Eden Bar and Grill: Garden of earthly delights

The new Eden offers a tempting combination of cheffy touches, solid cooking and value in a suitably jazzed-up venue, writes CATHERINE CLEARY

HERE’S A BEETROOT designed by Willy Wonka. It’s white and sliced paper thin with raspberry pink swirls through each slice. You could put them on sticks and call them lollipops. It’s the sexiest root vegetable I’ve ever seen.

The white and pink beet slices are sitting on top of a starter in Eden Bar and Grill on South William Street in Dublin city centre. Having “bar and grill” in the name is very now. Someone has decided “restaurant” is a throwback to crème de menthe and peach-coloured napkins. This new offshoot of Eden Restaurant in Temple Bar is in the former Nue Blue Eriu premises. That was a make-up and unguents shop where the prices alone could scorch off a layer of epidermis and ensure you left with a suitably youthful shocked look.

It looks small from the outside but past the long new marble and painted timber bar there’s a high glass roof giving it all an airy feel. The hanging baskets of greenery (à la Mother Eden) are here and the round white tables. There’s a Cathedral-scale biblical image on the end wall and splashes of colour in parrot prints elsewhere. Two African spears hang over a stage above a piano and jazz singer combo who are doing a fine job of Gershwin’s But not for Me. I like it.

It’s the kind of restaurant (sorry bar and grill) where everyone can see everyone else. So you can treat your trip to the bathrooms as a catwalk stroll. It makes it all the more of a fashion fail when I realise I’ve walked in wearing a high-vis cycling jacket.

Beside us there’s an enormous table with a group of European diners who have the tired look of people who have spent a day in a room with a whiteboard. I’m impressed that they have made the effort to get out of the hotel to eat. And by the look of the starter that Ali’s just ordered, their energy is being rewarded.

It’s described as “dressed crab” on the menu, which is a bit like saying Lady Gaga is a popstar who wears clothes. What arrives is a slate of food where every ingredient has been cheffed to within an inch of its life. There’s the candy cane beetroot, a paintbrush swish of carroty vinaigrette on which some pickled mussels sit. There are crumbles of things, shards of something that could be yellow carrot, a perfect mix of crab and mango and a yellow oil that slides off the slate on to the table (because slates are designed to let liquids, like rain for example, slide off them). It’s ambitious and dramatic stuff – and for €9 it’s hard to see room for an enormous profit margin.

The jazz hands are slightly more muted on my plate, which is squid done three ways, perfectly crispy fried rings, a pouch stuffed with vegetables and smothered in an earthy saffron tomato sauce and the chewy tentacle-y bit, which has been marinated in lemon.

We get two glasses of the house Colombard, Le Montalus, on the excellent waitress’s recommendation. It’s keenly priced at €5.50.

After the first act there’s something of an “oh” at the change of tone when the mains arrive. It’s as if someone in the kitchen said enough cheffing let’s start cooking so my “glazed boneless lamb shank with carrots, garden peas and onion” is a Ronseal dinner. It does exactly what it says on the tin.

There’s a lamb shank that’s been cooked slowly and tenderly, and peas, carrots, and an onion. The only cheffy touch is a smooth potato purée into which the peas have been dotted like a spoilsport parent’s idea of hundreds and thousands.

Ali’s risotto is a huge portion of good plain butternut squash risotto with two tempura prawns on top, which feel slightly like they belong on another plate. The sweet chunks of squash still have bite, otherwise this would be babyfood mush. Both main courses are much better than average gastropub dishes. Maybe it’s the bar food in “bar and grill”.

Desserts ride both horses, the simple and the fussy. A large bowl of Gathabawn farm ice creams tastes creamy enough to slap on your face. My lemon almond polenta cake comes with jewel tricolour pyramid jellies and is undersweet, which I like but may not please dedicated sugar fiends.

The bar is set high for restaurants opening in tough times and, despite a little bit of incoherence, Eden Bar and Grill looks more than up to the challenge. Dinner for two with three glasses of wine and a mint tea comes to €83.

[ Twitter.com/catherineeats ]

Here's a surprise in lovely Leitrim

Cruisers (of the boating variety) are already well acquainted with Harkins Bistro in Dromod, Co Leitrim. It's got one of those lovely riverside locations that make you think a river cruise mightn't be a bad way to see the countryside. The food is worth a detour even if you are not travelling by boat. We had a light lunch of two starters, slices of pork belly on a brilliant potato cake and a generous portion of chicken liver parfait with red onion marmalade and a home-made chutney.

The boys had good pasta with home-made sauce and chicken goujons and chips. The "surprise" kiddies dessert was a scoop of ice cream in a plastic cartoon character innards. Service was as slow as a canal boat but the place was so relaxing we didn't mind. The bill for the family lunch came to €52.85

Harkins Bistro, Shannon View, Dromod, Co Leitrim, tel: 071-9658718