the Dublin Gobbler

Fallon and Byrne food hall

Fallon and Byrne, the gourmet food emporium that lives in a magnificent building on Exchequer Street off Grafton Street, is a fine example of what you can do when you take a risk. The owners have put their money where their mouth is and for that reason, we too have supported this new venture with ours since it opened. Inside the store there is a selection of fine food and wine on the ground floor, a restaurant in the middle floor and function rooms for rent on the top floor. In the basement is an excellent wine shop and bar where you can hide in the dark from your employer on a Thursday afternoon, certain that even if they arrive, they will never be able to see you. Here they serve tapas style dishes and cheese platters and tasty wines by the glass.

Let’s start with the food store. It’s modelled on the American style delis and upmarket convenience stores like Wholefoods in Kensington. Fresh vegetables, artisan cured meats and cheeses, takeaway food made on the premises, interesting ingredients, pasta, even a juice bar offer a way of life to city centre foodies who live locally and want to buy something to eat or cook for dinner. Prices are not cheap, and over time they have crept upwards, making this a shop less suited to routine shopping than to elite browsing.

Indeed, when it opened first thedublingobbler would fly into town especially to buy thick cuts of aged prime steak on the bone, exotic vegetables and smoked salmon. We would spend around 70 to 80 euro a time and arrive home to gleefully lay out the goodies on the kitchen table before cooking. Then thedublingobbler’s husband would find little difference in the steak we bought at Fallon and Byrne and insist that we taste test it against the meat from Cyril’s butcher down the street. Cyril won the toss. And he was cheaper. Then the aged steak in F&B disappeared and new meat covered in ready-made sauce appeared and it cast a doubt on the provenance of the fine meat counter. Then we cast our eye around the store and there was not much left to buy – we had all those ingredients in our cupboard and while it was good to graze, once the meat was gone there was no compelling need to buy the other bits and pieces. Then a Fresh supermarket opened on Camden Street in Dublin 2 and it was easier to get to and the parking fees were cheaper. And it served speck and prosciutto and delicious fresh vegetables and we passed Cyril on the way home where we could buy the meat and he now knew our names and actually spoke to us, unlike the people in Fallon and Byrne who never registered that we existed (and now may be wondering where our spend has gone). And soon our compelling reasons for purchase disappeared.

fallon and byrne restaurant

We moved our business to the restaurant upstairs – a room of classic proportions with red banquette style seating and white tablecloths and stylish cutlery. The prices at lunch are reasonable and dinner is not too expensive though we racked up a bill of 250 euro at lunch for four with ease once we ordered the third bottle of wine. The food is not inspirational but it is good solid fare and the venue makes up for any losses. Over time, that is on our fifth or sixth visit we learned to navigate the menu and to stick to the steak and chips with homemade pate to start. This tactic served us well and we avoided huge size portions of caeser salad, the croutons drowning in cos lettuce or plates of non-descript pasta. When we stuck to the steak we had a good time, enjoyed the atmosphere and people-watching and drank the wine. By the eight visit we hoped that we had struck up some kind of familiarity based on loyalty but the sad truth is that, again, just as happened in the food store below, no-one knew we were there or ever recognised us when we booked or arrived. There were so many restaurants we wanted to try, and thedublingobbler felt that we had been loyal enough to this not-now-so-new venture. We slipped away quietly to other venues in town and because no-one ever noticed that we spent money there, no-one ever contacted us to ask why.

However, our affection for Fallon and Byrne remains and from time to time, we pop in and buy a bottle of wine or meet a friend for a fine plate of food in the wine bar downstairs. When the Irish economy flattens, and people no longer want to spend a premium or find like we did that convenience chains like Fresh have claimed their territory, perhaps we’ll get a call, perhaps someone will remember that we once spent money in their business and wished them well … perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.