Restaurant Review: Quality casual fare makes Dublin's Seafood Bar the catch of the day
Joe Oualadi, Martin Matej, Debora Silveira at the Seafood Bar
- The Seafood Bar
- Address: 1 Blessington Street, Dublin 7, D07 PR60,
- Telephone: 01-8308120
- Instagram: @seafoodbardublin
- Hours: Sunday - Wednesday: 12 Noon - 10pm; Thursday - Saturday: 12 Noon - 10.30pm
- The Tab: A meal for two including snacks, small plates, mains and desserts plus a bottle of wine costs a reasonable €142
Dublin is a port city with an active fishing fleet, and a signature song about a lady who sold shellfish “alive-alive-o”. And yet it has a dispiritingly small number of seafood restaurants for a city of its size.
This same thought occurred to restaurateur Joe Oualadi, I suspect. Just a few weeks ago he opened The Seafood Bar on the corner of Blessington Street and Dorset Street, just a few doors down from his pizza restaurant The Wood Fire Café.
Dorset Street is one of the most unloved streets in Dublin and long overdue a rejuvenation, especially at the Blessington St. end. This is the street where Sean O’Casey was born after all, and Leopold Bloom lived on Eccles St. just a step away. Maybe the Seafood Bar will start a trend — the best place to open a restaurant is near another busy one.
And it is busy, I visited for a late lunch on a sunny Tuesday and even in mid-afternoon there were still plenty of customers dropping by. The menu is Spanish-themed and I was pleased to see Kellys, Flaggy Shore and Rossmore oysters (€15 for 6, €28 for 12) as well as the famed Ensaladilla Rusa Anchovies from Cantabria (€9).
We decided to skip these famed treats and began with a snack course entitled ‘Bread’ (€9) which included crunchy sweet Pan con Tomate, silky Iberico bellota ham slices and marinated Malaga olives and a jar of pickles. A bargain starter.
Next came Deep-Fried Calamari with Shrimp (€14) served with a well-executed Tartar Sauce. The shrimps were tiny and sweet (as they should be), but the calamari had been breaded and fried at least a minute or two longer than needed so were rather rubbery — the only unsatisfactory item in our meal.
The calamari was soon forgotten once we tried the Tuna Poke Tacos (€14) — freshly made blue corn tortilla filled with raw tuna, chopped avocado and peppers with sliced cucumber and green chilli. I loved the freshness of these as did my guest although he would have liked a little more chilli to add extra heat.
Amejas Al Ajillo (€14) came next, a cast-iron pan of spanking fresh clams coated with garlicky salsa verde that enhanced the briny sweet flavours rather than overpowered — perfect. Of course, we had to try the Patatas Bravas (€6), properly crispy chunks of potato topped with aioli and a lightly spicy tomato sauce, while Hand Cut Fries (€5) were also good, properly crispy and nicely salted.
Valencia Paella (€36) was large enough to share and had pleasing chunks of monkfish plus fresh prawns and mussels nestling in earthy sweet saffron-flavoured rice. The trick with the best paella is to cook the rice until the grains are tender and creamy but not soggy, and ideally a ‘socarrat’ crust has begun to form underneath (but has not yet begun to catch and burn). The Seafood Bar had it virtually spot on and this was as good as many a Paella I’ve eaten in Spain.
The wine list is short but with some good choices including Domaine de la Pépière Muscadet, Zarate Albariño and a relatively rare Italian Pinot Noi — Endrizzi Pinot Nero imported by A Taste of Italy from Wexford, a solidly reliable importer. Our bottle of organic ‘Pinzeri’ Grillo from Sicily was also from A Taste of Italy and was very fairly priced at €36. Grillo is always a good choice for seafood I find, and this had that classic combination of lemon-tinged peach and tropical fruits balanced by texture and acidity — it worked particularly well with the Paella.
For dessert we opted for Tiramisú (€7) and Crema Catalana (€7), the tiramisú having a pleasing coffee kick and the correct texture while the Crema Catalana had a rich custard base beneath a properly caramel crisp top. A complimentary glass of Amaretto each was another welcome treat.
The Seafood Bar is warmly recommended, the kind of casual quality restaurant we all wish we could stroll to from our house — Molly Bloom (from Gibraltar after all) would have loved it.
- Food: 8/10
- Wine: 8/10
- Service: 9/10
- Ambience: 8.5/10
- Value: 8/10
- In a Sentence: A fine, casual, Spanish-influenced seafood restaurant worth a visit.
