Waterford: White Horses Restaurant has substance, like a fine red wine
IT’S hard not to think, for a happily unreconstructed, galvanised (double-dip) throwback like me, anyway, that the lads playing for Brazil and Chile in tonight’s World Cup clash in Belo Horizonte would be white-wine men. After all, some of them have had girlfriends called Chardonnay. There seems a lightness, a too-shiny sheen, and a puppyishness about them that might be overwhelmed by a Malbec or a Rioja. The consequences of an Amarone hardly bear thinking about. And they do seem to fall over an awful lot and rather too easily.
The converse, in my head, at least, is that the solid, 19-stone Frenchmen or Basques you’d meet around Stade Mayol or Stade Aime Giral, on one of those legendary European Cup sorties, would be red wine men. Grand Vin de Bordeaux even sounds meatier on the ear than an Alsace Pinot Blanc, no matter how wonderful or beguiling the white might be.
Substance over delicacy? Backbone over subtlety? Your guess, your view, is as good as mine.
And even if this is just another way to express my, ’em, world view, it still seems true. Certain types, certain cultures, and even certain places can be defined by their choice of food and drink — Northern Europe has herrings in a million ways, Southern Europe has anchovies in ten million ways, but always, always with olive oil. Munich’s Oktoberfest celebrates beer in a way that makes the Arthur’s Day marketing swizz seem a Baptist revivalist camp meeting in one of the 200 US counties where alcohol is still banned. In Korea, they eat dogs; some of us remember dogs in our will.
Using that kind of criteria in the most general way, and because the World Cup has such an impact on popular culture, a beautiful, sunny June evening at a lovely seaside restaurant seemed to sing out for a chilled, pert white wine. And so it was, but more of that later.
Some online sites, the ones where people tell each other about how wonderful, or otherwise, their holidays were, all behind a shield of venom-fuelling anonymity, describe White Horses as the best restaurant in Ardmore. As one of its neighbours is the highly-regarded Cliff House, that’s a plucky call, but after a lovely evening there I can see why someone would say that. To stretch the ‘white wine, red wine’ analogy, Cliff House is a fine white-wine venue, White Horses a lovely red-wine venue, with substance and plenty of subtlety, too.
For starters, DW indulged her enthusiasm for crab claws and, despite warnings about seasonality from Castletownbere, she was given a very generous plate of beautifully cooked, tasty and fleshy claws. If, as the season passes, they get better, then White Horses patrons really have something to look forward to. I chose chowder. Chowder is something a lot of people cook with enthusiasm, but it is a dish that, more than most, requires an equilibrium, an inner structure that works. It needs to add up and this pretty, traditional iteration did that splendidly. Substance, but with plenty of subtlety, texture and character.
For her main course, DW chose roast duck with caramelised orange and kumquat sauce. It was straight-down-the-middle traditional, but very well done and entirely satisfying. I had a wonderful plate of fillet steak Florentine with melted, Cashel Blue cheese. Hardly the plate of lightness a Chardonnay might ask for to celebrate a win in Brazil, but I’d have it again tonight, if I could. It was a wonderful use of very good beef.
At White Horses, you choose desserts from a display cabinet and this can be very challenging for the indecisive. DW chose, and was delighted by, Charlotte Russe. I asked for simple ice cream and meringue and, to continue the wonderful service offered all night long, I was asked if I’d like soft or hard meringue. Being a red wine man...
The only glitch in the evening was my fault. I chose a wine unequal to the task set for it by duck and streak — Colle Papa Frascati Superiore is, like the World Cup, enjoyed by millions, but maybe a shade or two on the light side to feed the soul.
Dinner for two, three courses with wine, coffee and tea, came to €123, tip extra.
Summer — Tuesday to Sunday, lunch from 12.30pm to 3.30pm; dinner from 6pm to 10pm. Winter — Friday from 6 pm, Saturday 11am to 11pm, and Sunday 12pm to 6pm.
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