scallop and scallion parpadelle pasta — was lovely. Rich and creamy, with layer upon layer of taste, it was very pleasing. A highlight.
Desserts — the so-classic-it’s-almost-naff Baked Alaska and a dark chocolate fondant — were good, hardly spectacular, but as good as anything you could expect for €6.
The wine, chosen from a good range of options, was Villa Huesgen By the Glass Riesling, from Mosel, Germany.
It was €24.95 and, though wine opinions are subjective, it was pretty disappointing. So much so that we did not even finish the bottle, which seems a damming indictment to me.
El Vino is a nice place to idle away an evening and it has cheery, helpful staff, which is always a plus, but never guaranteed.
Even if the food may not be premier division, it, like that of many other restaurants, meets its mid-range target well enough.
Dinner for two, three courses with wine and coffee, came to €95.45. Tip extra.
Monday: 10am to 3.30pm; Tuesday to Thursday, 10am to 9.30pm; Friday, 10am to 10pm; Saturday, 5pm to 10pm; Closed Sundays.
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