In a recent Michelin Guide newsletter, the restaurant gods finally spelt out what a Bib Gourmand actually is – overdue clarity now that the old price cap has vanished into fog. And no, it’s not a halfway house to a star, despite the mythology that sprang up after Bastible in Dublin went from Bib to one star in 2022.
A Bib isn’t a style. It’s a hunch: inspectors walk in, eat unusually well for what they deem a fair price, and decide someone deserves credit for not fleecing the public. There’s no checklist, no compulsory rustic crockery, no foie-gras origami. Michelin is clear about what you’re unlikely to find – nitrogen clouds and ultra-precious ingredients – but beyond all that, the whole point is “distinct character”.
Thyme in Athlone is deemed to have character enough to merit a Bib. Awarded in 2019, owners John and Tara Coffey have maintained it since. Of more significance is the fact that it is one of Mickael Viljanen’s favourite places for Sunday lunch. No small praise from the chef-patron of two-Michelin-star Chapter One.
The menu will warm your heart, because right at the bottom is a list of organic growers, free-range pork producers and serious butchers and fishmongers. Starters run from ham hock with a crispy egg to partridge ballotine, bluefin with ajo blanco, a shiitake custard and a smoked-mackerel velouté. Mains land firmly in winter territory – rib-eye with Yorkshire pudding, wild sika deer, plaice, John Dory, pork in several cuts and a Delicata-squash pithivier.
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The wine list is compiled confidently: European, organically minded and priced with restraint. By-the-glass pours sit around the €10-€12 mark, running from Loire Sauvignon and Sardinian Vermentino to Cahors Malbec, Xinomavro and Ribera del Duero. A glass of Domaine Macia Crémant (€15) and a glass of Veronica Salgado, Ribera del Duero (€12) sit well alongside the dishes.
House-made sourdough with a quenelle of butter takes the edge off our hunger before the starters arrive. The bluefin is exquisite – diamonds of rose-centred fish set in a smooth ajo blanco, the grapes, toasted almonds, bright drops of olive oil, and tiny leaves placed with deliberate care (€16). The warm partridge ballotine (€16) is a tight cylinder of bird sitting on pommes purée, ringed with tiny Romanesco florets and small cut-out flowers of Purple Rain potatoes. Someone in the kitchen has serious patience.
I am here for the roast beef (€36), a slab of aged rib-eye with a seam of fat to keep it basted as it develops a gnarly char on the outside. Precisely cooked, two thick slices are very much on the rare side of medium, served with roast onion purée, cheek and potato terrine and a neat little jug of gravy. The Yorkshire pudding is enormous and shatteringly crisp, the perfect receptacle for the rich jus.
A generous tranche of John Dory (€36) is burnished gold on top, pearlescent underneath, set over a glossy, herb-green ring and a seaweed beurre blanc. Around it are little pommes dauphine, a few pickled mussels, and a tight cylinder of leek pressed into a mosaic.
There are generous portions of sides – new potatoes and a superb mix of broccoli and cubes of courgette dressed in onion and bacon.
Desserts stay classic and are all €12. The apple terrine is exquisite, a neat, amber-glazed slab, the layers pressed tightly over a buttery sablé base. Beside it is a quenelle of vanilla-flecked ice-cream, sitting on a sablé crumb, scattered with thin batons of raw apple standing at angles like scaffolding.
The coffee custard tart arrives as a long, slim wedge with a perfectly even surface, the colour of a flat white. Off to the side is a neat scoop of whiskey ice-cream with two shards of meringue teetering on top. A dark dot of coffee caramel sits nearby for a formidable espresso hit.
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With serious suppliers, technical skill and clean execution, Thyme does exactly what a Bib Gourmand is meant to recognise. But the tyre men or women might take a harder look and compare it honestly with the places that earn a Michelin star in parts of France – some of which amount to sous-vide banqueting food served in a handsome room or on a scenic terrace. Despite what they claim, perhaps the one-star threshold still depends on the setting, unless you’re running a street-food operation. Would a smarter room be enough? Or a bit of caviar theatre? In the meantime, this remains the best Sunday lunch you’re likely to find in the country.
Lunch for two with two glasses of wine was €155.
The Verdict: Classic cooking at a serious level.
Food provenance: Gillivan’s Butchers, Pigs on the Green free-range pork, Millhouse Organic Farm, Lough Boora Organic Farm, Glenmar Seafood, and Eamon Giblin’s Gourmet Game
Vegetarian options: Mossfield cheese custard, Garryhinch shiitake mushroom royale, and pithivier of Delicata squash.
Wheelchair access: Accessible room with no accessible toilet.
Music: Torch songs and movie classics.
