One Pico are working against this trend, as are a number of other restaurants in Dublin. They want to let our belts out a few notches by stuffing us with cheap, gourmet lunches. I applaud their grasp of economics, the political classes should take a leaf out of their book.

I was in there for a birthday a little while ago, and decided to drop in while doing a photoshoot on the other side of the Liffey in the Belevedere hotel near O’Connell Street. It worked out to be a 13min brisk walk to just off molesworth street.

The return journey was a less brisk 20mins, an indicator of value for money in dining. Let me tell you why…

Arrived at the restaurant: the prices have gone down, but the service levels haven’t: they recognised a repeat customer from the birthday a week before and we got a friendly greeting and the last table free in the restaurant: An illustration of the concept of what our (not so wise) friends the economists call ‘Price Elasticity of Demand’, basically drop your prices, sell more and (hopefully) make money.

Straight into the meal: A fishcake with a posh name and some posh dressing for a starter, not huge but adequate portion and delicious. A winner.

Then, I had to do it: Confit du Canard on potatoes and a turnipy / squash thing. Apparently (according to a heavily worked looking chef) these things are cooked all night at a low temperature and then crisped quickly in one of those high temp ovens, thrown on the mash, covered in the sauce and served to me to make me late back to my client near Parnell Square.

Here’s the thing: I’ve seen these things in tins in France, eaten them and they were no where near as good as this, and they cost what my meal in One Pico did. How are they doing it? I don’t care as long as it is economically sustainable.

Not like our housing boom, where we were all going to do great having banks and builders sell substandard houses to us for inflated prices – and then we would live like kings on the benefits of trickle down economics. I can only assume One Pico were serving this food up to the great and the good before I could afford to eat there, and they made all their decisions after lunch. Mmm – it is around the corner from the Dail.

Onto desert: with my liver struggling to process the delicious crispy fat, I can barely remember something about little round donuts and in-house ice cream. I remember I thought it was good, and included in the 3 course price. I wouldn’t have been able for it if it wasn’t included in the price.

There are the little extras: sparkling water, a good espresso ristretto that add a small amount onto the bill, but even in the upsell they’re not gouging, and they’re not pushy.

The service is top class: unfussy, friendly and extremely professional. Surroundings are extremely agreeable. Long may it continue, finally some value for money in a restaurant in the middle of Dublin.

Take note politicos: In the 80’s good old Chas was urging belt tightening, robbing us blind, buying Kinsealy and cutting the health service. This decade we had the Mahon Tribunal to enrich the lawyers, while in the same sector the banks and builders were running the biggest ponzi scheme in Irish history. The mortgages taken out to pay these inflated prices will put a dampener on consumer spending for decades to come.

The common folk need to tighten the belts and share the pain? They already have plenty…Lucky for us that the silver lining may be that the little money we have can get us a decent meal in Dublin. And you never know: wasn’t it the MRSA that finished Charlie off? The universe may have a plan for these chumps yet.

Here’s the inside of One Pico, apologies for the poor quality, it was covert, as is the Guestspy approach to reviewing. They never see us coming

If you have an opinion on this restaurant or others like it (proper value/ proper food): Guestspy is always looking for reviewers: PLEASE COMMENT and if you’ve got what it takes I’ll make you an editor.

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I got to talk to several ladies of advancing age, having lunch and trying to relive their old stamping ground in the hotel. They seemed ’sporty’ (that’s a bad joke for those of you that have seen Intermission).

Since this is a blog that is meant to be about visits to places and what they’re like, I’m going to do the Hotel first and the camera second. Decor is interesting and particular in style as it should be in a Boutique Hotel, service is friendly and personal and the rooms are as good as I’ve seen, I had to look twice (and behind) a fireplace in the bedroom to see if it was electric or gas. It was electric, but they’ve moved on from a red bulb under a semi tranparent plastic mold of coal in yer grannys front room, I’ll get a pic of one later.

If you’re looking for a hotel with a pool and a gym, you wont want to stay there, you’d be better looking at other Donnybrook hotels. The building is an old row of nicely restored georgian houses, made to house the well heeled in centuries gone by. The hotels website says that it does have Free Internet, but I didn’t try it out to test the speed. I did however get this walk through of their drawing room, lobby and bar at about 3pm:

Hampton Hotel Donnybrook

I had the cod and chips in the bar, nice pice of fish, would recommend a stop off when the traffics too bad to check out the bar and the fish. They showed me the suite, it had a double walk in shower and two toilets. I didn’t ask how much it was a night, I knew it wasn’t for me .

For those interested in reliving the glory days of the 70’s club scene, They tell me they’re going to do a history section on the old Sachs place and the infamous club that was in it on their website). Get ready for sepia tone images of dancing at the crossroads (of Anglesea road )

Now, onto the camera: Disappointed. I had images of movie camera quality with my 14-24mm f2.8 Nikon zoom, and while the youtube encoding doesn’t give it full justice, it also hides some of the problems with it.

The are black bands that go up the screen, reminiscent of the old days pre-satellite when the fog would come in and S4C would go a bit funny, and panning too quickly looks like it drops frames. I used a fast SD card as the shop recommended, but I’m sorry: it went back to the shop.

Never mind: looks like redone are doing a nikon mount from that space alien 4K movie camera they make.

Don’t think we’ll be seeing them in Lidl anytime soon. I’m drooling.

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Croke Park Virtual Tour

Click on the link above and click and drag on the image to look around. Shift and CTRL can be used to zoom.

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I was compelled to do the sums: you can get a Ryanair flight to Anzio near Rome, stay in a 3star hotel, eat a better meal with less pretentious service, leave a big (by Italian standards) tip and fly home again. As long as you take a bus and not a taxi, you’ll still be ahead.

The food is pretty good, but not at all exceptional. But the worst thing is the portion size is abysmal, I read a review in the Irish Times that said the only people who complain about the portion sizes are country farmers that would be better advised to go where they can get a good feed of spuds. Now I’m a person who has never got good value out of an all-you-can-eat-special, and I weigh in at a miserable 11st @ 5′10″ and I was left ravenous. The bill for dinner for 4 of us over €400.

Avoid like the plague unless you’re an accountant and a Partner with no imagination drags you out to dinner there.

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Service wasn’t lightning fast, but this gave us time to soak up the atmosphere. If you’re looking for frosted glass, oak laminate and little blue lights in the floor, you’ll be disappointed. This was more farmhouse kitchen than boomtown Dublin circa 2002, with the chef plainly visible working his magic on the pan. Here he is at work:

I went for some goats cheese on a wholemeal pancake. Serving was reasonably generous, but my tastebuds and stomach compelled me to order a 2nd of the same, which I had some trouble finishing, but not for want of trying.

Everybody likes a pancake and I have yet to sample better, making this place a must for a visit at lunchtime. Good chats with the owner too. Friendly people.

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