Delighted With Catch At Quinlan’s Seafood Bar in Cork

Delighted With Catch

At Quinlan’s Seafood Bar

Enjoyed a terrific fish lunch, squid and prawns the highlights, at Quinlan’s Seafood Bar in Princes Street (Cork) last Tuesday (15th Feb 2022). Not the best of days weather-wise but certainly a cracking meal in a beautifully renovated and expanded premises which now has another entrance on Oliver Plunkett Street to add to the existing one. And, of course, a restaurant with quite a few outdoor tables, well covered, for when the weather improves.

The family seafood business is based in Caherciveen, Co Kerry. Kerryfish was started in 1963 by the father Michael Quinlan and has now been passed down to the second generation of Quinlans, Liam, Ronan and Fintan. And expansion is always on the agenda here and they have shops and restaurants all over Kerry and beyond!

I was surprised on arrival at about 1.00pm to find the “old” part of the restaurant pretty full for Tuesday lunch. But soon they found a table for us - lovely staff here - and there was no delay in bringing the lunch menu. You’ll find much the same dishes as part of the evening offering but it is an expanded one and do watch out for their seasonal offers. Lobster and Black Sole specials were available in recent weeks.

Their own fresh fish is the basis of what they offer and they handle it very well indeed. I found it hard to get past the list of tempting starters. In fact, I didn’t, as quite a few of them are also offered as main courses. Fish and chips are also on the menu but in Quinlan’s you get a choice of fish. The plaice was off on our visit but we could still pick from Whiting, Haddock, Cod, Hake or Goujons to go with the chips.

I started with Dingle Bay Wild Squid (deep fried locally caught squid "served with our famous homemade sweet chilli jam"). You also get a well presented salad, all for 10 euro. It was probably the best squid I’ve ever tasted, soft and easy to eat and no hardening at all from start to finish. And yes that Sweet Chilli Jam is every bit as good as they say.

CL was meanwhile enjoying her Thai Fish Cakes (cod, salmon, spring onion, coriander, chill in a Panko Bread Crumb, served with salad and Asian aioli) . A pair of really high class fish cakes (€9), beautifully and moderately spiced while the Panko and aioli were also perfect.

That starter list is full of good things, including chowder, sandwiches and hot dishes. None much hotter than the Sizzling Deep Water Atlantic Prawns (fresh Atlantic prawns in olive oil, chill and garlic, served with sourdough) and again there is a salad on the plate as well. The starter version is €12.00 and the mains (my choice) is €18.00.

It is a cracking dish enhanced by that flavourful and moderately spicy liquid. Having enthusiastically extracted every single one of the prawns, plump, slightly crunchy and sweetly juicy, I continued the enjoyment by dunking the sourdough and mopping up the juices. Just one tip. Don’t dive in the minute it arrives, count to ten, at least. It really is sizzling!

Our other mains was the Pan Fried Fillet of Salmon and that came with Lyonnaise Potatoes, Asparagus and Basil Pesto (18 euro). The fish, a very generous serving, was spot on, well cooked and the dish neatly presented.

Of course, they do desserts as well but having fed so well on the earlier dishes, we declined on this occasion. They have a selection of wines and beers and lots more in the bar (in the new section). If you want to go fishing in Cork, you know where to go now and you won’t be alone in this popular venue.

Nash 19 Takes Night Shift In Its Stride

 Nash 19 Takes Night Shift In Its Stride

Highlights on every corner from the 
Apple Mint (bottom right) to the Pickled Mushroom (top left)

Princes Street, and its many and varied restaurants and cafes, was quick to adopt outdoor dining and rapidly became the country’s poster child for the Covid enforced change to the undependable Irish exterior. 

We had our first visit there on Culture Night and it turned into an evening of delectation under the shelters of Nash 19 and owner Claire Nash.  Just the day before, Nash was awarded by the Georgina Campbell Awards as the person to represent being “the very best of community”, acknowledging Claire’s part in leading the Princes Street charge and in changing her dynamic daytime enterprise to an equally energetic day and night star.

Heirloom Tomatoes and Purple Basil

It was a double change for Nash, from daytime to night time and from indoors to outdoors. And immediately, they saw and began to work on the possibility of innovation that the double move allows. And it isn’t that Nash 19 just tagged along with the existing evening menus. No, if you know Claire, you know they jumped straight to the front and the menu is right on trend with a slew of small plates and no sectional guidance that you should follow the old three course pattern. Hop in to the menu, forget tradition, go free style and enjoy yourself.

