Restaurant review: This Dublin 6 eatery is building to something luxurious
Craft restaurant on Harold's Cross Road, Dublin. Photograph Moya Nolan
8/10
Eating out has become expensive, as you might have heard, and nowhere could be worse than our capital city, especially the city centre which now can be compared to London and New York for all the wrong reasons.
I don’t blame restaurants who are generally just scraping by, but it has become a real challenge to find restaurants worth visiting that can be called value propositions even in suburbia.
I suppose, technically, Harold’s Cross is suburbia but, as it is only five minutes walk from the canal, it barely qualifies.
Craft caught my attention with their Chef’s Menu for €39 per person, which is available on Wednesday and Thursday evenings and up until 6pm on Friday and Saturday. There is also a three-course lunch menu available on Fridays and Saturdays for just €25.
Philip Yeung opened Craft in 2016, having previously been head chef in Town Bar and Grill, and Bang. The space is modern and comfortable with a choice of sitting at the front facing Harold’s Cross Rd or a quieter space at the rear of the (relatively) narrow space. On a sultry Thursday evening, however, the obvious choice was the outdoor garden area nestled at the back.
The meal began with snacks as is de rigueur these days. Guinness brown bread was crumbly, rich, and moreish, and once smeared with Glenilen butter was effectively perfect. Leek and smoked Gubbeen arancini was my second favourite, a smear of prune and mustard purée atop the crispy shell added a pleasing kick of piquancy to the lush cheesy rice inside.
Fluffy whipped ricotta tartlets were given some punch with walnuts and sherry vinegar, and rich hash browns were balanced out with Iberico chorizo and beer pickled onions.
(A side note: Pickled onions need a proper revival. They make everything better and always bring me back to Sunday teatime in the late 1970s. I would use them to obliterate the faintly sulphurous taste of the hardboiled egg slice I was always obliged to eat, once I realised that hiding it under the plate rim didn’t work.) Craft’s snacks were pleasing to the eye, and the palate and the meal was jollying along at this point, offering a classic neighbourhood restaurant vibe.
Things changed with a ragu of lamb with pappardelle with fried breadcrumbs and parmesan.
A simple lamb ragu with a bit of fresh pasta has no right to taste this good.
The rich sweet lamb melted on the tongue, the breadcrumbs added garlicky crunch, and the satiny pasta held it all together.
This was not just Nonna-level pasta it was Nonna-working-for-Massimo-Bottura-in-Modena-good.
The chef’s menu offers a shared main course, and we opted for pan-fried cod. Cod gets a bad rap these days, but that is only in the hands of less talented chefs.
Crisp roasties topped with pungent garlic purée and sour cream demanded to be noticed, just like the chilli, galangal, and lemongrass flavours in the sauce, like mischievous kids at the back of the bus, disrupting but adding to the fun of the journey.
Craft’s wine list has around 40 choices, including six wines under €40 and a starting price of just €34 for a Dão red that I have recommended in this paper’s wine column.
This is remarkable value for a restaurant of this quality in Dublin; far too often these days I see wine lists where the starting point is around €48.
A couple of low-sulphur or skin contact wines would be a welcome addition, but overall this is a solid list with good options.
Given the warm evening, we chose Bergerie de l’Hortus rosé from the Languedoc (€55) — a raspberry scented tangy delight that worked well with virtually every course.
Our busy waiter convinced us to try a little of both desserts. Elderflower panna cotta wobbled and crooned, strawberry sorbet zinged (on lead guitar perhaps), and a pistachio crumble was the rhythm section holding it all together.
Chocolate mousse, meanwhile, was languid and luxurious, while yuzu added citrus dissonance, hazelnuts added crunch and salted milk ice cream tasted like the whipped soft-serve we all wish existed in our local shop.
Craft bills itself as a neighbourhood restaurant and it certainly is that, offering perfect pasta, crisp roasties, and satisfying desserts.
But there is ambition, taut cooking, creative flavours, and fun to be had.
This is the kind of restaurant all neighbourhoods deserve.
- Craft Restaurant
- 208 Harold’s Cross Road, Dublin 6
- craftrestaurant.ie
- Dinner and wine for two cost €133
