Restaurant review: Sadler's in Tipperary falls far behind the rest of the pack

The railings dividing the room and tables suggest horse stalls in stables at Sadlers in Tipperary.

Sadler’s, Cashel Road, Fethard, Co. Tipperary

Our rating: 5/10

Billionaire horse breeder John Magnier’s business interests are global but the heart of his empire is in Co Tipperary where, as recent news stories suggest, he remains ever keen to add to the thousands of acres he already owns in the Premier County. 

It also includes a tidy little hospitality portfolio: exquisitely refurbished Cashel Palace Hotel, including Michelin-starred restaurant and the cracking Mikey Ryan’s gastropub next door. Sadler’s, a subsequent addition, occupies the former home of the late lamented Dooks, in Fethard.

Lest there is any doubt that it is named for the legendary thoroughbred stallion, Sadler’s Wells, and not the internationally renowned London ballet venue, almost every square inch of wall space inside Sadler’s is festooned with equine photos and paraphernalia. Even railings dividing the room and tables suggest horse stalls in stables.

A bitterly cold Wednesday in prohibition January, yet the large space is more than half full as The Gambler and I arrive for lunch. Brown soda bread with his potato and leek soup (€6.95) is good if slightly under-seasoned; all salt apparently in the soup, a muddy brown I associate with using up all the leftover veg. I don’t taste potato, says The Gambler. Actually, he says, I don’t taste leek either. And he’s right.

Last year, I repeatedly consummated my love affair with beetroot, so I opt for heritage beetroot salad, sheep’s cheese labneh, candied hazelnut, blackberry, balsamic dressing (€14.95).

Beetroot is definitely roasted but only to a point, barely cooked beyond fibrous, well shy of the literal sweet spot where the earthy root veg's sugars break down and flavours take flight. 

This is all earth, no sugar. Rough-hewn chunks, their eating is grimly penitential, not improved by dense and curiously bland labneh, considering it is supposed to be from more flavoursome sheep’s milk yogurt. Grace notes add nothing. 

Blackberries in frigid January are from the freezer, a fleeting, almost fruitless sting; hazelnuts are roasted, zero candy. ‘Salad’ is three solitary leaves.

I assure myself redemption will come with one of my most favourite comfort dishes, wild mushroom risotto (€18.50). Traditional arborio rice is substituted with pearl barley. Not an issue — though it makes for an entirely different dish, both flavour and texture, I’ve previously enjoyed excellent barley risottos. Anyway, mushrooms, especially wild foraged, are my edible special place. These, however, are cultivated, bulked out by common whites, topped with a chunky ‘steak’ of king oyster. 

King oysters are comparatively neutral in flavour but very firm of texture, perfect for freighting oceans of added flavour, especially delicious sautéed or roasted. This glistening, greasy yellowy-beige specimen has none of the carmelisation of a properly roasted king oyster, which I’m informed is the kitchen’s method.

An initial taste is impossibly callow until it resolves into a deeply unpleasant finish that I struggle for a moment to pin down. Then I have it. It is the bitter acridity of chip-pan oil on the cusp of turning. Surely, it hasn’t been deep-fried? A server promises to ask. He never returns.

The best I can say about the pearl barley itself is that there is plenty of it but bounty is not required with a foodstuff so fibrous and filling; intense, deeply concentrated umami flavours don’t lighten the load. You’d imagine the tangy cream of another ‘local’, Cashel Blue cheese, might furnish contrast and light relief, but it is fridge cold, startlingly so. Stirred in to warm and melt, it too is overwhelmed by the umami sludge. While the server asks was everything OK while removing my barely touched plate she doesn’t wait for an answer. If she had, I’d have told her it was the worst dish I’ve paid for in many a moon.

The Gambler has Donald Walsh’s 7oz Burger (€21.50) with roast pepper, charred onions, smoked cheddar, streaky bacon, and Sadler’s mayo. It is an impressive looking affair but the burger itself is finished to a near-blackened carapace, the hard shell enclosing densely packed meat, juices mostly cooked away. Trimmings are decent, bar roasted pepper, like an unwanted runaway from an entirely different dish where it might have shone.

Fries of the day (€6.50) are dressed with parmesan and excellent Sadler’s mayo, lush, thick, stinging with garlic, although shaving rather than grating the cheese means its melting is less effective, eventually gathering in gummy clumps.

By now, the bar is so low, we have scant expectations for sticky toffee pudding (€10.95), with brandy snap, caramel sauce, vanilla ice cream. It clears that low bar but doesn’t soar. Service is charming and friendly, execution of actual duties is extremely poor, but that is increasingly a national dilemma.

Maybe I’d have been better off plumping for something like the braised beef and mustard mash but a good restaurant must deliver on every dish. And judging by diners’ choices on all other tables, I’d doubt they sell very many ‘wild mushroom risottos’ and it’s there as the token ‘veggie’ offering. Either do it properly or ditch it altogether.

Overall, it smacks of a menu designed for a kitchen someway short of the skills, precision and culinary empathy to execute on the plate. And this isn’t city slicker sneering at country culinary conservatism: a wine/cocktail list includes six reds, rising rapidly from €42 to €106 for a swanky Margaux; for all the rustic wellington boots under tables and horse boxes outside, I’d imagine Sadler’s regular clientele can spend, especially the visiting horsey set.

I’ve been restrained with horsey metaphors so far but if this meal was a steed, the racecourse vet would be slipping behind a screen to put it out of its misery.

Lunch €82.35. including coffees

sadlersfethard.ie