With the smell of bonfires in the air it seemed a good idea to try P.D.'s Woodhouse in Dalkey, a small neighbourhood restaurant that sends out plumes of woodsmoke conviviality through its doors. Right in the heart of the village with a chi-chi address - 1 Coliemore Road - this is a place that gives the impression of being more of a club than a restaurant. Walking in is like stepping into a private party with owners Kay and Pat Doyle, very much the welcoming hosts behind the bar.
It's determinedly cosy and old-fashioned, with red walls, low lights and wooden tables and chairs, most of them full on the night we visited for a 9.30 p.m. sitting.
The overall atmosphere is jolly and intimate, rather like a Jilly Cooper novel. It seemed to be full of attractive middle-aged blondes wearing lycra bodies, accompanied by well-built men in viyella and tweeds or sports jerseys with stand-up collars. If you stumbled across it on a holiday to Dublin you would be wowed by the friendliness of it all, as Polish friends of ours did.
They went in for dinner and came out with the lease on a house - all organised over the phone by Kay who one has the feeling knows just about everything that moves in the village.
We were shown to a good table in the middle of the room with a great view of the restaurant's main feature - a giant wood-burning barbeque where a red-faced chef was lining up steaks and skewers of meat and fish. The thing belts out tremendous heat, so ask for this table if you are frozen to the bone and need to thaw out. We slumped into our seats and started taking off layers of clothing immediately.
"Seats are a little hard," said Patsey, squirming around on the wooden bench she was sharing with David. Hard and narrow, and probably designed to fit in as many people as possible, but definitely uncomfortable. Soon the layers of clothes were being used as cushioning.
I got a proper chair on the other side of the table and we swapped half-way through. It was bottomnumbingly hard all right. The table looked good with real napkins and a dish of crudites that were freshly cut and crunchy. Soon we were offered a choice of homemade rolls - white, brown or herb-filled from a basket, although not before the really friendly waitress had exclaimed over a novel Patsey had been reading that was lying on the table.
The menu is easy to follow. You can have steak, fish or chicken and most of it comes on a skewer. Vegetarians can have vegetables on a skewer or a halloumi kebab - marinated feta cheese on a skewer, barbequed and served with a lime dressing. Baked potatoes or new potatoes in season come with all the main courses, the menu said. But the new potato season goes all year round now and by the stove I could see a platter of those small ones that you get everywhere - the slightly watery tasteless ones.
What you really want with steak is a hefty baked spud with a crispy skin and a fluffy interior that's begging for butter. A restaurant that offers one type of potato only should be getting it right and not buying the least interesting potatoes on the market. Salad is included in the price and sauces are served up in a little ramekins so you can add as much as you want at a time. It's a formula menu and it works up to a point, particularly if you are hungry and want instant gratification without having to wade through a complicated menu.
Having spent an evening in casualty with a child who turned out to be fine, I was definitely in that camp and in need of a drink. The wine list looks full of interesting names from all over the world but we were happy with the owner's favourite - a Mitchelson chardonnay that was well chilled, strong and oaky and a match for anything the barbeque could throw at us.
It was late and we decided to skip starters and go straight for the main event. Patsey, rebelling a little at the formula menu, wanted to have vegetables and prawns on a skewer, not just vegetables or prawns. This caused some confusion but finally word came back from the kitchen that something could be done along those lines. David went for monkfish from the specials board while I ordered Surf and Turf.
At the last minute we gave in and asked for a plate of barbequed chicken wings to be going on with. These arrived promptly and were very good, with tender meat falling off the bone. The portion was just enough for three. The bones and plates were whipped away and our main courses arrived within minutes. Our waitress was brilliantly efficient and nimble as she dashed around the long, narrow room with plates held high.
"The skewers are very hot," she told us as she lowered our plates onto the table. I wasn't paying attention and, picking one up a few seconds later, I just about branded my thumb, which soured my outlook on kebabs a bit.
My Surf and Turf was one skewer of steak and another of prawns - exactly what the menu said - but somehow I had imagined a nice big steak with plump prawns in sauce on top. Both meat and prawns were fresh and juicy, if not absolutely dripping with flavour. The meat was exactly medium as I'd ordered, and this must take some skill on such a beast of a stove. It was interspersed with mushroooms which hadn't come out so well and were all shrivelled and brown and made no impact on the dish whatsoever. Little onions would have been much better.
David's monkfish special was simply chunks of monkfish on a skewer. It tasted fresh, but for £17.95 you expect something more than a ramekin of mild buttery sauce to accompany it. Patsey toyed with her brightly-coloured peppers and prawns but wasn't terribly enthusiastic about either. The shared bowl of salad was more interesting, with its different lettuces, thin onion and scattering of vegetables.
By now it was pretty late and the owners had retired to a table by the door to have a glass of wine and chat to people as they left. Last orders are not until 11, and a couple arrived just in time and were congratulated for having made it all the way over from the northside. That's the sort of thing that would set your teeth on edge.
We all felt entitled to desserts. My hazelnut ice-cream with pecan sauce was incredibly sweet and very good. David's vanilla icecream with toffee sauce was just OK. The ice-cream was bland and icy, and the sauce came in another annoying little ramekin. Patsey finished with a creme brulee which, again was pleasant and sweet but not outstanding.
This is a nice, cosy place where you could take friends from abroad and be sure of a hearty Irish welcome, but it's not particularly cheap. Our meal with one bottle of wine at £22.95, mineral water and coffees came to £93.80.
P.D.'s Woodhouse, 1 Coliemore Road, Dalkey, Co Dublin. Tel: 01 284 9399
Orna Mulcahy can be contacted at omulca@irishtimes.ie
