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"The Sunday Times 21st June 2009" AA Gill
"According to AA Gill"
Chapter One Restaurant
Basement of Writers Museum,
18 Parnell Square, Dublin 1;
00 353 1 873 2266. Lunch, Tue-Fri, 12.30pm-2pm; dinner, Tue-Sat, 6pm-11pm

****

Five stars Phwoar, the Corrs Four stars Dashing Day-Lewis Three stars Naughty Norton Two stars Goody-goody Geldof One star Worn-out Wogan

I’ve never been to Dublin. No, that’s not entirely true; I did go to Dublin once. I have it on good authority, but I was so drunk I can’t remember a single Irish thing. You’ve never been to Dublin, people say. You’ve been to Samarkand, to N’Djamena, to Antananarivo. You’ve been to Stow on the benighted Wold more than once, but you’ve never been to Dublin. How can you square that with a rounded existence? How can you call yourself a man of the world when you haven’t suckled on one of the globe’s great erogenous zones? Well, yes. There are no excuses, except that Dublin is two places. Very few places get to be two places. The real place, which I haven’t been to, and the literary, anecdotal, imaginary place that floats on an ethereal Liffey. I was saving Dublin for later. We rush around the world gobbling up places for kiddultish gap decades. You need to put something aside for later: Dublin.

I seem to know an inordinate number of Irish people. I don’t go searching them out — well, you wouldn’t — but they just accumulate. They’re the ones you meet at parties, who say, as you’re leaving, “We must have dinner sometime,” and then actually call you. It’s the Irish who, when you say, “Let’s have Sunday lunch,” actually turn up. Well, now I’ve been and gone and done Dublin. The editor said: “You need to go and do Dublin. Go and eat.” So I’ve been and went.

I called Patrick Kielty, who lives round the corner, and said: “Do you fancy some lunch tomorrow?” Yes, he said, because he’s Irish. In Dublin, I added. “Right. Do I have to buy my own ticket?” You do. “Fine, come and pick me up at seven.” So we’re checking in, and he starts patting his pockets in the international sign language of dementia. “I haven’t got any photo ID,” he said. “Ah, but it’ll be fine.” Ah, but it won’t — this is an international flight. Ah, but it was. He went to the desk and they wrote “No ID” in red Biro on his boarding card, and that was all he needed. The immigration officer in Dublin said: “Where are you from?” “Down,” ye man replied. “Are ye English or Irish?” the highly trained defender of his nation’s borders asked. “Irish,” smiled Paddy. “Do you really want to get into this argument? Have you got time for a pint?” “Come the way in,” said the gimlet-eyed functionary. That’s it. All you need is a red Biro and a bit of a wink to leapfrog European border security.

In the taxi, he had a transformation: he went from being Patrick to Padraig, and so broadly diddly diddly dai dai that his accent turned bright green. We went to Croke Park, which, he told me, was the home of the GAA, the Gay Athletic Association. How very liberal of the Irish, I thought. We were shown round by a wonderfully enthusiastic lady, and Paddy said: “I used to play this when I was a boy.” With the Catholic brothers? I asked. “I was very good at it,” he said. “There are two ways you can score: over the top, and in underneath. You weren’t allowed to be a member if you played rugby or football, or had been in the British armed forces.” Really? There are hundreds of squaddies who are as bent as a strap-on shillelagh. And I got a very long, hard look. “It’s the Gaelic Athletic Association.” Ahh.

Then we went off to have our pictures taken with the Irish Eurovision Song Contest entry, a foul-mouthed glove-puppet turkey that looks like a gynaecologist’s teaching aid, and which was sitting with an Irish newsreader, a Fearne O’Cotton. The turkey is attached to a man in a baseball cap, whose professional life consists of looking up newsreaders’ skirts from under a table. They were here to advertise Bloomsday, 24 hours of Ulysses. Now who’d have thought you could advertise the greatest, obliquest novel in the language with a turkey, a newsreader, a comedian and a passing food critic? There was no time to ask. I had to get a Donegal tweed jacket in a shop that had photographs of every known Irishman, including Patrick; Terry Wogan I found behind the buttocks of a mannequin. I won’t be able to come back for a second fitting, I said. “What makes you think we’re going to get the first one wrong?” replied the assistant. “Where are you off to?” We’re late for lunch. “Oh, I’ll drive you,” he said, and he did.

My editor booked a table in Chapter One under the name of Mr O’Cock. At the door, a maître d’, who was so effusive and charming he could have given a Christmas tree diabetes, said:

“Mr Gill, it’s an honour and a great, great pleasure to have you here,” which was three lies in the first sentence alone. “It’s a small place, Dublin,” he winked. I reckon he was tipped off by the immigration officer.

The restaurant’s in the basement of the Writers Museum, hence Chapter One. I was told this was once a rough part of town, north Dublin, as opposed to the genteel south. “Before we got the euro, the local currency was heroin.” The dining room is neat and calm, with a sort of good taste that’s principally designed to offend the fewest possible people. It whispers “fine dining”, and was faintly nostalgic. “Let me show you round,” said the maître d’, lighting up like a carousel. “Here is our latest addition: the chef’s table with a view of the kitchen.” Oh Jeez, would ya look at that. It really is the 1990s. We’re back in my favourite decade of food. The presentation was exactly middle-period Marco: a bit of a tower, a bit of a fan, a bit of a blob.

On the menu, every dish came with more supporting bridesmaid ingredients than a Hello! wedding. For a terrible moment, I thought it was going to be Holy Ghost food all over the place. I started with tongue and sweetbreads, and a huge sigh of relief. It was brilliant, and why wouldn’t it be? If you’re going to get great tongue, it’s going to be in Dublin. Next, I had salmon with, among other things, a mild curry sauce, which was interesting, and not at all unpleasant. Paddy got the best dish: a stuffed rabbit, with a shepherd’s pie made out of the bunny leg, with puréed potatoes, a Mr Macgregor pie. It was one of the best things I’ve eaten for a good long time. Irish cheese, and big 1990s disco puddings. This is a really accomplished kitchen that’s keeping a lot of competing ingredients and methods under tight control, while still cooking with the hurley stick and a broad dash of muscle and guts.

After lunch, we went off to the Gravediggers’ pub that’s mentioned in Ulysses. Paddy had a pint of Guinness, and as I walked in, a man at the bar said, “Ah, so it’s your man AA,” as if I’d just left half an hour ago. “What have you been up to today?” and then, reprised: “So it’s Croke Park, the turkey, fitted up by Louis Copeland, lunch at Chapter One, and here a drink at the Gravediggers’. Well, you can go home now. You’ve had the complete city. You’ve done the lot.” I sat on the plane feeling absurdly happy. It was a magic day. Dublin flashed past, funny, elegant, immensely friendly, relaxed, and civilised in all the places that really matter. I got home and the Blonde said: “Did you have a nice day?” Well, I went to the Gay Athletic Association, and I talked Joyce with a turkey. I think we might have to go to Dublin quite a lot.


"The Sunday Times 21st June 2009" AA Gill