Lucinda O'Sullivan's Ireland

About The Restaurant

I was passing through Dun Laoghaire with ‘the fashionista’ on a particularly fine Sunday evening, when I spotted the grey fronted Harbor House with its small clapper board out on the pavement. It caught my eye, because it’s a new Chinese Restaurant, situated almost where, many years ago, there was the Lotus House, a very smart upmarket Chinese Restaurant, which had been owned by the parents of Kevin Hui who nowadays has one of Ireland’s best restaurants, the fabulous China Sichuan in Sandyford.

We pushed the door open gingerly and immediately the vibes were good. A smiling meeter greeter rushed forward, as other smiling faces, including Chef Tony Shi, were behind the counter of what was a very fine kitchen. Add to that, beside a bowl of fresh flowers on the counter, another little blackboard proclaiming  ‘Chef Special – Fresh Irish Lobster; Monkfish.’ We couldn’t sit down fast enough, as we quickly ordered a bottle of Marius Peyol 2021 rosé with the typical delicious pale blush pink Provence, and were quickly brought a tasty glazed chicken wings and prawn crackers.

Seating about 28 people comfortably, this is not a restaurant with 1-300 iterations of Chinese dishes. It is what they describe as Cantonese Fusion with a menu inspired by Cantonese cuisine from Sai Kung, a quaint fishing village situated on the peninsula in Hong Kong. They buy their produce locally from suppliers they trust to ensure they are always cooking with the freshest ingredients possible and, with dishes from South East Asia and mainland China, their mantra is to cook simple dishes, full of flavour, seasoned with soy, sugar and ginger. There's everything you could possibly want at good prices from bao with roasted duck to spicy squid with salt & chilli to lettuce Yuk Sung to crispy aromatic duck. Mains are listed and priced by the main ingredient, be it Vegetable, Chicken fillet, Beef fillet, Cantonese Roast Duck, or Fish – Sea Bass, Cod fillet, Grilled salmon & King Prawns – each with sub sections for types of sauces or style of cooking. 

Well, of course there was one decision made before we sat down – the lobster. So we went the route of one two course dinner, including a starter of scallops and a mains of King prawn, and a Dim Sum platter – all of which we shared.

The scallops proved sublime, a brace of good size queen scallops in each of two shells beautifully steamed and served with garlic butter, chilli rings and spring onion. The Dim Sum platter was terrific, and a lovely presentation of pork and prawn dumplings in various shapes with two each Ha Kaum dumplings, Siu, Loong Bun, Siu Mai and Gyoza. The King Prawns mains with baby broccoli, spring onions, and a little bowl of rice were very fresh and nicely cooked but of course the real delight was the star of the show, the lobster – suitably stunning - broken into sections, and coated in finger licking ginger and spring onion. A real treat, you could have it with other sauces.

We passed on puds including Chocolate Ganache pudding, ice-cream, and ‘cake of the day’, but we thoroughly enjoyed the music, the vibe and the food at Harbor House. 

A real find. 

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