Five Times Better

Much derided for profiteering during our age of plenty, the restaurant industry is having to strip back and get creative as belts tighten. Odessa has been at the fore of this new value-for-money spirit and there has been quite a bit of buzz about their Fivers menu - a refreshingly straightforward idea where generous tapas-styple plates are served at, that's right, E5 each. And it appears that where efforts like this are being made by restaurants, diners are being responsive.

The first impression that struck me arriving in Odessa, mid-week early in March, was nostalgia. The full dining-room, hearty laughter, high spirits, tables heavy with assorted dishes and plentiful plonk all screamed, "Recession. What Recession?" While outside Rome burns and Cowen fiddles, within the cocoon of the Odessa dining room diners ate, drank and made merry like t'were early 2008.

Initially guided to an awkward table in the thick of the crowd, on request we were happily reassigned to a cosy berth by the window with no qualms, not always the customary response of a busy restaurant that would much rather you sat where they had put you and you were least likely to linger longer than was profitable. This pleasant service was maintained for the evening - our waitress disarmingly charming, knowledgeable about the menu and helpful but unobtrusive throughout. Cold tap-water arrived at the table with the menus; bread coming shortly thereafter. In sporting parlance, we were off to a flyer.

Glancing about the room we readily decided that two of the Fiver plates may not be enough to fill us individually but three may have been too much. Between the two of us then, the Med-Head and I, we picked five plates (are you detecting a theme?) from among the 12 or so on offer, a selection which ranges widely across cuisines and should keep most happy.

First up, on the express recommendation of our waitress, was the Brandade - an intensely fishy salt-cod puree. The concentration of the fish flavour was cut through to some extent by fresh herbs (dill certainly and others too) but the portions were off with too much puree and not enough bread for dipping. Less would have been more and, taking a few solo spoonfuls, the sensation was much the same I would imagine as sucking on a fisherman's tackle. Not one for the faint-hearted.

Sticking with the surf, salt and pepper calamari arrived next and were a shining example of how something so familiar, in the right hands, can be a rare treat. A judiciously seasoned crust gave way to thin cirlces of squid that had bite but were never chewy - snatched from the oil at precisely the right moment. This plate challenged the sharing ethos of the meal and the Med-Head proved himself the bigger man by leaving the last ring to me.

Mushrooms with garlic and thyme were probably the weakest element of the meal, over seasoned and over-cooked, the little button mushrooms too meagre and shrivelled. A lighter hand and a bigger, more flavourful mushroom is needed to balance the flavours in the dish. A small antipasti plate of olives, artichokes and peppers hinted at good sourcing of ingredients.

The chicken leg confit took an age to arrive, probably a good sign, but was a bit on the plain side and would have benefitted from something wet alongside the solitary poultry leg. The confit istelf was technically flawless, crisp outside like a winter morning; the meat within giving way to the fork like soft earth to shovel. The same skills are brought to bare on the impeccable duck confit on the main diner menu.

With two espressos and a drinkable, if forgetable, bottle of house red the bill came to E48.90 without service. When you consider your typical three course set menu weighing in at about the E25 mark before drinks, the Fivers menus offers a novel and economical alternative dinner for two. In the coming months our new economic gradient is likely to sort the restaurant wheat from the chaff. On this evidence a table at Odessa seems as good a place as any to wait out the last days of the Celtic Empire.

Odessa
14 Dame Court, D2
+ 353 (0)1 6707634
www.odessa.ie
info@odessa.ie

What Is Luxury?*

Conspicuous consumption, it would appear, is out. Belt-tightening becomes much easier when goodies are rationed. But the perception that luxury should equate to expense is perhaps a little misguided. Epicurus, the godfather of gourmandise, recognised this well when he said, ‘bring me some cheese, that I may have a fest when I please’. Whether it was a block of Calvita or a finely ripened Stinking Bishop was not the question. Rather he was commenting on how we maximise our pleasure in life in the ways that we think about, relate to and socialise through food. Not that this should preclude the occasional indulgence for indulgence sake. The secret these days is finding the balance.

