Ireland's Best Chef?
Helen
Lucy Burke reviews Kevin Thornton's first outing at the Fitzwilliam Hotel
You knew Kevin
Thornton's former restaurant in Portobello? Right! To imagine his new one,
Thornton's in the Fitzwilliam Hotel on Stephen's Green, just focus on every
dear detail you remember, and then imagine its exact opposite. You're there?
Good. (One exception: the Ladies' loo is still pokey.) Anyone who knew it as
Peacock Alley under his predecessor – the Incredible Sulk, Conrad Gallagher –
can use the same technique.
My itemized
description is for those who never patronised Thornton's, either because they
could not afford to – valid unless they spent their recreation money on booze –
or because they thought a take-away Indian curry could not be improved on. And
if you want to imagine the look of Kevin's servings, think of what the Russian
jeweller Fabergé might do with food.
ARRIVAL:If you are
driving, take a left down a weeshy lane just before the hotel. By mistake I
turned into the College of Surgeons car park (and I bet you will too).
AMBIANCE: Not a
scintilla of the previous incumbent remains (thank God). Thornton's Portobello
enterprise was quirkily decorated: the new place is in almost freezingly good
taste. Walls painted a neutral shade are hung with neutral-shaded paintings
which look silvery sideways on. The carpet is red. Tables are spaced well apart
in the main room; a smaller, more intimate room with a large bar, which we
rather preferred, is behind it. A startling porthole gives live-action glimpses
into the kitchen, with a censorship blind which can be lowered from inside. I
brooded on possible situations which would require a blank out: tempers lost,
utter mayhem with copper saucepans flying, filleting knives for two, coffee for
one. Chefs are a passionate lot. And that is what I missed in the dining-room
ambiance – a decor showing passion or eccentricity to match Kevin's cooking,
down from the days of the Wine Vault. There's too much pastel good taste and
not enough fun, though daylight suits it far better. A set of violently
coloured paintings by Australian aborigines might do the trick. "The
restaurant is made for man, not man for the restaurant."
ATMOSPHERE: Very
subdued and nervous-whispery among the customers, at least until we hit the
scene. Even my host addressed me in tones suited to a pinnacle moment in a
church ceremony. After I had screamed at him not to conform, we proceeded in
normal uninhibited tones; by the end of the evening the surrounding tables,
emboldened, talked almost normally. A completely full dining-room would have
helped the atmosphere.
CLIENTELE: Trevor, my
host, could have modeled for a fashion shoot and I had done my poor best with
an amber necklet. Our surprise was great to see two men wearing tracksuit
bottoms, while one female companion had obviously dressed from a well-known
chain store in well-worn garments. When I remarked on this to Kevin some days
later, he seemed astonished at my noticing such a thing and said "Any
dress is fine with me. They were obviously ideal customers, who put food before
fashion and style."
SERVICE: Luxury-class
on the Concorde. Olivier, that suave divinity, presides and his crew could not
be faulted. A wish need only be hinted and Lo! 'tis already on the table. Price
Set-price lunch is €28 for 2 courses, €39 for 3 - service is extra. Dinner is á
la carte, each dish individually priced and most starters begin at €30. Main
courses – Phew! The eight-course surprise menu (by table only) is set at, oh
dear! €120 per person, service extra.
Recently Marion
Finucane, weeping with laughter, read us a very pretty piece on the radio about
an incident in Saudi Arabia. (I laughed too.) A convicted murderer and drug
dealer was hauled to the scaffold where the noose was adjusted around his neck.
At that interesting point he had a massive heart-attack. The noose was untied;
the murderer was whisked off to hospital for treatment. When he was quite
recovered he would be returned for hanging. The situation at the new Thornton's
is not an exact parallel, but a hot-line to St James's Hospital might be a good
idea for patrons who pass out on seeing the prices. In my own case – and I was
not paying – I could feel the blood leaving my heart in a surge when I studied
the dinner menu.
You will find all
Kevin's trademark ingredients served lavishly, truffles and foie gras as
standards, and dishes of the season, such as grouse, which are rarely served
anywhere else. Furthermore his portions are not stinted. Yes, even humble
potatoes made an appearance in a capacious dish and were pressed on us with
smiling indications not to hang back. I asked how he or his staff would respond
if a customer asked for more: "We'd give them more. But it would take
time, as things are cooked to order, and it would have to be within reason.
More potatoes? "Absolutely." I gather that this means no double
portions of truffles et al. Kevin admits freely that he likes cooking only with
expensive luxury ingredients, "Fish, all wild fish, and especially shrimp
if I can get them." Those who know the prices of truffles, prawns, and of
pretty nearly any fish that swims within reach of a net or a long-line, will
realise that his margin of profit is not high at all. His wines offer a fuller
selection than before and he has brought down the prices.
