HAVE you tried Belle’s Kitchen? I hadn’t even heard of it, let alone tried it, and I don’t think I would have set foot in the place if a friend who knows his onions hadn’t suggested it.
Even then, it was the location that most attracted me. I love that whole area around Lough Swilly. It seems haunted almost. The trees start to crowd the road as you drive from Letterkenny towards Ramelton. The architecture feels alien. Everything feels out of time. And on this autumn day, the land and houses were sepia touched and empty.
The River Lennon was still, as was Lough Swilly, flat and grey, fringed by lonely shores. This lough knows things – it knows Wolfe Tone, the Flight of the Earls, the Royal Navy’s Grand Fleet. It has been overseen by the soldiers of different armies at Fort Dunree, and its serenity and shelter sings inaudibly of Amazing Grace.
And then suddenly there’s Belle’s Kitchen, brash and blaring red up the road from the pier. It looks and feels and shouts like an American diner, squeezed in among the mute tight houses of the town. There are red vinyl benches and gleaming white bucket seats and laminated menus groaning with choice, and those plastic tomatoes filled with ketchup. You half expect waitresses on roller skates carrying trays of soda pop and milk shakes.
But here, what you see is not what you get. Because what you don’t see is Ronnie, the chef, back in the kitchen sending out lovely, high-quality dishes, hearty and subtle, traditional and surprising. So either way you look at it, it’s happy days all the way.
We went all classy for our first course. The French onion soup was absolutely delicious. As bizarre as it sounds, it wasn’t overpoweringly oniony, just sweet and subtle and earthy, with a good saltiness from the cheese and a nice bit of texture from the croutons.
The crab salad had a couple of pieces of shell in it, but that didn’t spoil the enjoyment in the least. There was a plentiful portion of white meat, light and sweet to start with, giving way to a deep, savoury flavour.
One thing about the starters that’s worth noting is the bread – a side dish, maybe, but certainly not an afterthought. The wheaten bread was the best I’ve ever tasted. A deep, rich, dark brown, it was fresh and soft and beautiful, the flavour beautifully enhanced by the use of Kinnegar Annaroddy Porter. I’d go back for this alone.
Having had a grown-up starter, we reverted to type for the main course. Cue the arrival of burger and fries and fish and chips – mighty platefuls, well-presented, with sides of peas and a crunchy coleslaw. The burger was fantastic. It was perfectly seasoned, big and meaty, made with proper beef, cooked exactly right.
Now, the fish and chips. Gosh, this was good. I’m normally a bit wary of a menu that describes something as traditional, especially when this comes in inverted commas, but traditional is exactly what it was. It tasted like it came from the very best chippy.
There were lovely flakes of firm fish encased in a light, crisp batter. The chips were soft on the inside, with a good, golden brown outer crunch. Close my eyes and I could have been walking back from the match, eating this straight from the paper, with the Footy Echo tucked under my arm, top of the league.
Both dishes were that generous that neither of us could finish. We certainly didn’t have room for pudding. That didn’t stop us, however, although we got the brownie to take away and gobble later. Deeply, deeply rich, a nice, broken crust on the outside, with gooey chocolate inside, ready to stick to your palate, like good brownies should.
From the outside, Belle’s Kitchen could be easily dismissed, and I understand why the owners are considering a makeover. Some of the charm might go, but I imagine that it’s a bit of a secret in the area, somewhere the unenlightened might just walk past, which is a crying shame.
I reckon the earls might have stuck around longer if they’d known about Belle’s, all singing Amazing Place, too.
THE BILL
Crab cocktail – €6.90
French onion soup – €4.90
Steak burger and skinny fries – €11.50
Fish and chips – €11.90
Chocolate brownie – €3.50
Total: €38.70 (£34.84)
Belle’s Kitchen,
Pier Road,
Rathmullan,
Co Donegal