1. Hotel Breakfasts

As they say, ‘eat breakfast like a king’. For those not dwelling in a palace, a good hotel is the next best place. Do it properly and wake up in the Ritz to Eggs Benedict with your morning papers. (www.theritzlondon.com; 0044 20 7493 8181)

2. L’Ortolan

The last meal of Francois Mitterand, Ortolan makes fois gras look like spam. The bird is caged and force-fed oats and figs before being drowned in Armagnac, roasted and eaten whole.

3. Cod and Chips

Once the food of the common man, cod's increasing scarcity has made it something of an environmental luxury. Some say other white fish will fill the batter just as good but it’s debatable. Eating an animal into extinction? That’s decadent.

4. Someone to do the washing up

You just cooked up a storm, and consequently your kitchen looks like Hurricane Nigella just hit. Enter the kitchen-cleaning fairy, everybody's favourite dinner party guest. Failing that, call in the pros. (www.pristine.ie)

5. Dinner in El Bulli

At E250 a head, dinner in the 'best restaurant in the world' represents something of an investment. If the cost seems a little exorbitant take solace in the fact that, by the time you can get a reservation, the recession will probably have passed. (www.elbulli.com)

6. Chef's Knife

Japan’s GLOBAL brand of knives brings centuries of samurai sword-making expertise into the kitchen. At E100 each they are certainly not cut-price but will last a life-time. (http://www.yoshikin.co.jp/w/)

7. Kitchen Bible

For all their slick production and lifestyle appeal most modern cookery books see little time in the kitchen trenches. Not so Nicholas Clee’s Don’t Sweat the Aubergine, an indispensible and humorous source of counsel in a foodie’s darkest moments.

8. Kids in the Kitchen

Without coming over all Jamie Oliver there is a great pleasure in sewing a few foodie seeds. If you don’t have a kid, borrow one. Baking will never be as much fun again.

9. Home comforts

We all have them; those meals that aren’t the same unless eaten at home with the seasoning of comfort and nostalgia. My own is my mother’s scrambled eggs, with plenty of butter and cream, taken off the heat just before fully set.

10. Going Native

Sick of Croque Monsieur in Paris and Spag Bol in Italy? A little local knowledge can make all the difference in avoiding the tourist fodder. In the absence of a local guide, take to the blogosphere. (www.hungryinparis.com)

11. Hidden gems

There’s something tantalising in stumbling upon an unexpectedly good eating house; a sense of privilege from being in the know about the shabby Trattoria with the best tiramisu this side of the Apennines. I have mine, and I’m not telling.

12. Cooking Holidays

As you were told when sent to the Gaeltact, the best way to learn a language is by total immersion. It’s the same with food. The luxury here is time, giving it over totally to food, its preparation and its consumption. (www.ballymaloe.ie or www.atasteofrome.ie )

13. Pig Out

We’ve had our differences of late. Time to heal the rift. What better way than to eat a whole one? Try a roast

suckling pig, a cross-cultural totem of luxury and celebration for millennia. (www.brasseriesixty6.com; 01 4005878)

14. Saucing it up

With a large collection of ramekins, I have sometimes struggled for ideas to fill them. They are empty no more thanks to Janet’s Country Fayre, a range of artisan condiments produced in Co. Wicklow and stocked nationwide; a lustrous accompaniment to any meal. (www.janetscountryfayre.ie)

15. Thirst Quenching

Luxury is relative. Trekking in hills in 40 degree Tanzanian heat, the juice of a fresh coconut, cut from the tree and drank from the shell was the nectar of the gods.

16. Chocolate

Such are the psychological benefits of eating a good bar of chocolate that far from being a luxury in days of recession, it should be available on the medical card. I prescribe J.D. Gross Amazonian (60% Cocoa) available in Lidl, taken daily with a glass of red wine.

