Restaurant review: Daróg Wine Bar is serving two-star level dishes at bistro prices
Daróg wine bar opened late last year in what was once Tartare on Lower Dominick St in Galway’s West End.
Ireland is a hospitable place. Now it isn’t a competition of course, but despite having no connections there, I seem to feel most at home in the West of Ireland. It is as if the stars there are different, or that the air in Galway and Connemara adds a warm blanket to your soul.
Galway punches well above its weight in the restaurant stakes, as you know, and I have a new name to add to your list. Daróg wine bar opened late last year in what was once Tartare on Lower Dominick St in Galway’s West End. Zsolt Luckás and his wife Edel are the couple behind it, Edel working in restaurant design and marketing and Zsolt having been sommelier in nearby Aniar for several years. In the kitchen is Attilla Galambos who was sous-chef in Aniar and worked in stellar restaurants in France, Japan, and Denmark, and on the floor is the talented sommelier Iseult Gumbleton.
I try to be anonymous but given my love of Galway’s restaurants, this wasn’t going to happen in Daróg so I decided to let Zsolt and Iseult largely dictate our food and wine pairings; a wise decision.
Iseult began our meal with glasses of 15-year-old El Maestro Sierra Oloroso, a nutty, complex, aged dry sherry that tasted of almonds and dried fruits with a touch of mahogany. This turned out to match nicely with our first dish of the evening, wedges of French toast (€8) topped with piped finials of smoked Knockanore custard. The dense crusty toast was offset nicely by the creamy, rich cheese while some yeasty crumbs lifted the flavours.
Iseult’s next choice was Moment of Silence from Blank Bottle, a fragrant textured Chenin-Viognier blend from South Africa, the mouth-filling, creamy melon fruits coping well with tender nuggets of barely cooked fresh mackerel (€15) on a fennel emulsion with shards of crispy parsnip adding texture and earthy notes.
Dexter beef tartare (€15.50) was mixed with anchovies, ramson capers, and crispy kale with the meat tasting sweet and grassy while the anchovies and capers added salt and extra umami. This was followed by one of the meal’s highlights: Roast smoked pumpkin slices (€12) offset with blobs of sweet carrot purée and thin slices of pickled pumpkin. a whey foam added tangy milky notes.
Scallops with salt-baked kohlrabi and Parmesan sauce (€16.50) were beautifully caramelised while still translucent, and served with a surprisingly weighty, creamy sauce offset by nutty kohlrabi. It was at this point I found myself thinking about previous scallops I’ve experienced in two- and three-star Michelin restaurants that were pale imitations compared to the magnificence that Atilla and his team have conjured.
The Engineer was on reds and had this dish matched with a tangy raspberry-flavoured Broc Cellars KouKou Cabernet Franc, but I think I had the better match with a lightly honeyed and raisined skin contact Fiano from Mercoledì Paestrum in Sicily.
Dry-aged Dexter beef cooked on the embers came with Jerusalem artichoke, swedes, baby leeks, and brown butter (€28). The earth and savoury notes from the artichoke and brown butter were a solid foil for the sweet, beefy, and lightly charred goodness of the meat. A shared glass of Château Sénéjac 2016 (€17) added a touch of classical polish.
The only negative in the evening were some deep-fried hasselback potatoes (€7.50) which looked pretty but were rather too soggy inside; a drier more waxy or floury potato would have worked better. A small cheese plate (€16) was pitch perfect in its textures, ripeness, and selection but was served a little cooler than the ideal. St Tola goats, mature Durrus, and Young Buck blue cheese with good bread and a glass of Lapierre Morgon (€14) had the Engineer beaming with happiness and fully sated, but I craved something sweet. Rum baba (€9.90) had a gorgeous sweet-boozy soft sponge and was, I think, made with a fruity light Rhum Agricole rather than a darker molasses based rum. The baba was contrasted with some crème frâiche and preserved blackberries and was a deeply satisfying finish to the meal.
So if you haven’t realised by now, Daróg is simply wonderful, creative precise cooking from a tiny kitchen in a simple wine bar setting. Staff are adorable, professional, lithe on their feet, and brimming with knowledge. There are two-star level dishes being served here at bistro prices. Do visit soon.
Food: 9/10
Wine: 9.5/10
Service: 9/10
Ambiance: 9/10
Value: 8/10
Dinner for Two including several shared plates plus dessert and several glasses of wine cost €206
56 Dominick Street Lower, Galway. H91K225
Open: Tues-Thurs: 5-10.30pm; Fri - Sat - 3-11pm; Closed: Sunday & Monday
