Sunday roast Irish striploin beef, bearnaise sauce, duck fat potatoes, baby vegetables, red wine jus. Photo: Lucinda O’Sullivan
Today at 03:30
‘He who shouts loudest is not always the best”, to misquote the old adage. Down the years I’ve seen restaurants and chefs from the likes of Planet Hollywood to Gordon Ramsay to Jean-Christophe Novelli to Gary Rhodes all arrive in Dublin with a blaze of egotistical puffery, only to depart, tails tucked, when the paint was barely dry on the walls. They learned the hard way that Irish customers are no daws and that the restaurant’s first-night “flash crowd” would soon move on to the next “big” opening.
Coincidentally, as I was thinking about this, word came through to me that Richard Corrigan’s second Dublin venture is to close at the end of the year. It too is barely 12 months old, having opened with a flurry of positive publicity. However, the tables turned rapidly when the staff shouted from the treetops of their discontent with the working conditions and pay.