Most places be doing brunch early in day so not sure about steak. In evening Whitefriar Grill prob 15 min walk max from Stephens green does lovely steak and so savage steak and ribs deal on Sundays
Irish Times Restaurant of the Year Awards
[SIZE=4] Restaurant Oscars for 2014:
[/SIZE]
Best starter
Graham Neville’s stuffed courgette flower in Restaurant 41
In January the idea of courgette flowers feels as distant as a sun-drenched photograph. But they will return and if we’re lucky they’ll be filled with prawns and scallops and set to sail on a frothy lovage soup like they are in Neville’s beautiful dish. Restaurant 41 at Residence, 41 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, tel: 01-6620000.
Runner-up: The decor doesn’t get more plain and simple than James Sheridan’s Canteen at Blackrock Market. But for a few nights of the week he cooks up a stonker of a set menu. His lobster raviolo with samphire, peas and carrots (another hit of summer) really floated my boat last year. The Canteen, Blackrock Market, Blackrock, Co Dublin.
Best main
Mikael Viljanen’s hare royale at The Greenhouse
“Do you like blood?” Finnish chef Mikael Viljanen asked before serving up an astonishing plate of hare royale, a dish not for wimps. A round of slow-cooked hare meat coated with thick gravy of blood, booze and truffles, its colour and texture verging on hot, black and profoundly flavoured mud. Like nothing I’d ever tasted before. The Greenhouse, Dawson St, Dublin 2, tel: 01-6767015
Runner-up: Kevin Aherne’s hake in Sage Restaurant in Midleton. Gorgeous, fresh china-white hake fried in butter and served with great bearnaise and a crispy egg showed that Aherne is not only able to source great ingredients he can also do them real justice in the kitchen. Sage Restaurant, The Courtyard, 8 Main St, Midleton, Co Cork, tel: 021-463 9682.
Best dessert
Mikael Jonsson’s chocolate dessert at Hedone, London.
In this chi-chi West London suburb Swedish chef Mikael Jonnson takes food deadly seriously. It’s what makes his chocolate dessert such fun. He combines temperatures, warm and frozen, textures, crisp and cloying and bitter and sweet in a bowl – I can go into a dreamy reverie remembering at will. Hedone, 301-303 Chiswick High Road, London, tel: 44 20 8747 0377
Runner-up: It reminded me of breakfast in my Cavan grandmother’s house with rhubarb and ginger jam on home-made bread but I think I would have loved The Courthouse rhubarb rice pudding with house-made ginger ice cream even without that little tug on the heartstrings. The Courthouse Restaurant, Carrickmacross, Co Monaghan, tel: 042-969 2848.
Best one-night only dining experience
Alain Pasard at Ox Restaurant, Belfast
The French kitchen genius Alain Passard dancing from table to table to pose for selfies in Ox Restaurant Belfast in his shiny white patent shoes and floor-length apron. The visiting chef served up truffled egg yolk, lobster and black radish, a heavenly asparagus consomme with vegetable ravioli alongside Stephen Toman’s superb signature dish of squid noodles, romanesco and chorizo jam
Runner-up: In the gloaming of the evening at the end of the summer we sat at a long table in a garden in the Irish Museum of Modern Art for a candlelit supper cooked over a fire by chef Giles Clarke with Michelle Dermody of the Cake Café.By the end of the night I was riffing in a southern (as in Streetcar Named Desire rather than south Dublin) accent with lovely people I’d never met before. Fun on a stick.
Best ethnic
Aroi Limerick
At bog standard takeaway prices, Eddie Ong Chok Fong takes southeast Asian food out of the sugar and sour sledgehammer flavour world and brings many other layers to the experience. His hake wrapped in banana leaves with a 12-hour sauce made with lime leaves, chilli paste and wild ginger was wonderful. Aroi Artisan Street Food, 1 O’Connell St, Limerick, tel: 061 311411
Runner-up: Pho Ta. In the foothills of the Central Bank in Dublin’s Temple Bar this Vietnamese restaurant does great basin-deep bowls of steaming pho and banh tom pancakes and plenty of fresh vegetables and herbs to add to your dish at the table to experience a really fresh soup. Pho Ta, 6 Cope St, Temple Bar, Dublin 2, tel: 01-6718671.
