Restaurant review: Dublin 2's Floritz flourishes with a fabulous feast

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• Floritz
• 22 St. Stephens Green, Dublin 2, D02 HW54
• 01-5312535
• Floritz.ie
• Open: 7 days a week; Lunch: 12-3pm; Dinner: 5.30-10pm
• The bill: Dinner for two including cocktails, wine and a selection of small plates cost €233

Sir Thomas Lighton, 1st baronet, was here first, building his house on fashionable St Stephen’s Green in c.1790. 

He’d been a soldier for the British East India Company and received a reward of £20,000 for smuggling back a vast quantity of pilfered Asian loot to England for his commanding officer.

Floritz is there now, in the space that was once the Cliff Townhouse and before that Richard Corrigan’s short-lived seafood restaurant.

Downstairs is Cellar 22 wine bar (reviewed here in February) but Floritz is quite different, bold and bright, lavishly decorated with Asian botanical scenes and warm striking colours.

The Asian theme is continued in the menu, a mixum-gatherum of cuisines with Japan, Indonesia and various regions of China all featured.

Chef Matt Fuller has been in lots of good restaurants over the years, most recently in Suesey Street, but I’ll always remember him best for the much-missed Boqueria tapas restaurant in Stoneybatter (reviewed here in 2016).

As I was thanking my guest for a favour, I suggested she begin with a glass of Gremillet grower Champagne, decently priced and decently tasty at €18. 

I took advantage of the excellent sherry selection with a gorgeous glass of Williams Fino 2015 (€10), its nine years’ ageing having softened its yeasty tang and added delicious earthy-lemon notes – as far from parent company Williams & Humbert’s A Winter’s Tale as St Stephen’s Green is from Tokyo.

With over 60 items on the menu, we took a scattergun approach and ordered sushi, yakitori skewers, tempura and bao buns, deciding to skip the good value noodle bowls and the less good value ‘Irish wagyu’ steak (€50 per 100g).

The first dish to arrive was four plump fingers of crisp turbot tempura (€28) topped with pink ‘ume roasted’ sesame seeds with a punchy basil, coriander and jalapeño dipping sauce – no bargain but fish this tasty deserved its price (just about).

Similarly, two little-finger-sized Dublin Bay Prawns on a yakitori skewer topped with ‘majada’ almond crumbs cost €13.50 including a tangy whey dipping sauce. Had they not tasted so good, we might have remembered they cost €6.75 each. Both sauces were so good, we kept them for the rest of the meal.

Two pieces of tuna nigiri (€18) made with o-toro tuna belly are perfection – succulent, luscious and intense – freshly grated Singing Frog wasabi root from West Cork adding extra deliciousness. 

After the high of the nigiri, the six hosomaki tuna sushi (€22) rolls seem a little bland. Next time I’ll ask for more wasabi.

SIMILARLY, our duo of confit lamb bao is tasty enough but could have done with an extra kick of heat or sauce to fit in with the rich flavours in the other courses.

Miso roast black cod puts us back on track and is on special that evening, reduced from €45 to €25. 

At €45, this would have been outrageously priced but, at €25, it felt like a bargain, flaking nicely into translucent nubs with the best part the intensely flavoured sweet-savoury skin.

Rice crisps at €6.50 are the bargain of the night – make sure to order double portions of these cubes of crisp-fried rice coated in ‘dragon sauce’, a sticky rich, spicy umami-bomb of flavours with chilli, soy, ginger and garlic notes.

The Floritz wine list has been thoughtfully chosen and is fairly priced – €9 for a glass of albariño, €35 for a bottle of tasty Bardolino Chiaretto rosé and a mere €34 for a Languedoc Pinot Noir. 

There are also cocktails, saké and a good selection of dessert and fortified wines. Our bottle of Lapilli Greco di Tufo is well worth its €50 – floral, peachy and crisp with enough heft to cope with all the intense flavours.

For dessert, a delicately scented jasmine tea panna cotta works well as does the brightly creamy goat’s milk ice cream (€12.50) accompanying it. A properly nutty hazelnut mousse and brioche sandwich with pistachio ice cream is also satisfying.

All the servers in Floritz were stars and managed to make sure we were minded but also left to enjoy our meal. We talked Asian sauces and K-Pop with our delightful Korean server Si-Hyun, and the Amalfi coast, Italian lemons and the grape varieties of Campania with our knowledgeable Italian wine waiter – we were completely charmed.

So Floritz can be expensive if you order the high-end dishes but doesn’t have to be.

I’m not sure what the 1st baronet would have thought but I really don’t care – we loved it.

THE VERDICT:

Food: 8/10

Drink: 9/10

Service: 9.5/10

Ambience: 9.5/10

Value: 7/10