The Tannery Restaurant, Dungarvan

Excellent, as it is generally. 3 of us ate lunch, two had pork, I had rib eye beef, greens, gourmet fries and a smoked paprika aoli. 70 euro for three at this level is good value. Staff, as ever, pleasant and professional in equal measure. When the Tannery is good it is excellent, and their off days are merely good.

We we given the dining room as there was a large goup of us, I cannot fault the service for food,the wine could have been kept flowing a little better. THe food was a shortened menu to accomodate our numbers. The lamb carpaccio while very tasty the overwhelming taste was parmesean, even the beans and broccoli got lost in the taste of the deepfried garlic, the lamb i think was lovely, pity i couldn't taste it. The crab bruleè has been going on here for a very long time indeed, and if it's not broke why fix it? well, it's unfortunate that all I remined of was overcooked ommlette with crab, it was lovely but wasn't soft enough. The steak was delicious a great piece of meat, the mushrooms were excellent but the wilted greens were very domneering. The saving grace came in the form of the humble spud, theses were the most delicious potatoes i had/have/will have ever tasted, the butter the spuds, oh Lord! The monkfish was colossal, the romesco sauce was delicious.I didn't taste the duck but it sounded good. The deserts were good, the chocolate tart was phenomenal, the honeycomb just bringing out the saltiness, fab. The cherry and white choc sundae was shrap and sweet and tangy served with a warm madeline with orange overtones. The chees palte looked great. Overall the food got better with course and rising to a crescendo! The wine, not my choice was not hectic, semillion/sauv blanc was harsh and the red wasn't to my taste either, that's not to say they wouldn't suit someone! A good experience but i'm not in rush to get back.

It's a disused leather warehouse (hence the name) and has been beautifully converted to create a contemporary and spacious restaurant. The downstairs area is where you find the bar and where there's a bar, there's cocktails served at little round tables and very comfortable seats. They were so good and so potent, that I've forgotten what they were called! After a browse through the short but perfectly formed menu, we settled on who was ordering what for dinner. As I let The Hubs have first choice at lunch, I put my size fives down and demanded the pick of the menu. My starter choice was pre-determined : it had to be the crab creme brulee with pickled cucumber and melba toast. The Hubs made a face at this which I took as a good omen i.e. I wouldn't have to share it. He opted for the caramelised red onion tart with soft Dromana cheese. Mains kept both of us happy - aged ribeye steak with a wild mushroom duxelle and creamed onions, and smoked Barbary duck with green beans, peaches, bacon & girolles. In the interest of research, I also ordered the french fries with smoked paprika aioli (more about this later...). We were led upstairs to the very bright and airy dining room where I had a perfect view of all the activity. The restaurant was absolutely packed, with early bird diners leaving and being quickly replaced by the 8pm mob. Soon the crab and the tart showed up and we stopped talking. Until somebody opposite piped up "do you want to try some of mine". This isn't him being all nice and sharing. It just means that he wants some of mine. I happily handed over some of my crab, complete with pickled cucumber on a shard of melba toast and happily accepted some of his red onion tart which reminded me of my favourite Portugese tart, Pasteis do Nata. The Dromana cheese was soft and delicate which worked really well with the crispy pastry and melting red onion filling. My crab creme brulee was gorgeous. I actually would have been happy to eat a main course-sized portion of it