Equality and fraternity

FOOD has almost replaced soccer as the unavoidable presence on television.

Few other subjects can corral an audience hour-after-hour, night-after-night but flambéd this and diced that seemingly can.

Especially if you’re a middle age man given to couch grazing and Nigella is doing the dicing in her soft-porn but terribly-affected voice.

The programmes promote the presenters’ particular enthusiasms and an opportunity to flog the inevitable book.

Some are wonderful and challenging. Others, as soon as you find the one that shares your world view, are reassuring and confirm that you were right all the time and that roasting meat without a good layer of fat is a waste of time, effort and an affront to everything your mother taught you.

The programmes can be spectacularly revealing, too.

If you have not seen Man Versus Meat you may not be aware that there are far, far more barbarians living in America than you ever imagined; if you have not seen Clarissa Dickson Wright rave against the slacking modernity inevitably brings, you should, because she has a good case to argue, at least as far as contemporary food is concerned.

All of this has created a new, if minor, breed of diner, one who will nervously pick at a perfectly good dish wondering what Masterchef’s Michel Roux Jnr might think of it.

They usually fret about seasonings or how the plate has been built rather than enjoy a perfectly good meal. These people are usually seen in stiff places where infusions, froths and handy snacks posing as main courses are the order of the day.

Thankfully you won’t find them in the Liberty Grill, a happy place to meet friends and enjoy decent, predictable food. It is not a foodie pilgrimage destination but a good unpretentious place that’s very easy to enjoy, especially as it offers recession-bursting good value.

We — colleague NH joined me — visited on Tuesday night and shared the experience with couples, groups of friends and two family groups.

Though the food was the cornerstone of the experience, it was just part of it, and the warm ambience and cheeriness of the place made it very easy to appreciate the experience after a day of keyboard surfing.

Starters were simple, NH chose devilled crab cakes and polished them off with the kind of focus only a good appetite can bring and pronounced herself very well pleased.

I chose tuna and noodles and it was just ok. The very generous portion of tuna, for a starter at least, was not enhanced by noodles that were far, far too greasy and lifeless.

The dish could have done with the slightest piece of salad, or even a tiny speck of steamed spinach, something other than the easy-option spoon of soy sauce to give it an edge.

NH chose a fillet steak with the usual trimmings.

She was not disappointed. The steak was all you could ask for, good meat, perfectly cooked, and the salad was crisp and not drowned in a overly-heavy oil dressing as it so often can be.

My main course was a very pleasant surprise. Monkfish poached with spinach, pomegranate and potatoes. This was an unusual and attractive use of monkfish and if you’re just a tad weary of the more common monkish dishes — with the mandatory garlic — this is well worth a try.

Desserts — pancakes with bananas and cream, chocolate ice cream with raspberries — were everything the menu promised they would be and rounded off the meal perfectly.

Our wine was another very pleasant surprise. It was a 2007 rioja, a Ontañón Crianza and at €22.80 I can’t remember a bottle as pleasing anywhere close to that price point.

The Liberty Grill has extensive menus for breakfast, lunch and evening meals and few other restaurants offer as many special options or seasonal specials — this month they offer a range of evening specials, including venison burgers which sound as if they alone might be worth the trip.

Of all the restaurants I’ve visited in the last year none makes better use of the internet to entice punters.

That, an extensive menu and very long opening hours, shows a commitment and produces an experience that deserves to succeed.