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2007 Reviews

Best World Cuisine Award 2007 – Silk Road Café

"The Silk Road Café has been doing its rather quiet but truly excellent thing for some years now, but recently this delightful self-service café has really come into its own. Having moved to Dublin from his native Jerusalem, Abraham Phelan built quite a reputation at the popular canteen of Clonskeagh’s mosque before bringing his largely Middle-Eastern influenced cooking to the Silk Road Café in Dublin Castle. Housed within the multicultural treasure-trove that is the Chester Beatty Library, the cafes repertoire of ethnic dishes is suitably wide-ranging, taking Mediterranean and North African influences into a largely Lebanese menu. "

Food & Wine magazine’s Restaurant of the year awards 2007, September 2007

Best of the best

"In a fine location in the heart of the city centre, Dublin Castle provides wonderful gardens and historic architecture which greatly enhance the enjoyment of a visit to this unusual restaurant, which is situated in the clock tower beside the Chester Beatty Library (European Museum of the Year in 2002, and one of the few Dublin museums offering free entry).

Middle Eastern, Mediterranean, vegetarian and organic are the themes brought together by Abraham Phelan and his small but dedicated team, who create inspired versions of classics like Greek moussaka, Moroccan cous cous, falafel and spinach & feta pie to the delight of their many returning customers.

Fresh organic herbs are used in all dishes and, in line with halal/kosher rules, all dishes are made without the use of pork or beef. Prices are very reasonable. "

Chosen for inclusion in the highly selective Georgina Campbell’s Best of the best Ireland guide

Five stars

"One of my favourite places for lunch, great value, huge portions, fantastic selection of dishes, wonderful salads, very very tasty..nice atmosphere and plenty space, nice place to relax & you never feel hurried. The floor staff are 10/10, I was there recently to meet a friend with her new baby, they were so friendly and helpful and went out of their way to assist at every turn..offered to bring boiling water to clean the dummy when it fell on the floor etc etc - above and beyond normal service standards in Dublin today! All in all, great spot, highly recommended for casual lunch date. "

Review on Menupages.ie, September 2007

Salad days

"The Chester Beatty has long been one of Dublin’s best-kept secrets, so I expected its café to be an equally undiscovered gem. But, when I arrived, the place was teeming with the standard Sunday afternoon museum visitors – couples talking loudly about art, and parents with an air of up-since-6am desperation trying to coax their little darlings into sitting still.

The furniture and strange orange curtains scream West of Ireland craft shop rather than eastern exoticism, but the food more than redeems the Silk Road – it is a café proper, not some token museum eatery to fill a gap. Here, instead of overpriced quiche and dried-out cake, there is creamy mousakka and deliciously sweet baklava.

And it doesn’t matter if you’re not up on your Greek/Middle Eastern cuisine – staff seem well used to being asked about dishes, but simply pointing to what looks best is equally effective.

A pie of soft spinach, salty crumbled feta and crisp filo pastry was particularly good but, for me, the accompanying salads were the stars of the show. Mung beans and chickpeas in a sour, lemony dressing, toasted pumpkin and sunflower seeds, and mixed peppers with olives and feta were all definite improvements on the usual Dublin offering of soggy lettuce and tomato.

With main courses and two salads for under a tenner, make sure you save room for coffee and a flaky pastry, or a few cubes of Turkish Delight. After all that, it may be difficult to drag yourself around the museum itself – but, with food like this to look forward to, there’s always a next time. " 

Aoife Ni Dhalaigh, Evening Herald, 12/1 2007

A Streetcar Named Connolly

"… One of the best places to eat in Dublin is actually a café within a museum. Practically all the museums in Dublin have a partner restaurant that echo, in terms of cuisine, the museum’s theme. Tucked away behind Dublin Castle is the Chester Beatty Library, created by the American Industrialist Sir Alfred Chester Beatty who later bequeathed it to a trust for the benefit of the Irish public.

The Library also houses a museum containing Sir Alfred’s outstanding collection of Islamic manuscripts, along with Chinese, Japanese, Indian and other Oriental art. Early papyri, including some of the earliest texts of the Bible and other early Christian manuscripts, western prints and printed books complete what is one of the richest collections of its kind in the world. It was voted Best European Museum in 2002.

