About a 30 minute drive out of Galway heading east is the tiny village of Bullaun. Not exactly the place you’d expect to find a high end restaurant, but here it is. Situated in an old stone building, it was once a popular local restaurant. Slateford House closed a while back and has been re-opened by the son of the original owners who is cooking up a storm … this is Lignum.
A large extension has been built on the side of the original house and is a good size space with large tables and comfortable seating. On arrival we were given a tour of the kitchen which was very interesting, usually we ask to see the kitchen after our meal. Except for one electric hot plate, everything is cooked over open flames, in fact they have duck hanging over the main cooking area which also smokes the duck, neat idea.
We were seated at a good size table which would have been comfortable even if we had four in our party but on this occasion, it was just the two of us. A nice touch was some hot towels to freshen up.
As it’s a taster menu, there are two choices, the six course or the eight course option which was our choice. There’s also a good sized wine list which reads really well. Another nice little touch, was to be offered a choice of tap, still or sparkling water – so many places never give you a choice of tap water, wanting instead to up-sell you still or sparkling, so bravo there. For the record C opted for tap, I went with sparkling.
We ordered two glasses of prosecco which were fantastic, our sommelier informed us that he tried about 50 different bottles before deciding on this one, it was a good choice – I probably should have got the name of it.
Onto the meal…..
Homemade butter along with some sourdough and brown soda bread was handed out to enjoy with your meal. The sourdough was tasty, the brown soda was nothing special but not unpleasant, however, they make their own butter on-site which was really good.
Next was an amuse bouche of a mushroom tartlet, it was very tasty having real depth of flavour – a delicious start.
Our next course, Sprout, Jowl as it appeared on the menu was their version of the Irish classic – bacon and cabbage. Brussel sprouts took the place of cabbage along with trimmings from the jowl of the pig (pig cheek). It did indeed taste like bacon and cabbage, however ultimately that’s pretty much all it was – a slight twist on the Irish classic.
Next was the scallop, served with pumpkin miso and ramson (wild garlic) – this dish was a winner, the scallop was cooked perfectly and the savoury sweet miso along with the ramson worked a treat.
Some venison followed served with barley….which was not to our liking, there was nothing wrong with the dish, we’re both not a fan of barley.
Next, my favourite root vegetable, celeriac, served with lovage which brought a pleasant aniseed flavour to the dish along with the seeds which have a little salty spicy kick – fantastic dish.
Halibut was the main fish course served with a sherry broth and some blackened leaves. The fish was perfectly cooked and very tasty although the broth lacked any real depth of flavour but I think that’s what they were going for as not to overpower the fish.
The one dish we were both really looking forward to was the duck, which was served with a pureed swede and salsify. The duck was cooked perfect, crispy skin and really tender and succulent, top marks. Along with the swede and salsify, this was a fantastic dish.
Dessert followed, yogurt flavoured with meadowsweet and some rhubarb and also baked Alaska. C really enjoyed the meadowsweet yogurt, anything that’s “rose” flavoured or floral, is not to my liking, thankfully though the baked Alaska was a much better affair and looked impressive on the plate.
To finish, we got some sweets and a quirky twist was to roast your own marshmallow at the table, great fun and the mallow was really tasty.
Lignum’s cooking style is described as Asian and Nordic along with an Irish slant and we feel all three were reasonably well represented. It’s early days yet for this young restaurant but it’ll be a “go to” place once word really gets out. The food overall was very good and while some of the dishes did not hit the mark, the majority of the cooking was well executed, tasty and more than worth a return trip. The service was good and the staff were genuinely interested in feedback. The head chef joined us at our table and really appreciated out thoughts on the cooking and thanked us for our custom and feedback.
Until next time…
C&J
cjfoodandtravel 