Cafe Bar Deli

JL, D, C and me were at Cafe Bar Deli, Grafton St, last week to grab a quick meal. Their menu isn't bad but a tad bit pricey for what it is. JL and C got pizzas which tasted great but were a bit too bland and homely-looking for my liking. Referring to the four, sad-looking basil leaves atop his pizza C remarked "The leaves flew in", which is exactly what it looked like. D loved his Caesar Salad but it was too small and my Feta cheese, broccoli, and chickpea salad was OK but bland. But salads are supposed to be bland right? Cos I've had their Spaghetti with ricotta before and it rocked. Maybe I was just in a foul mood. Since everyone was still hungry and I have a perennial sweet tooth we got the Brownies and the Nut Sundae with fudge sauce. Two of the three different ice-cream flavours on it were good (Caramel and Vanilla, not a fan of choc icecream) but the crumbly biscuit base really ruined it. Plus the glass started to leak halfway through and the spoon is just too long to hold right. OK so I'm just blaming the poor dessert for my slobiness. Really Cafe Bar Deli isn't all that bad, I'll stick to my favourite Spaghetti with ricotta next time though.

Fresh Guacamole and Mexican Potato Skins

Went to celebrate L's birthday tonight in Acapulco, the Mexican restaurant on George's street. Been there a few times before (got my surprise birthday bash there) and the food is always yummy albeit a teeny bit pricier than a lot of other places. But then a lot of other places don't make their guacamole fresh and tangy like Acapulco does, or their fajitas spicy and sizzling, and the desserts oh my....well I could go on.

I've never tried the chilli, which was trés tempting but I was ravenous and you know when you're super hungry and you want to 'bite' into something not suck or slurp it? Well I was in a bite-some mood (when am I ever not?) so I forego the veggie chilli (yet again) for my tried and trusted fave: The enchiladas (I used to watch an ol Winnie the Pooh episode when I was a young kid where Eyore made enchiladas for everyone, I remember thinking then how exotic they sounded and wishing I could have me some enchiladas) : Soft tortilla wraps filled with vegetables and refried beans, served with sweetcorn and Mexican rice, drizzled all over with melted cheese, guacamole and spectacular sour cream! There's something about Mexican food that is very filling. Usually we skip out on the starters but since it was L's birthday we decided to splurge a bit and went for the combo starter for 3 even though there were 4 of us: it had some usual fare, the onion rings, the nachos, the buffalo wings but the two things that made my tastebuds hop into a space shuttle and rocket into space were the mini Corn Chilli Sizzlers deep fried baby corn and whole jalapeno chillies filled with soft cheese and the Mexican spud skins filled with cheese, sour cream and chives...yummy! ofcourse it came with salsa, sour cream and some spanking fresh guacamole, which was utterly sublime! It transported me right back to California. Nowhere in Dublin have I had such good guacamole (as of yet, not even Taco Taco!)

My friends got sizzling fajitas and Tostadas. Dessert as always is highly recommended in Acapulco. We were so full yet who could resist the deep-fried icecream, deep fried dish of bananas, caramel and cream in a tortilla wrap (quite tasty) while I had hot chocolate fudge cake with ice-cream. I usually dont like choc cakes (Yes for a cake lover it''s quite weird but I find choc desserts quite blasé usually) but since I got one at my birthday surprise party which my friends threw I've been sold on this cake. It's warm, soft and melts in your mouth along with ice-cream and gooseberry (I think that's what it is, but need to check that) sauce. The cake was as good but the portion was tiny compared to the last time. Not happy.

Oh and the service was so much better this time. Nice waitresses and cool manager who waved goodbye to us as we left as well as wishing L and her sis a happy birthday!

Chocolate soup...?

I happened to chance across a futuristic-looking* little cafe on Debenham's second floor on Henry Street the other day, called Chocolate Soup. What an odd name for a cafe I thought, soup and cholocate, weird combo or what?

One glance at the menu and I found out Chocolate soup is actually a dessert that this place specialised in. It's made of chocolate, cream and milk with different flavourings. But I tend to like my soups savoury (and less calorific) so I decided to forego the weird concoction (don't worry I'll be trying it tomorrow or one day) for one of the numerous other sweet delights they had on offer.

Usually cafes in Dublin offer tonnes of French pastries and scones with some stale, defrosted chocolate cake slices or below par cheescakes. But this place is not your ordinary cafe. Among the usual fare, they had, wait for it...chocolate fondue! (shrieks of Oh-my-god) , they had this brownie sandwich which is stuffed with ice-cream and sauce in the middle and they had french toast!

No ordinary French Toast, let me tell you. This French Toast was chock full of yummy-sweet goodness, with ice-cream and bananas and what not. Not only that, they seem to be one of the few places that actually do proper pancakes. And I mean pancakes not crepes. (Note to all European eateries, those flimsy, crispy things are not pancakes (And where's the maple syrup godammit?!)

So there I was standing in the middle of the queue my mind reeling with the various possibilitiesI had to send my taste buds into space, when a creamy demure looking piece of cake caught my eye. It sat next to the humdrum, ubiquitous chocolate cake (Borrrrinnng) and looked like it needed someone to believe in it. And you know what? I went for it. It was called Pear and Cookie cake. Really soft and fluffy, with fresh cream and juicy pears. There was no sign of cookie though. Which is just as well, as biscuits and cake should never meet as far as I'm concerned. Biscuit is cake's poor cousin and they should remain separate. Forever. (Unless it's biscuit and ice-cream or ice-cream and cake, and it's maybe OK for cheesecake but then again cheesecake ain't really cake is it now?)

That's probably one of the best cakes I've had in Dublin in a long time.

*And what's really chic and original about Chocolate Soup (apart from their left-of-field dessert menu) is their seating area: It's a long, narrow corridor slightly jutting out of the second-floor building that looks like it belongs in some trendy part of Tokyo or something.