The Silk Road Café is the threat that binds and reflects the museum’s collection by serving culinary treasures influenced and inspired by Eastern Mediterranean cooking. This simple but stylish museum café which spills out into the library’s sky-lit atrium is well worth a visit on its own. Chef and owner Ibrahim Phelan has created a fascinating menu that changes daily. For starters one should not miss the salad greens with Sicilian dressing bedecked with Kalamata olives, tabbouleh, hummus and couscous wrapped in vine leaves. For main course: grilled spicy Lebanese chicken, marinated in yoghurt and spices, lamb mousakka, kofta meatballs in rich tomato sauce, spinach and feta filo pie and lots of vegetarian options. For dessert my partner and I shared a plate of stodgy cake made of pecan, walnut and pistachio and tidbits of baklavas, Turkish delight, and dried fruit.

Popular with museum visitors from far and wide, it is no longer Dublin’s best-kept secret. But for me, the Silk Road Café has become almost a place of pilgrimage. "

Guillermo Ramos, METRO Society, Philippines, December 2006-January 2007

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2006 Reviews

Eating Out

"This year’s hugely successful Taste of Dublin was an eye opener for many. If ever you wanted proof that the level of gastronomy in Ireland’s capital is at its highest level ever, then this display by 15 of Dublin’s restaurants provided it. Of the 15 participating restaurants 14 were well known to me, but one – The Silk Road – was not.

You can find The Silk Road Café in Dublin Castle, where it occupies part of the ground floor of the Chester Beatty Library. I’d arranged to meet Kevin Flanagan and Sorcha for lunch there, since it only opens at night for special occasions. All I knew about it was that it specialized in Middle-Eastern cookery. It did occur to me that while the news was filled with daily reports of the continuing tragedy in Lebanon, now was a good time to see a more positive side of what the region has to offer. I arrived a little before Kevin and Sorcha, which gave me time to take in the surroundings.

The café is in two parts; a part is set up where the kitchen is, another part in what would have been outside had the space between two buildings not been covered by a glass roof. It almost feels as through you’re outside because the glass roof is three storeys high, so there’s a great sense of space at the tables that are set up there.

The Eastern Mediterranean covers a number of countries, and to some degree their gastronomies overlap. As well as that they all share the same approach to a meal, which is that the starters are many and varied, and sometimes so many that they in fact make up the meal. The notion of one plate with meat and two veg on it is unknown. In Dublin some compromises have been made by The Silk Road to accommodate the Irish way of eating, but the dishes on offer are authentic and typical of the region.

I don’t normally report on the owner when I review a restaurant, but for Abraham Phelan I’ll make an exception. You may wonder about his surname, so let me explain. He’s taken his wife’s surname, maybe because it’s more pronounceable than the one he was born with. Anyway, Abraham is a Palestinian and in him his people have a worthy ambassador. He’s charming and urbane and as I’ll describe, he also makes good food. I spoke to him after our meal and we talked of the tragedy in Lebanon. He was saddened and distressed for those caught up in the invasion, but resolute in his dignity. He told me that in his restaurant he regularly served Israelis, Palestinians, Jordanians and Lebanese customers. If only their homelands were as peaceful and as welcoming as The Silk Road.

So to the food. While Kevin and Sorcha held a table I went inside to the counter and picked out what would be my starters: humus, falafels and dolmades (stuffed vine leaves). For my main course I picked the moussaka and the spicy red rice. A bottle of mineral water completed my selection. While I sat picking at my starters, Kevin and Sorcha went inside and returned with their spoils. For Sorcha a plate containing a chicken and coriander curry, a pasta salad, some humus and some red spicy rice for her too. Kevin had picked out the Turkish chicken, okra in tomato sauce, cauliflower and red rice.

What struck me while I picked on my starters was that this was probably the first time that I’d actually enjoyed stuffed vine leaves. I’ve eaten them many times in Greece, but they’ve always left me feeling rather flat. These were actually good to eat. And that delight in these simple dishes continued with the humus and the falafels as well – they were all expertly done and much tastier than any I’ve had previously.

