21 Kildare Street, Dublin 2.
Town Bar and Grill is one of the city's busiest and buzziest restaurants. Situated under Mitchells Wine Shop the narrow basement room has been cleverly designed to make the most of the space and give an airy feel. The colour scheme too is pleasing, plain blocks of neutral colour, like fashionable mushroom, and simple, but effective lighting.
Spot some of Dublin's more famous faces while enjoying the superb service. Interesting and fairly priced wine list, with a preponderance of Italians and some tasty house wines around €21. All the gang dined there one night and here's what happened....
The starters arrived and all three looked very good. Deirdre's seafood plate had langoustines, prawns, chilli squid, gravadlax and oysters and was nicely presented. Gerard had the red mullet fillet, which came with a fennel and orange salad, and my veal cheek came with herbed gnocchi and a wholegrain mustard. All three of these dishes were well made, well flavoured and well presented.
The main courses were more mixed. Gerard had the rack of lamb, which came with slow-cooked shoulder and caramelised sweetbreads. The sweetbreads were spectacularly good, the lamb tender and succulent. The clam linguini, a variant of the Neapolitan signature dish spaghetti alle vongole, was less successful. The seafood taste that's so integral to the dish was hidden behind other flavours, and the pasta was a little too al dente for my taste. That said, my mushroom risotto was very well done; a good mix of mushroom, truffle oil, prosciutto and Parmesan.
We toyed for a while with the idea of desserts, which are mostly priced at €9.95, before eventually ordering a crunchy biscuit ice-cream to share between the three of us. The meal ended with two good espressos, both drunk by me, which brought the bill to €166.50 not including service.
I suspect it will remain one of those restaurants that have the epithet 'institution' attached to it, since it's now so well known. Superb service made this evening pass by very happily.
