RESTAURANT PATRICK GUILBAUD

Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud was far from full when we arrived for dinner at 8 o'clock on a miserable Thursday evening. Good scabs as always we began the evening at home, toasting my sister's thirtieth at home with a bottle of Mumm Cordon Rouge 1998 and Bollinger NV.

I have long been under the impression that Mumm NV is proper plop, but this was pretty damn good. Lovely autolytic biscuit notes and oodles of complexity, this was tasty, pinot noir led champagne. A bit of a cheese-y nose, and some undergrowth complexity. The Bollinger seemed fairly one dimensional in comparison, and had a metallic taint, a faulty bottle?

We arrived in Guilbaud's and were shown to our table. There were only three or four other occupied tables in the restaurant, and it was far from buzzing. This was the place where the tiger came to tea, so I suppose it wasn't so surprising that business appeared to be suffering. Undeterred we sat down and ordered a bottle of Chablis premier cru 2008, on the suggestion of the sommelier. To my shame I didn't catch the name of the producer, but it may have been Guillaume Vrignaud. This was structured, mineral, restrained in its use of oak and good, although I still prefer the iodine aspect of Jean Claude Bessin's wines.

Our bouches were amused by a perfect pairing of parmesan foam, red wine syrup and foie gras. This was truly fantastic, a real exploration of fermentation flavours and was probably the best thing I ate that night.
STARTERS
I chose truffle tortellini with warm baby leeks, hazelnut, potato mousse and a truffle vinagrette.
At 38 euro this consisted of three tortellini, sitting on the potato mousse, and topped by the leeks and hazelnuts. As the proud father of a relatively new baby I can attest that the leeks didn't actually taste of warm baby, but perhaps that is no bad thing. The dish was elegant and restrained, a sound combination of autumnal flavours. A slight criticism that the pasta was too thick at the edges, but overall this was good.

My sister went for the red king crab cannelloni, with pineapple, pickled ginger, baby herbs, and wasabi creme fraiche. This was all you could wish for in terms of light, fresh, clean flavour without resorting to lime juice or coriander- I know because I scabbed some! She was bowled over by the intensity of the micro greens and also, strangely that the wasabi tasted of wasabi but 'didn't hurt when you [ate] it'.A very good dish, and perfect lady starter food.

The Ma elected to try the stewed basque pepper terrine, with whipped goat's cheese, fennel confit, balsamic croquant and black olive tapenade. This was good, but not great. I didn't think the balsamic croquant had much to recommend it. It looked quite cool, but the flavour was not good. It tasted like burnt-y cake bits. Pretty punchy at 35 bucks, although a bit of a bargain relative to the omnivore's starters.

Pa Pa had the Castletown Bere Scallops, with cauliflower three ways, confit zest with grapefruit reduction and citrus seasoning. I purloined a piece of the scallop and thought it was perfectly cooked, although the Pa said he would have preferred it to have seen the pan for a minute more. He was wrong.

Main courses followed a bizarre interlude where empty plates were places in front of us, presumably to symbolise the lost fish course which we had decided to fore go. I shed a single golden tear. Goodbye my fishy friend. No cutlery was presented. I can't decide whether this made it all more of less bizarre.

MAINS:
Pa couldn't resist his favourite food, veal sweetbreads. These were served with endive and caramelized fennel, with an aribica glaze, and were pronounced excellent.

Despite her fear of bivalves Mama chose the West Cork Sole, Artichoke, Parsley and Shellfish nage. This featured a sizeable and perfectly cooked piece of sole, covered in a nage, which failed the scary bivalve test, and therefore passed mummy muster with flying colours.

My sister's turbot with carrot and star anise and seaweed butter, was a very good combination, featuring a generous portion of turbot.

I chose the Brittany pigeon, slowly roasted with parsnip and seasame and cocoa grue. This was quite a small portion compared to the fish to my right and left, but was good.

Wine wise I chose from a surprisingly well priced list, at least relative to continental urban two stars. Regular readers- are there any?- will know that I am a foul scab, but when in Rome...