We did what all serious foodies do and shared little tit-bits with one another, about the only thing we had in common was the red rice. Sorcha’s chicken curry with coriander was nicely balanced, the coriander complementing the chicken rather than overpowering it and I was very taken with Kevin’s choice of Turkish chicken. Marinated in lemon juice and turmeric it was bright yellow in colour and the zesty lemon gave it a fresh, crisp taste. Other tastes that were worthy of mention were the okra in tomato sauce, which I enjoyed, and the simple pasta salad that Sorcha had. A main course with a choice of three side orders is a modest €9.95.

Not so much from hunger, but rather in a spirit of gastronomic discovery, we decided to try the baklava. If that name has confused you in the past, it may be because as I discovered from Abraham, that the word is generic – it applies to any dessert with the basic ingredients of filo pastry, sugar and nuts; normally pistachio, almonds and coconut. We tried three different varieties and enjoyed them all, although I’ll admit that baklava does give you a major sugar rush.

All this variety of food, our fruit juice, my three bottles of mineral water and our coffees came to just €57.80, which I thought was terrific value for what we’d eaten. There are some wines available, but as it’s not a feature of the café I won’t be allocating marks this week for the wine list. "

Food 4 Ambience 3 Service (self service) Value for money 5 Total 12/15

Paolo Tullio, Irish Independent Weekend, 9/9 2006

What’s hot

"Silk Road Café the exotic jewel in the crown of the Chester Beatty Library at Dublin Castle."

Irish Times, What’s hot and What’s Cold

Dublin

"The Silk Road Café. This pleasant place has become a haven for Hellenists in Dublin since opening five years ago at the superb Chester Beatty Library. Housed in a new addition to the old clock tower building at Dublin Castle, once strong-hold of Britich rule in Ireland, now headquarters of government and municipal offices.

Visitors to Dublin yearning for something Greek to eat may lunch on moussaka, spanakotiropitta or yemista at the café, described as "one of Dublin’s best-kept ethnic treasures" in the June issue of The Dubliners, rated Ireland’s top city magazine. Proprietor and chef Ibrahim Phelan, a Jerusalem-born Palestinian, ran a taverna and learned Greek cooking skills on Crete, where he also met and married Caroline Phelan. The Greek specialties he included on the menu in the museum café promptly attracted Dublin philhellenes. "

Ann Elder, ODYSSEY The world of Greece, September/October 2006

15 of Dublin’s Top Restaurants

"The Silk Road Café is one of Dublin’s hidden ethnic culinary treasures. Tucked away in a quiet inner courtyard of the Chester Beatty Library in Dublin Castle, this inexpensive day-time restaurant boasts a peaceful interior water feature on one side while the other faces the well kept decorative gardens of the Castle’s Coach House where the Taste of Dublin experience is being held. The inspiration behind the food here is Mediterranean, North Africa and the Middle East, and the daily menu, prepared following halal… rules, is peppered with classic dishes such as Greek mousakka and spinach and feta pie, Moroccan cous cous and Middle Eastern falafel. "

The Irish Independent, Fine wine and food guide, June 2006

"Stylish museum cafe, spilling over into the library's skylit atrium, that's well worth a journey in its own right. The chef (who's from Jerusalem, one of Chester Beatty's favoured hunting grounds) rustles up mostly Middle Eastern food - lamb moussaka and lasagne, falafels, spinach and feta filo pie and plenty of other veggie options, and very good salads. To round off, as you'd expect, there's great coffee and titbits such as Turkish delight and baklava."

2003 Reviews

"Instead of the usual cafe favourites, the Silk Road offers a menu influenced by the Middle East and inspired by the traditions of the Eastern Mediterranean. Popular with people working in and around the city centre, and people looking for a different menu at a reasonable price, the Silk Road is a haven of peace just minutes away from Grafton Street - and seconds away from some superb exhibitions."

2002 Reviews

"Bravo to The Silk Road Cafe for daring to be different...instead of the usual museum cafe favourites...The Silk Road offers a far more interesting menu, with its sights fixed on the Middle East...there's plenty to choose from: fine looking salads, seven hot dishes, including a couple of vegetarian options...it's very satisfying...All in all, The Silk Road Cafe is a great addition to a fairly tired list of lunch favourites."