Restaurant review: Eden Bar and Grill
Myself and Jay have history — I suspect I (and he) will always remember that time in his rough and ready bar Shebeen Chic when he had me in a headlock for about 10 minutes after I sent back an over-cooked steak.
It didn’t hurt and it was (mostly) a friendly headlock.
I’m sure there are many restaurateurs that have fantasies about doing this to a critic and in a strange way I’m glad I made Jay’s dream come true — other dreams have not (let’s not mention Bellinter House).
Bourke’s best restaurant was Eden in Temple Bar Sq (now serving Burmese food) and Eden Bar and Grill was designed to be a more casual version.
I liked it when it opened in 2012 and I’m reviewing it again today because Jay is claiming that he is now serving the best pizza in the city (possibly the world).
This is a strong claim but the unique selling point here is that the base is from a sourdough recipe from the Romanian grandmother of one of the chefs.
This is not the first sourdough pizza in the city which was probably Dave’s wood-fired pizza whose vans can be found at Dun Laoghaire and Marley Park Markets — their base is light and thin with good toppings and they cost from €6 to €7.50.
This year Cirillos on Baggot Street made a bit of a splash and its carbonara pizza is strongly recommended but don’t risk the manzo which I found distinctly odd (beef, red pepper and salsa verde).
Also try Dublin Pizza Company on Aungier Street — you can feel the heat of the oven from the counter as they have about five square metres of space — pick up some doughnuts for dessert from Aungier Danger four doors down.
However, back to Eden — the wood-burning oven is large and impressive and the dough really is good.
We began with small plates of marinated olives and wood-fired chorizo with flat bread. The chorizo rather lacked spice and the olives were stoned (never a good thing) but we still cleared our plates.
Spicy pepperoni pizza was well-executed — the pepperoni was indeed spicy, the base nicely charred on the outside, airy and light in the centre.
My rather complicated smoked duck, pear and cashel blue cheese pizza shouldn’t have worked but it did — sweet tender duck and good contrasting flavours from the pear and cheese and again a nice contrast from the well-cooked base.
Triple-cooked-chips had to be tried also and here we hit our first real disappointment.
Heston Blumenthal brought triple-cooked chips into the mainstream.
He cooks them first in water and then in oil at different temperatures, allowing the chips to cool down and rest in the fridge each time.
This dries out the moisture and creates a perfect crisp outer later and a light and fluffy interior.
Sadly what we were served in Eden was potato wedges with their skins on — they were appalling — dried out, chewy and tasteless.
For dessert we were told that the intriguing chocolate soup was not on the menu yet (the new menu was three days old), so we opted for two slices of tart — chocolate and a pear and hazelnut version.
The topping of the two tarts was acceptable enough but the pastry was poor with a dense texture and a slightly synthetic taste. I only ate the topping.
The drinks menu is short but interesting with a good range of wines and cocktails and my glass of Mount Auriol rosé was well worth €7.
Other items on the menu include meat and cheeseboards, bone marrow with ox-cheek, and dover sole so there is clearly ambition here; but I think if I visit again I’ll stick with the pizza as if the fish was over-cooked or the ox-cheeks under-cooked I might end up in a headlock again.
Two small plates, two pizzas, a side order of chips, two desserts plus a glass of wine and a coke cost €66
Open daily – 5.30pm-12pm Eden Bar and Grill:
6.5/10
7/10
8/10
7/10
7/10
The new menu needs time to bed in.
