Pleasant Times Again At The Four Liars. Arabic Coffee And Superb Baklava Finalé

Pleasant Times Again At The Four Liars
Arabic Coffee And Superb Baklava Finalé

Baklava

We are sitting here in Cork’s famous Shandon at the end of an early evening meal and we agree that the Baklava we are enjoying is the best. Indeed, one of us is newly converted having found previous versions just too sweet. But this is not packed very tightly packed - it has the pastry layers for sure - and also seems fresher. I wouldn’t very much about the Mid-eastern sweet but this is delightful and very highly recommended.

A terrific desert (€6.00) then and it goes down well with my Arabic coffee. This is influenced by cardamom and comes in an open pot that you pour yourself. I also enjoyed that. Just reading the menu, you may well think that €3.50 is a bit much but the pot will give you two fine cupfuls.

Kibbeh

The restaurant is the Four Liars and it has recently been taken over by two Syrians, Abdul Khallouf and Ahmed Saqqa. They’ve been told the story of the four liars (the clocks on the four faces of Shandon tower that disagree), liked it and decided to keep the name.

Falafels

Their plan is to treat you to Syrian dishes. So the menu features food from their country which is of course, like all cuisines, influenced by the food of neighbouring countries. And many of you will be familiar with the likes of mezze, fattoush, hummus and the aforementioned Baklava.

No doubt, some visitors will not be that keen on dishes on the menu with strange sounding names (some un-translatable) but they’ll be catered for with more familiar fare such as Pizzas, Burgers, wings, wraps and so on.

But I’m anxious to try something from Syria and am puzzled when my order for Syrian Kibbeh gets a big thumbs up from Abdul. It is only later I find out that this is the Syrian national dish, a dish of many versions.

It is also a dish of many elements, an enormous plateful. The Kibbeh consists of lamb meatballs (tasty, aromatic), with tabbouleh, hummus, baba ghanouj, and spinach samosa (very tasty and crunchy). More like a starter and main course in one! 

CL likes her Falafel and so ordered Falafel Platter: five chickpea croquettes with herb and tahini sauce, salad, hummus and their own pitta bread. The “crust” of the falafels was a touch on the hard side but overall it was a very flavoursome dish indeed, the salad veg chopped a little rougher than we’d expect, hummus and bread excellent. And great value for a tenner.

Best of luck to the two entrepreneurs who have just started here - they also do takeaway by the way. It is a work in progress, some tidying up to be done around the premises and perhaps the service needs a little more alertness but overall interesting food and good value once again in the Four Liars, a place where we were regulars about 25 years ago! Still some souvenirs around the place from those days but also some new items such as the shisha pipes.

The Four Liars  

O’Connell Square (alongside the Butter Museum)

Dominick Street

Cork

Tel: 083 080 8283 

Syrian and Irish on the Plate at Bandon’s Bayleaf

Syrian and Irish on the Plate at Bandon’s Bayleaf

The Bayleaf Bistro has been operating in Bandon for close to a year but I hadn't heard about it until walking around there the other day. Saw the menu, a mix of Irish and Syrian, and, since it was more or less lunchtime, popped in. The interior of the building is much the same as it was under its previous name The Chapel Steps. 

We had two menus available to us: the Lunch Menu (mainly sandwiches, wrap, salad, burger) and the General Menu (Healthy eating choices, Make your own sandwich and generally more substantial dishes including a few Syrian ones).

I was temped by the traditional Syrian Bammia, an Okra stew, but, with a big dinner on the horizon, decided to leave it for another day. After a discussion, and a little advice from the friendly staff, we came up with a sharing idea. 

One of our choices was the Shannonvale Chicken Wrap: local chicken fillet marinated with exotic Middle Eastern spices, served in a Syrian Wrap,  and on the side there were homemade chips and seasonal salad. Top class piece of chicken, the traditional chips and salad were excellent and the Syrian contribution (including the bread wrap) was superb. Excellent, all for €9.95.

The big one (€14.95) to be shared was the one called A Taste of Syria, “a superb collection of our homemade traditional Syrian appetisers” and so it proved to be. It consisted of Falafel, hummus, quinoa tabouleh salad, mutabbel (blended smoked aubergine with tahini, natural yogurt, tomato salsa), rice stuffed vine leaves, marinated pitted olives, white chillan cheese, lebneh (thick natural creamy yogurt garnished with mint and olive oil), crisp fried vegetable samosa, served with warm pitta bread.

I think many of you will be fairly familiar with most of appetisers listed thanks to the rising influence of Middle Eastern cuisine in Ireland. Don’t think though that I’ve come across the mutabbel before (similar texture to the hummus but with different flavours). And it was definitely my first time eating that stringy and salty cheese (apparently one of many such across the Middle East)  - won't be my last! Won’t be my last time visiting the Bayleaf either!

The Bayleaf Bistro

St Patrick’s Place

Bandon

Co. Cork

(023) 884 2589

For updates, check their Facebook page 

Links for this visit:

Inchydoney Hotel Wine Dinner. 

The Eccles Hotel in Glengarriff.

Bantry Market.
A Couple of Days in West Cork