Bates Restaurant, Italian, Rathdrum

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Review

You find Bates in a little laneway that runs down the side of the Cartoon Inn, right in the middle of Rathdrum. The first change I noticed is that this laneway is now very pretty: every building along its short length has been renovated, the stonework looks great, and the whole thing looks as though a single theme binds it all together. Bates is a long narrow building on your right.

Inside, it's warm and cosy and it has a kind of bucolic charm; you sense that the floor isn't quite level, the walls not quite square. Simple tables and chairs are arranged with enough space between them for a modicum of privacy and the dining area covers two rooms, one on a lower level than the other. It was very busy when we arrived, and I should mention that even using John Boorman's name when booking meant that we got a table, but only after 9pm.

The menu has clearly had a lot of thought put into it. The first thing you notice is that almost every ingredient has a provenance and many of the ingredients are organic. The second thing you notice is that there's a very European feel to the menu. I discovered later that the chef is Italian, which explained that.

Several things pleased me about this menu: first, the provenance of the ingredients; second, that homemade pasta and gnocchi were on the menu; third, that the various risottos were made with carnaroli rice; and, lastly, there were dishes that used Gubeen's chorizo and pancetta.

I'll make a small aside here. When cheesemakers make cheese, they're left with whey. Traditionally, the whey was fed to pigs and that's exactly what the cheesemakers of Gubeen are doing. Then, with their whey-fed pigs, they make chorizo and pancetta, cleverly adding value to their produce all along the line. At last, the artisan producers of Ireland are beginning to learn the skills that have made the cured pork products of Italy and France.

Obviously I had to try this, so for my starter I ordered the homemade tagliolini (thin, hand-cut pasta) with Gubeen pancetta, egg and Parmesan. You'll notice that if you substitute spaghetti for the tagliolini, you've got a Carbonara. Full marks to Bates for not calling it 'Carbonara' then have people complain that there's no cream in it. Both John and Marian ordered the glazed Wicklow goats' cheese, which came with grilled aubergines, courgettes and peppers. These were three perfectly made and nicely presented dishes, each one €8.

We all chose different main courses: the rose veal for Marian, the monkfish and oxtail for John and a rib-eye steak for me. Let me decribe these. The veal was breaded like an escalope and was served with a fried egg on top, with a sauce of the jus with capers and anchovies. The monkfish was a large piece of tail and surrounding it was a sauce made of shredded oxtail, mushrooms and rosemary. Lastly, I was handed a steak that must have weighed a good 10oz. An array of vegetables arrived, and I particularly liked the battered and fried courgette batons. My only reservation with these three dishes was with the monkfish. I wasn't completely convinced that this version of 'surf 'n' turf' worked very well, even though the fish and the oxtail were individually very good.

All of this left us replete, so we ordered coffees and no dessert. They were really good espressos too, a great way to end a meal. We'd had a bottle of the house wine between us, but we could have picked some very good wines from the list, which is entirely Italian and well chosen. Mostly, the wines are in the €20 to €30 bracket, but there are pricier wines as well, for example a Vino Nobile for €54 and an Amarone for €59.

The bill for the three of us came to a modest €126.45.