THE MEAL And so to our
dinner. Was it perfect? No. Nearly perfect? Yes. I had allowed Trevor first run
at the menu. He picked all the dishes I had my eye on and they had the edge on
mine. Our amuse-gueule, free, came first, in the form of a coiled thing like a
minute Swiss roll with a stiff brown rectangle propped against it and a green
basil sauce. It was an elegant little joke: the roll was made of sole, and the
rectangle was a refined intellectual chip. Genuine delicious Fish and Chip, you
understand, but not as Beshoff would serve it. Kevin, it grieves me to say that
the chef of the Four Seasons in London, Eric de Blonde, trumps this by serving
miniature fish 'n' chips in a miniaturized sheet of newspaper. The starters
were priced at €35 each, yes, €35: for Trevor, sauted foie gras with scallops,
cep sauce (served with warm brioche). Ceps (in French cepes) are big
shiny brown mushrooms which look like glazed buns. It was faultless, starting
with the luscious appearance on the white plate and the divine smell, and then
conquering the palate not only with the barely-cooked foie gras but triumphing
with scallops which streaked ahead of all other scallops I have ever stolen off
a friend's plate. Ah oh, the cep sauce – Trevor's face shone. But! My eye had
strayed to ravioli of lobster with quinoa (I knew about this; the seed of a
South American member of the chenopodium family) and lobster consommé. I
queried Olivier as to the ratio of lobster to ravioli, having been unhappily
deceived as to this in other restaurants. Lots of lobster, he assured me, lots
and lots and lots. But not lots and lots of ravioli, in fact only a single
raviolo, a mighty dumpling containing lots and lots of very tasteless lobster.
Even a gleaming piece extracted from the claw which flanked the dumpling was no
great shakes. And the pasta encasing the lobster filling was thick and rubbery;
if this is the consistency absolutely needed to hold the ingredients in place,
I would scrap the whole concept. And yes, I know any lobster is a toss-up as to
how it tastes. A tiny present from Kevin was an intermezzo mounded with the
foam of a sabayon at one side, almost El Bulli style, flanking three apiece of
what we were told were prawns. And so were the three of them shaped, but as I
ate I doubted. They tasted like prawns which had become divinities, but the
texture was so different, so meltingly dissolvably different that I had to get
Olivier to confirm that they were prawns. "The difference is that they are
fresh," said he. I shook my head; fresh prawns and I are old friends.
"And dry cooked for 15 seconds," he added. Now I know. It was a main
course of fish for both of us at an identical €48. Trevor scored highest; he
had Atlantic halibut with courgette soufflé, potato purée, truffle sauce, and I
had fillet of wild seabass with fennel and herb risotto, asparagus squid ink
sauce. Now Kevin, here is another serious fault. Will you not leave us some
bread to do a bit of vulgar mopping? Trevor cleared his plate to the point
where it could have been put back clean in the cupboard, but had he not
covertly used his finger, some of that extraordinary truffle sauce would have
been left. Likewise with mine, though I had less inhibitions and openly licked
my finger. The fish was outstanding, the halibut bearing away the palm. To
achieve perfection in fish cookery, split second timing is essential, and a
kitchen staff poised to seize it 20 seconds before it is done. Each portion was
large – I could not finish mine – with taste and texture a brilliant
revelation. Halibut is a king of fish – far ahead of turbot I believe – and for
anyone who has eaten the seabass so common in restaurants these days, the wild
kind is a revelation compared with the flabby muddy specimens raised in cages
along the Mediterranean littoral.
The extra little touches, such as T's courgette
soufflé which looked like a puffball in the nascent stage of puff, and my
faultless risotto, gave excitement. My excitement lay in having a risotto which
lived up to its Italian name, instead of being a salty rice-pudding. Trevor's comment
on his main course when I invited his opinion was to point silently to his
gleaming plate. A lot of Kevin's cooking is invented to make the best use of
the best ingredients available on the day. When I asked him, would he describe
himself as being in the French tradition of cuisine, the foam of rage flew from
his chops (foam lightly dusted with truffle of course and a hint of tarragon)
as he replied, "Not French at all. The ingredients are Irish and I'm
Irish. Mine is classical cooking, with techniques common to the Mediterranean
in direct line of descent from the Ancient Romans who in turn got them from the
Greeks." As for the so-called ethnic cooking in Ireland he commented,
"It is bastardized." Trevor asked for a plain green salad to refresh
his palate, and I asked for two forks and two plates with it. Fits of laughter
engulfed us when it was carried towards us. Plain green salad, my granny! Two
huge white plates with regular black spots around the rim held a concoction
something like a book with one page green and one page green with a red stripe
and asparagus tips. I turned the questioning eyes of a dumb beast towards
Olivier who kindly told us that this was baby red chard, which started green
and developed a red strip in adolescence. The black spots were, of course,
minced truffle. Again our fingers came in useful. (By the by, Kevin, someone
had sprinkled on two helpings of salt.) Then a pre-pudding amuse-gueule of
variations on the banana: banana and chocolate parfait, banana ice-cream,
banana with butterscotch sauce, followed by our real puddings: a fruit salad
for Trevor and for me a palette of sorbets which was an exact replica of a
painter's palette with the exquisite sorbets in jewel colours. My first
champagne sorbet, for instance, and another of deep crimson blackcurrant which
was a taste explosion in the mouth. Coffee, petits fours, a bill of €297 to
which Trevor added €33 service. Coffee and petits fours had cost €7 each, our
wine, a Cotes de Provence, €64. Then a tour of the kitchen and larder and an au
revoir embrace. And it was really "till we meet again," for I
lunched there four days later. I would like to bring my hammock and live there.
The Dubliner magazine
