Restaurant review: Marco Pierre White’s Bar and Grill, Dublin 2
What’s in a name? If yours is a byword for fame based on culinary skill and a reputation as a successful restaurateur, then there’s a lot riding on having your name emblazoned over the restaurant door.
And in this case too, there is history to contend with — Marco Pierre White was the youngest British chef to win three Michelin stars — he is viewed as a ‘celebrity’ chef, he’s a television ‘personality’, and was once known as the enfant terrible of the UK restaurant community.
Certainly, White has come a long way from leaving his council estate home in Leeds in the late 1970s without any educational qualifications. Not that he wasted time in making his way up the ladder.
Learning his craft in the presence of Michel Roux and Raymond Blanc in the early-mid 80s and opening up his own Michelin-grabbing kitchens in the late 80s, White has seen them come and go.
But then – following a reputation that had him viewed as hubristic, at very least – he handed back his Michelin stars, retired from working in the kitchen, and transformed himself into a restaurateur.
And so here we are. It’s our first time in the Marco Pierre White Steakhouse & Grill, a joint that has been on Dublin’s Dawson Street since 2009, and the fact that it’s still here is testament to many things, primarily its quality.
While the Irish weather is rarely conducive to al fresco dining, there is a covered and extremely well heated outside space for diners who might like to light up a cigarette after polishing off a steak.
We prefer to go inside, away from the fag ash and the chilly summer evening, and are greeted with the kind of interior that wouldn’t look out of place in London’s Soho, circa 1980.
In fact, it reminds me, ever so slightly, of a London brasserie operated, back in the day, by Peter Stringfellow.
(How do I know this? Don’t ask…) I say ‘ever so slightly’ because the interior hints at celebrity status (always a bad thing), without ever pitching itself as such (a good thing).
Yes, there are framed monochrome photos all around the walls depicting famous people at brunch, lunch and dinner, but it’s all quite retro and merely adds to the genial atmosphere.
We are with a group of friends, catching up after months (and months) of being out of touch, and the overall ambience of the room adds to the occasion.
Factor in that we arrive on time for the Early Bird menu (one course, €16.95, two courses, €21.95, three courses €26.95 — the latter two of which are exceptionally good value), and you have a couple of hours yakking and eating that won’t break the bank.
We share some starters (including shrimp cocktail, asparagus, with sauce hollandaise, seared flat iron steak salad – all of which receive a collective thumbs-up), and then await our mains.
These include fried haddock and chips (with mushy peas and sauce tartare), pan seared organic salmon (with warm potato salad and lemon beurre blanc), honey roasted pork belly (with bubble & squeak, Bramley apple, creamed cabbage and bacon), and— well, we are where we are — sirloin steak (with sauce béarnaise, frites, and a side order for a supplementary €5). Between the six of us, only one chose a dessert: rhubarb mess.
Because we are all eminently sensible, have children to tend to the next day, and have cars to drive, we order two reasonably priced bottles of wine (very much Vin Ordinaire, if I’m to be honest) between us.
We conclude that the food is very well priced, but that it lacks the necessary zing and zip of truly inspired cooking (in other words, just because there’s a well known name on the streetside awning doesn’t mean that the well known name is toiling away in the kitchen).
But then, in fairness, a restaurant such as this isn’t necessarily a destination for exemplary cooking but more a busy, buzzy place to pass a few hours in.
You can see that as the time passes by: the room fills up, and by the time we pay the bill, there isn’t one empty table to be seen.
Enjoyable? Yes, but Marco Pierre White Steakhouse & Grill does what it does without any degree of amazement or glaring brilliance.
For all of that, its atmosphere makes up for what it lacks. There are far worse places in a city full of restaurants in which to spend your well-earned money.
The tab
Dinner for six, with wine, came to €210, no tip (a service charge of 12.5% is applied to parties of six or more).
Monday to Saturday, noon to late; Sunday, 1pm to late.
8/10
7/10
7/10
/10
8/10
Excellent atmosphere, good front-of-house and waiting staff, and decent food at excellent prices.