I was tempted by the Trimbach Pinot Gris Reserve 2005 at 49 snots, which is a lovely wine but probably too big, even in the dry Trimbach style, to go with all the dishes chosen. I went instead for a superb A and P de Villaine, Cote Chalonnaise 'Les Clous' 2006. 100% chardonnay made on the personal estate of Romanee Conti owner, Aubert de Villaine. Both the reds and whites are fantastic and worth looking trying if you come across them. This was restrained and fine, with a certain yuminess, and a nose full of ripe orchard fruit and a hint of oatmeal. Perfectly balanced, this is a superb wine for the money. We also got two glasses of Simon Beze Bourgogne 2006 to go with my pigeon and the pa's veal, this was very good albeit at 12 a glass. Still when you can pay the same for a glass of absolutely crap pinot grigio in the Shelbourne perhaps this represents relatively good value?

We finished with a selection of fromages- more expensive than a selection of cheeses would have been. The condition of the cheese wasn't great. Not that they were underripe but rather that the rinds of the soft cheeses, particularly the washed rinds were dried out.m Twenty five quid verges on outrageous for 200g of cheese.

This was washed down with a glass of Trimbach Gewurztraminer VT 2002. The sommelier seemed surprised by this choice, conceding that it would be good with the blue cheeses but conveying an overall impression of deep scepticism. I have long thought that gewurz is probably the best variety to pair with cheese and it worked out well.

My sister's chocolate fondant with a warm criollo biscuit, milk chocolate and hazelnut centre and a stout ice cream was decidedly underwhelming. My sister is a chocolate fondant jedi and found this lacked real depth of flavour.

We finished with some good coffees and a plate of very average at best petit fours, including chocolate tuiles and cubes of orange jelly.

The bread throughout the evening was delicious.

Would I be running back with my own money? Probably not. It isn't that there was anything wrong with the food, some of it was very good and the amuse bouche was genuinely excellent. Amuse Bouche aside there was little in the way of genuinely exciting flavour combinations, and for this kind of money you can eat in some of the rural french three stars.. I suppose the 85 euro tasting menu is good value, but I think Guilbaud's is more about the service and being seen than a genuinely memorable gastronomic experience.

Yannick Amirault Le Grand Clos 2004, Bourgeuil

Yannick Amirault is widely regarded as one of the best red wine producers in the Loire.Yet his wines remain affordable and are a hot tip for anyone presented with a terrifying tome of a wine list in Relais et Chateaux restaurants. Guilbaud's used to list some 1995's but don't seem to have any left.



Yannick took over the 3.4 hectare domaine from his grandfather in 1977, and has built it up to 19 hectares today. Yannick's son Benoit joined the enterprise in 2003, and the pair are currently in the process of converting the domaine for organic certification.

Amirault makes a number of different cuvees of Bourgeuil, and St Nicholas de Bourgeuil- all from 100% Cabernet Franc. The fruity La Coudraye, La Mine, La Source and Le Rose are from sandy soils; the heavier, more serious Le Grand Clos is from clay-silex; and La Petite Cave, Les Quartiers and Les Malagnes are from and sand and clay mixture.

The wines are in short supply, so much so that Irish agents Sheridans/ Grapecircus were unable to secure any 2005s whatsoever despite having bought a large quantity of 2004s. Sheridans have just sold out of Le Grand Clos 2004, but still have some of the lighter, cheaper, and less interesting La Coudraye 2006 (16.95) in stock. This cuvee conforms more to light and fruity, chill it if you like, Loire red than the more serious Le Grand Clos. I think La Cave may still have a couple of bottles of Le Grand Clos 2004 on their list. Visitors to the Grand Epicerie in Paris can stock up on a wide range of Amirault's wines at very reasonable prices ( from 9 euro upwards).

2004 was not a decent but not fantastic vintage for Loire reds, nowhere near as ripe as 2005 or 2003 and probably on a par with 2002. Then again it wasn't a total wash-out and maybe you get more a sense of red Loire from an goodish vintage, than from a blockbuster year like 2003. Enough decent weather to get rid of dilute character and serious greeness, but not sufficient heat that you would never guess Loire. Think 2004 Bordeaux vs 2005. High levels of ripeness in 2006 prior to rain in September saved the harvest from washout. I would avoid red Loire 2007s, probably 2008s. 2009 is supposed to be savagely good, on a par with 2005 according to initial reports.

Anyway suffice to say that the Grand Clos 2004 (22.95) was just coming into its own. I tasted this a few years ago and it was good, but far too young. Now it had blackberry fruit with a hint of briar attached, restrained oak (2nd uses barriques from Chateau Margaux), smokey/ cigar box and some nice secondary characteristics starting to come through. Too bad this is the last bottle! Went very well with the huge veal cutlet from the butcher's in Donnybrook, which cost almost as much as the wine.