Restaurant review: An Port Mór serves lovely food in one of Ireland's loveliest towns
Frankie Mallon's An Port Mór Westport Joe McNamee
- An Port Mór
- 1 Brewery Place, Westport, Co Mayo
- Tel. 098 26730
- anportmor.com
Opening Hours: Tues to Sat, 5pm to 9.30pm
Having managed to pawn off the progeny for the first time in almost a year we have secured an extremely precious 48-hour furlough in Westport. Though winding down for winter hibernation, one of Ireland’s loveliest towns still sparkles on a crisp clear night and we skip along as though still a newly courting couple.
Squirrelled away down a Dickensian laneway, An Port Mór’s Victorian-style windows radiate a cheery glow, and, entering to an especially warm welcome, the little bistro’s charm never flags.
Having hardly eaten all day the better to clear desks and hit the high road to freedom, we are in the words of a former Aussie flatmate, ‘hungry enough to eat a baby’s arse through a wicker cane chair,’ and fall like hyenas on good breads, white yeast and treacly soda, for once not worried about filling up before the meal proper begins.
Current Wife is developing a thing for lobster of late and delicious Clew Bay Lobster Salad won’t throw her off that particular track any time soon, in a dish that manages to effortlessly combine dirty decadent indulgence and clean fresh flavours without missing a beat. Succulent, meaty flesh is refreshed by the tonic aniseed of fennel mayonnaise as soft boiled egg and crisp Granny Smith add textural layers.
I don’t like goat’s cheese says CW, masticating one of my golden deep-fried breaded fritters as if it were the first course of her welcome meal in heaven. I can see that, says I morosely from across the table.
Deep-fried Camembert (or some similar soft washed-rind cheese) was cornily endearing in its 70s heyday but the subsequent cooked-from-frozen version that began polluting Irish menus in the intervening years, particularly when paired with saccharine jelly or compote, is one of the most egregious crimes ever committed against cheese and an instant indicator of a second-rate restaurant.
However, chef/proprietor of Frankie Mallon began his career as a callow teenage commis chef working alongside future star chefs Darren Simpson, Alistair Fullerton and Robbie Millar and led by Roscoff chef/proprietor Paul Rankin, and was a core member of the original kitchen team that earned the Belfast restaurant Northern Ireland’s first Michelin Star, in 1991, and profoundly influencing Irish cooking for the next decade.
Mallon’s travels after that included time working for the legendary Guy Savoy in Paris so if Mallon sees fit to put it on the menu, I’m game; that he uses raw milk Corleggy Kid, made by, Silke Cropp, one of Ireland’s finest cheesemakers, seals the deal.
It is a guilty pleasure, elevated by the nascent complexity of the Corleggy. Roasted red peppers are a sophisticated partner, sweet umami sufficient to gently burnish cheese’s creamy opulence; verdant green spinach puree, a clean chlorophyll accent.
Our late evening flit up the Western seaboard means we are the final table of the night, so Mallon himself emerges from the kitchen bearing our main courses, promising us we are ‘sitting down to two right good feeds there!’ He’s not wrong.
CW has asked for the Kelly’s Pork & Chorizo sausage to be omitted from Grilled Fillet of Monkfish with Seared Scallops, and Beurre Noisette and it isn’t missed for a moment. Beautifully carmelised fish is pearlescent and tender within, swollen, plump scallops are succulent and sumptuous, all anointed with a rich, nutty butter emulsion. She dissolves in a puddle of ecstasy, pronouncing it ‘the most beautiful hug’. A musky full-bodied Slovenian Laski Riesling (Roka 2018), holds its own — crisp lime and peach notes a cleansing counterpoint.
My glistening roasted rack of pork is a fine hunk of meat on the bone, charred, sweet, savoury crust encasing perfectly toothsome and so flavourful white meat. It pairs immaculately with a superb German pinot noir (Weingut Friedrich Becker Estate 2016), supple black fruit and dry acidity perfectly delineate the toasted caramel of the meat. Both dishes are served with steaming, floury Setanta spuds and excellent local carrots and broccoli, glazed in butter. Warm chocolate fondant with cappuccino ice cream and a sound cheeseboard conclude a great evening.
In APM, Mallon’s consummate skill and vast experience are deceptively distilled, delivering excellent local produce as classic ‘Irish bistro’ fare, utterly shorn of pretension and flush with all the joyous healing of finest home cooking. Home? Kids? Errah, we’ll check up on them in the morning.
