Extreme value combined with very good grub
Did I ever you tell you about my stalker hell? It was almost exactly like Single White Female, except with blokes. It all started more than a decade ago when an individual with whom I was on nodding terms – a middle-aged businessman with a lovely wife and two deeply unpleasant daughters – tried to wheedle his way into my social circle. I can’t use his real name here for legal reasons, so let’s just call him Walter Mitty. Long after I’d frozen him out, I overheard Walter in the pub one night retelling a mildly amusing true story that originally involved me, Brian Cowen and the disputed ownership of a pint of stout. Except, in this particular account, he had cast himself in my role.
But it was only when he arrived unannounced at the same Lake Como hotel where me and Mrs O were holidaying that I really began to get concerned.
Previously, I’d told him about a great break spent in the Riviera town of Villefranche-sur-Mer. Though he hadn’t heard of it, it was only a matter of weeks before he was making regular trips and speaking about the place as if he’d been going there since childhood. All very strange, frankly.
The reason I’m reminded of this is that the pokey little flat we stayed in there overlooked a magnificent, slightly sinister-looking belle époque mansion. Only a few years later did I discover that this was Villa Nellcôte, which was used as the local Gestapo headquarters during the Nazi occupation of the early 1940s. Thirty years on, it was also the location for the recording of the Rolling Stones’ drug-addled masterpiece Exile On Main Street.
Fast forward by another four decades and Exile still sounds as impossibly cool as ever. So it made perfect sense to hear it in the background at Artisan Parlour, an ultra-hip new venue in Ringsend. This is the sort of place where you could well see groovy young people with skinny jeans and laptops. But it would be a mistake to let that put you off, because the food is very, very good.
It was opened a couple of months ago by former nightclub impresario Martin Thomas and his wife Venetia Quick (great name, that, and not even a makey-up one). The front of the premises has a deli counter and small food hall selling artisan produce. Beyond that is a seating area with just enough space for a couple of dozen punters.
Decor-wise, it’s all very simple: the furniture consists of slightly larger tables and chairs than the ones in junior infants’ classrooms. There’s an open kitchen at the back and specials – a daily hot pot, soups, salads, sandwiches – are chalked up on a large blackboard.
You might have even caught a glimpse of it on the telly. Venetia is one of the stars of Connected, RTÉ’s fly-on-the-wall documentary series about the lives of six women from very different backgrounds, and she was filmed with Martin as they worked to get the premises ready. Meanwhile, their youngest son Casper had a very brief cameo in a recent episode of Love/Hate.
Nor do the showbiz connections end there. Running the kitchen is Mike Hanrahan, the singer, songwriter and guitarist best known for his work with Stockton’s Wing and the late Ronnie Drew. Mike studied at the Ballymaloe Cookery School and later went back there as a teacher. He also worked as head chef at comedian Pat Shortt’s gastropub in Castlemartyr, Co. Cork, before returning to Dublin.
Anyway, the food. My guest started with the spicy pepper and lentil soup, which had just the right amount of kick to it. As in it was spicy, yes, but not to the extent that it’d burn the mouth off you. Meanwhile, my pea soup – a hearty version speckled with generous flakes of ham – was every bit as good in a wintry way as the lighter, summery rendition I had at Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud last year.
On my one previous visit here, I’d had the toasted ham and cheese sandwich – although that simple description doesn’t begin to do it justice. It is enough to feed a family of four, for starters, but the mustard-infused topping makes it more like a French-style croquemonsieur. This time, my friend went for that and I had the beans on toast – although that’s underselling it again. It came as a pot of delicious homemade baked beans with chorizo, served with some lightly browned excellent bread.
I could go on. The wine list is short, but well-chosen and keenly priced. Service from the charming young staff is excellent. And the grub, as I say, is top-notch. Unless my eyes have started playing tricks with me, the soups were priced at a fiver on the blackboard. Only on checking the bill later did I notice we’d been charged just €3 for them under some combo deal with the sandwiches. Which, if my sums are correct, is pretty good value at a tenner a skull for two courses.
I think this is a place I’ll be going back to. At least, that is, until my old mate Walter finds out about it.