Best casual dining
Pizza e Porchetta, Dublin
It might hide under a bridge but it’s far from being a troll. Pizza e Porchetta is worth the small schlep away from the docklands, a place where pizza lovers and people who prefer something slightly less casual can get along. Pizza e Porchetta, The Malting Tower, Grand Canal Quay, Dublin 2, tel: 01 6624199.
Runner-up: Elaine Murphy has had some teething problems with this being such a large and unwieldy hodgepodge of spaces but The Woollen Mills has given Dublin has some lovely new dishes like the curried crab claws and the pink eggs and tongue: ox tongue fritters and eggs pickled in beetroot with horseradish mayonnaise. The Woollen Mills, 42 Ormond Quay Lower, Dublin 1, tel: 01-8280835.
Best chips
Super Miss Sue, Dublin
We nicked so many of the Super Miss Sue chips out of our kids’ portions that there was nearly a row. Friends have ordered bags with the intention of only having a taste, before polishing them off right down to the salty crispy shards at the end. They’re simply the best chips in the city. Super Miss Sue, Unit 2-3, Drury Street, Dublin, tel: 01-6799009. Runner-up: The Tuscan fries at Mourne Seafood Bar in Dublin’s docklands. They’re fried with the skin on and then dusted with diced black olives, parsley and parmesan. Mourne Seafood, Millennium Tower, Charlotte Quay, Grand Canal Dock, Dublin 4, tel: 01-6688862.
Best coffee
I doff my hat to Irish Times arts writer Gemma Tipton for her line that some of the trendier coffees must taste better through a beard. Maybe the facial hair filters out the bitter grittiness of it all. My best coffee of 2014 was a lovingly-brewed glass cup of V60 drip blend of a blend of four beans at the gorgeous new arrival on Dublin’s coffee scene. Two Fifty Square, Park Lane House, Williams Park, Rathmines, Dublin 6, tel:01-496 8336.
Best restaurant
Harry’s Restaurant on the Inishowen Peninsula in Donegal
It was a tussle between two excellent contenders but the title for 2014 goes to Harry’s Restaurant on the Inishowen Peninsula in Donegal for what they’re doing with food and where they’re doing it. The Wild Atlantic Way has a wildly good restaurant in this partnership between chef Derek Creagh and owner Donal Doherty. They serve just-landed fish from local boats alongside just-picked vegetables from one of their three gardens. Irish restaurant dining doesn’t get better than this and they’re selling it a prices that are jaw-droppingly low. Harry’s Restaurant, Brigend, Co Donegal, tel: 074-749368544.
Runner-up
Forest Avenue.
I love what chefs John Wyer and Sandy Sabek have created in this magic small place where the welcome matches the food. Again the ingredients are king here and a thoughtful calm kitchen turns them into small plates of mouth-tickling pleasures. Forest Avenue, 8 Sussex Terrace, Sussex Rd, Dublin 4, tel: 01-6678337.
Best chips
:rolleyes:
Best chips?? And best dessert is in London?? FFS Sake
Aroi 
Sage
Lovely homemade chips.
Aroi
Aroi
Aroi
Aroi
Aroi
I love the place
best coffee - ffs sake
Its fairly obvious that the list is a joke mate. Is there even a place in the Fingal riviera on it?
the west brit IT wouldnt dare send a journalist to Free Fingal
Dined in Kimchi tonight. Delightful as always. Also, this belongs in the getting old thread but I offered to drive which was accepted, sipped a bottle of beer and water over nearly 3 hours while everyone else got a bit pissed, dropped people home after the meal and then declined to go to a party afterwards because “ah I’m a bit tired and have a few things to do tomorrow”.
Still though getting the last few minutes of Scarface here though.
Roly’s in Ballsbridge. Hey or nay?
Old school and bit pricey. Wouldn’t be my choice but you will get a grand feed there
Mightn’t be as held highly esteem wise as it used to be but you should never turn down the opportunity to go to Rolys.
Believe it is still firing out the good stuff and you are taken care of in there.
Was a gamechanger back in the early 90s but it’s time is long gone now.
I was there twice before Christmas with work stuff, very traditional but tasty all the same
Roly’s has stood the test of time. For that alone its worth a visit now and again.
mac, bon appetit says the cost of maintaining a michellin star is too prohibitive so will change their menu
views?
Enjoyable enough feed there. Service a tad slow but worth waiting for.
What did you have 'Arry?