But if you do like the comfort of a big feed, and we all do from time to time, some of us more than others, then Nash 19 have you covered well on that front also.

Crispy Chicken Confit of Leg

Claire is rightly proud of the menu and delighted too with the mini-menu she had drawn up for the Culture Night event going on simultaneously in her Stern Gallery (in the backroom of the restaurant). That included the new vermouth by two sisters from Valentia Island and that was our first drop of the evening.

Nash 19 have quite a wine selection now, some fifty bottles, mostly organic, some natural, all low intervention and quite a few by the glass. There’s sparkling wine, rosé, red and white of course, and sweet to finish. We thought we’d have white and enjoyed a glass of Izadi Larrosa Blanc (a Garnacha blanca from Rioja) and one of Von Winning Weissburgunder (Pinot blanc from the Pfalz in Germany).  Glass prices vary from €6.50 to 11.50 in white, roughly similar in red.

Smokers Plate via Hederman

We were soon down to the food. CL’s first dish was the Seared Scallops with Annascaul Black Pudding and apple mint. Superlatives all around here, even that apple mint was outstanding and, in any case, CL is a big fan of the Kerry blackpudding. 

Plum dessert

Mine was the Frank Hederman Smokers Plate (another 14 euro dish). Hard to describe the mix on that plate, ineffable. Let us say it was a delicious mix of mussels, crab, and salmon, all given the unique Hederman touch in his harbourside smokehouse (decades old and now itself an integral part of the smoking process) and even that pickled cucumber by Nash kitchen was quite possibly the best of its type.

Round one may have been a knockout but we were ready for round two, along with what remained of our colourful and flavourful side of the gorgeous Heirloom Tomato and Purple Basil Salad. 

Nash have employed new tasters for this menu.
Illustration from the menu

And we did our delicious duty again. Mine was the Garryhinch Wild Mushroom Ragu on Sourdough Toast with a generous coating of Parmesan. And it came with a steak knife. Superb texture, moist temptation, hardly time to share a morsel or two as I fought back the urge to rush but instead took an unwavering steady stroll to satisfy my senses with its warmth and savour. All for 12 euro!

CL bit into her Crispy Chicken Confit of Leg with Korean Dressing and Charred Corn (also 12 euro) and her casual tongue was immediately stung into alertness by the Korean spice. But, once she got the various elements together, the spice became a key though not dominant facilitator of amazing flavour, and she was as happy as any diner on the busy street.

It wasn’t the only busy street on Friday as quite a few folks were out and about taking in the many events of Culture Night. We began heading back to our hill. We crossed the river and headed for Harley’s Street and its little market and found the place rammed, the crowd there enjoying the bites and exotic music. 

Great craic evident too at St Luke’s Cross with Henchy's and the wine bar the main venues. Lovely to see Culture Night back on the streets and hopefully the English Markets will be back at the heart of it next year.

Lemon Meringue

As is the case with Nash by Day, the Nash by Night Menu provides lots of variety, not just throughout the menu itself but also via its daily changes.

Valentia vermouth
& strollers

Our culture night menu started with a bunch of “small plates” of which no less than five were fish; we picked two and the others, just to give you a hint of what may be coming your way if you call in (and you should), are Irish Prawns with Sea Samphire, Wild Irish Tuna Sashimi, and a “Taste” of Monkfish Tempura. We had two of the non-fish small plates and the others was Ham Hock Terrine and Free Range Chicken Liver Paté.

After that, you are moving into more serious platefuls including Rib Eye of Beef, Pan Seared Hake, their familiar and always superb Producers Plate Tapas Style; also a local Charcuterie Board plus there’s a Heirloom Tomato Pasta Penne with Toonsbridge Feta and an Irish Cheese Board with Fig Confit. Descriptions have been abbreviated in these two paragraphs.

And there are sides of course. Our Heirloom Tomato and Purple Basil Salad was a super treat and others on offer were Fries (smoked butter, sea salt), Waterfall Green Leaf and Herb Salad, Mediterranean Olives or Salted Valentia Nuts, along with Bread, Seaweed Butter and Olive Oil (all at 4.50 aside from the tomatoes at 6.00).

Homeward bound