Restaurant Review - FXBuckley Temple Bar
Tuesday 21 May 2013
I lusted long and hard for a couple of years over a designer dining table with a silver Indian ‘white metal’ top. “They are very cool - I saw a similar one in Jamie’s in Covent Garden,” I pleaded with Himself - who remained unmoved by the table and my desire! The people in FXB’s in Temple Bar would understand my obsession, for they have just had a major makeover installing a similar fantastic “white metal” ceiling – which would also look great in my diningroom! I could lie down and look at it all day!
Anyway to what goes on the table. Following the horsemeat scandal, people are looking more closely at the provenance of what they put in their mouths and returning to the family butcher and baker. Indeed, I was also a tad alarmed to read recently of a report which claims pre-washed, ready to eat, bagged salads were more dangerous than horsemeat and should be again washed before eating. I am now going to be looking and worrying about every bit of rocket on my plate in restaurants!
Francis Xavier Buckley opened his first family butcher shop on Moore Street in 1930 becoming a Dublin institution carrying a reputation for top notch viandes. Some years ago, FXB’s progressed into opening Steakhouse’s in various locations around the city, including the aforementioned branch in Temple Bar. The revamp has seen not just the new ceiling but ‘butcher’s shop’ touches of old white shop tiles bearing their ‘meat par excellence’ logo, cleavers as door handles, a ‘butcher boy’s bike’ and a big Damien Hirst style glass fridge installation displaying hanging joints of meat.
The place was pretty packed when we arrived in for our reservation and we had to wait for our table but we eventually got settled in. Starters €5.25/€12.50 included traditional things we not only enjoy, but which I think tourists also like to see on Irish menus. Home cured Irish salmon was with warm potato salad and wholegrain mustard dressing, whilst an assiette of fresh seafood had oysters, crab, scallops, mussels and prawns. Castletownbere mussels featured, as did Kilmore Quay scallops, whilst James Joyce was recalled with flambéed kidneys. My friend Mary opted for Beef Carpaccio (€9.50), which produced a good plate of wafer thin beef, topped with shaved Parmesan, olive oil, lemon juice, salt, pepper and rocket. I had pan fried Gambas (€12) – decent nicely seared King Prawns in a little black skillet bubbling in garlic butter.
Basically it’s all about the beef at FXB’s, in every form and size possible, this is what people love, but they also had pan roasted Dover sole, pan fried Hake, Free range chicken, and Portobello Mushroom Wellington. Steaks – sirloin, fillet, rib-eye, rump, T-bone, Bone in Sirloin, Porterhouse or Chateaubriand for two, every option is there, priced from €21.75 to €59.95. Mary went with Steak and Seafood (€29) that saw a delicious chunky 6oz fillet steak with four decent seared silky scallops and a portion of crispy fries. I had something I had never seen before, and which, in a way, is I suppose an ingenious way of serving an expensive fish at a reasonable price. Sole on the bone was listed as €25 and I realized it probably wouldn’t be a Moby Dick at the price for this high end King of the Sea. However, what arrived was a tranch of the top end of the fish, having been cut in sections crossways, providing actually a decent enough ‘steak’ of its ‘better’ end. Bathed in caper butter sauce, it was perfectly cooked and delicious, but this method of serving should be explained on the menu, as one could get a bit of a ‘lemoner’ if expecting a full fish falling off either end of the plate! Accompanying new potatoes in butter and green beans were also excellent. There’s an assured hand at the stove!
Passing on puds and coffees, our bill with a bottle of Touraine, Cuvee Marc Bredif, Sauvignon Blanc 2010 (€27) and service came to €112.50.
Busy Buzzy Buckley’s. Still love the ceiling!
F.X.Buckley Grill,
2 Crow Street,
Temple Bar,
Dublin 2.
Tel: (01) 671-1248