17. Scavenging

There is a primal pleasure in gathering your own food; mushrooms from damp August fields, plump inky berries from the hedgerows.

18. Love at first bite

Each new flavour and ingredient promises a sensual revelation and even when it disappoints it’s a notch on the bed-post of the gastronome that wants to taste it all.

19. Food al fresco

During the good times we sank millions into patio heaters, timber decking and patio furniture. And still we wait...

20. Home-brew

The oenophile can spend untold sums on the finest vintages. What about something more unique and personal – home-brewed apple and elderflower wine? Get those creative juices flowing and fermenting. (www.thehomebrewcompany.ie)

*A version of this post appeared in the March issue of Food and Wine Magazine

Better The Devil You Know

In the spirit of all things recessionary I set myself a little challenge yesterday: go into Tesco, buy the cheapest meat you can find, bring it home, cook and eat it. In the interest of comparing like produce I limited my selection to raw meats in the chiller section, though perhaps there was an element of self preservation here too. Not even a global economic meltdown will get me eating meat from can. With these carefull parameters in place I ended up at the till with a half-kilo of pork liver, at a total cost of e1.57.

The first thing to notice about the product was that it was double-sealed. This was ominous. It is a wrapping tactic I use myself with dirty sports gear. I'm not quite sure of the precise health and safety reasons in the context of fresh meat but an obvious one that quickly came to mind (and nose) was the smell.

Now I'm not squeamish when it comes to food, and neither am I a total novice in the consumption of the more visceral inards of an animal (lightly poached goose gizzard is a personal favourite) but the odor of bodily function that accompanied the piercing of the second layer of plastic gave me pause for thought. Pork liver smells like...well actually, it smells precisely how you would imagine a pigs liver smells.

Assuming you can get past the smell, what are you signing up for with pork liver? It has higher levels of iron than other meats and so may not be the ideal introduction for a novice liver eater - I've had subtler fillings. With little connective tissue in the meat it can quickly become tough and dry as well (you are by now beginning to understand the reason for its bargain price). It's a meat that needs a fairly robust sauce to mask the flaws as it were.

Despite some work on the trendier fringes of celebrity cookery, we have to a great extent lost the culinary skills required to make these less enticing animal components more palatable. In embracing a more frugal cusine we do well to learn lessons from our forebearers who exhibited a greater resourcefulness when meat was rare, little was wasted and was never far from spoiling.

"Devilling" is by now almost an arcane term, originating in the late middle ages when new spices and herbs came from the east. It refers broadly to any variety of foods prepared with spices or strong seasoning and is distinguished from curry probably by its emphasis on vinegar and mustard. One would hazard a guess that the satantic reference was evocative of the sharp and fiery flavours of the sauce.

Here's my super cheap recipe for Devilled Pork Livers on Toast:

Ingredients:

2 pork livers
Tablespoon plain flour
Tablespoon paprika
Knob of butter
1/2 and onion (finely diced)
Splash white wine vinegar
Tablespoon Tomato Puree
Teaspoon dijon mustard
Tablespoon creme fraiche
Half Lemon
Few sprigs of flat leaf parsley

Crusty Bread
Splash of olive oil

Method:

1. Place the flour, paprika and pork livers in a sealable bag and coat the livers well in the mixture.

2. Soften the onion in the butter over a medium heat.

3. Turn up the heat and add the livers, cooking for two minutes on each side.

4. Add the vinegar to the pan and reduce for a couple of minutes.

5. Stir through the tomato puree, mustard and creme fraiche, allowing the sauce to bubble slowly over a low heat until the pork is cooked through (the braver among you may like to leave a subtle pink trace through the meat - pork liver can quickly turn tough).

6. Season with salt and pepper, add a squeeze of lemon juice and chopped parsely and serve on thick slices of grilled bread drizzled with olive oil.