Classy value
That’s my conclusion paying the bill at Kevin Thornton’s Michelin-starred restaurant in Dublin. After six dishes, 90 minutes of gastro-theatre and service from men and women who treat their jobs as a craft, the tab for two is just €54.50.
Now that Ireland’s fat cats and corporate expenses accounts have been pureed, Thornton’s is taking the recession by the horns. A three-course menu for €25pp is one of a suite of lunch and pre-theatre offers, and L and I went along one Thursday to see if it’s as good as it sounds.
The restaurant is attached to the Fitzwilliam Hotel, so you can enter via the baronial-chic lobby, or a dedicated stairwell flanked by exquisite prints of raw ingredients and finished dishes (Thornton is also a fine art photographer). Push open the walnut-framed door, and you’re in.
If you haven’t dressed up, it’s too late now. Thornton’s feels swish and sophisticated, with suited waiters floating about amongst white linen, huge tiger lilies and primetime views over Stephen’s Green at one end, and the kitchen — via an amazing, over-sized porthole — at the other.
The €25 lunch menu (there’s also a €49pp version available) offers a choice of two starters, two mains and two deserts. L and I wanted maximum bang for our buck, so we ordered one of everything, starting with a smoked fillet of mackerel and a poached quail egg salad.
It’s theatre from the get-go. The mackerel arrives in a bowl which, when the waiter raises the lid, releases a puff of smoke like a magician’s trick. The fish has a crisp skin and delicate flesh, and an accompanying gazpacho adds an injection of cucumber. It’s hard to suppress the giggles.
Salad can’t match that showmanship, but the tiny quail eggs, encased in golden crumbs, burst beautifully with the poke of a fork, releasing a dart of yellow yolk. A brightly-dressed watercress salad and crisp, cheesy parmesan tuille complete the plate.
Our first main is a fillet of hake with baby spinach, pea sauce and tiny golden potato scales overlapping on the fish. More squeals of delight. Our second is a braised beef brisket with barley risotto and summer vegetables, which the waiter adds to by pouring beef consume into the bowl. It’s a little heavy, and I’m not sold on barley risotto, but the beef is perfectly fall-aparty.
The food isn’t all we get for €25pp, either. Our iced water is magically refilled, crumbs are stroked from the table, we get a full selection of fresh breads, and pretty much everything can be adapted for coeliac diets — a rare moment of gluten-free heaven for L.
It’s the full, Michelin Star treatment, in other words, and there’s no pressure to tack on the wine (from €10 per glass) or side dishes (though we can’t resist a thyme-infused potato dauphinoise for €4.50) either. Amongst our fellow diners are a senior Minister, a mother and daughter, and several groups of friends. The atmosphere is sophisticated, but never stuffy.
Desserts include a white chocolate mousse with raspberries, and a lemon tart with cassis sorbet. The raspberries, artfully arranged around a pyramid of cold, hard mousse, come with chocolate cream stuffed into their hearts. They are blissful little bites.
Sure, you can call this elitist. You may have better uses for a linen napkin, or think life is too short to make potatoes look like fish scales. But don’t knock it without trying it. Take the day off, arrange a city break around it, balance the books by eating dinner at McDonald’s. But this lunch special is a once-in-a-blue-moon chance to savour culinary art on the cheap.
We stuck to our budget, but you could also add petit fours (€4), tea or coffee (€3.50) or a side of summer vegetables (€5.50). My only quibble was the piped music, which adds nothing. Pound for pound, Thornton’s three-course lunch could be the best value dining in Dublin.
