The Eglantine Restaurant is so understated as to seem to hark back to a bygone age, before anyone even thought of the razzmatazz now so prevalent in the restaurant business. You could walk past it, on Cork's Princes Street, just off the South Mall, and fail to notice that it is a restaurant, for there is no more than a written title above the window, and in the evening the curtains are drawn. A narrow door opens into a hall and then a small room, decorated in various monochromes, with a little bar at the end and a scattering of linen-dressed tables. The lighting is unshowy and the music, amazingly, is mid-period Bob Dylan. Now, whatever one thinks of Bob Dylan (DJ Karl Tsigdinos's demolition of Zimmerman as "a good demo singer for Jimi Hendrix", is my all-time favourite), Bob's introspective, early-1970s navel-gazing is hardly the right mood-music for a restaurant which should, given its size, play zippy, cool sounds.
The music is also out of step with Kevin Arundel's cooking which, in spite of generous nods in the direction of classical cooking - baked pig's trotter; fondant potatoes; beef with herb and peppercorn butter; chicken liver parfait - enjoys lots of modern nuances and flair. Menus offer dishes such as cannelloni of red peppers, goat's cheese and lentils on a sauce gazpacho, or escalope of tuna with cucumber noodles and a tomato and tarragon vinaigrette, pretty much as CalMed-conscious as you can get.
Kevin Arundel opened the Eglantine late last year, moving his pots and knives down the hill into the centre of the city from Montenotte's Arbutus Lodge, where he spent 18 months. Before that he had worked in Wexford's Marlfield House, after spells abroad, mainly in England and Scotland. Arbutus and Marlfield respectively conjure up visions of lavish, grand food, but Arundel's food seems to me to work best when he leaves flavours as uncomplicated as possible. A starter dish of confit of duck leg with hazelnut and kale potatoes with shiitake was brilliantly achieved, the confit dry and crisp with the fat expertly extracted, the kale potatoes underneath fresh and enlivening, the shiitake an extra presence that didn't intrude on the centrepiece of the bird and the staple. It worked because the flavours were individually distinct yet intricately supportive.
By comparison, an open ravioli of crab and salmon with carrot spaghetti and a saffron beurre blanc looked handsome, but was too buttery - an effect which masked the flavour of the fish and shellfish. Pasta never suits too-rich sauces, especially with such flavourful ingredients as crab, so the fine quality of the ingredients was muted.
My main course of caramelised scallops with red pepper jam, sauce vierge and cucumber noodles (I rather thought chefs had ditched that hard-work idea of turning cucumber into noodles and carrots into spaghetti, but Arundel clearly remains fond of it) had good shellfish, and the pairing of the sauce vierge - a mix of coriander and basil with lemon juice, olive oil and balsamic vinegar - suited the shellfish. But the tomato jam was too sticky, too jammy, and slightly unbalanced a dish which had a parcel of spinach in between the cucumber noodles and a base of potatoes.
If the cucumber noodles are pressed into service here and there, so are Arundel's trademark potatoes with hazelnut and kale, used as the staple in a main course of pheasant which was surrounded by a sherry vinegar sauce. The meat was good, and the potatoes just as suitable with the game as they had been with the duck confit.
Desserts are variations on classical themes - duo of chocolate mousse; hot bread and butter pudding; caramelised lemon tart; iced banana parfait - and of these the mousse with coconut ice cream was excellent, the lemon tart with a creme chantilly was just a little too zesty, which rather took the breath away.
The inconsistencies of the dinner show a cook still working at chiselling out his own style, still finding his own voice, but there are sufficient confident gestures already at work in the Eglantine to wish it well for the future. Certainly, it should be applauded for the correctness of the service and the style - "It is nice to have somewhere in the city with linen on the table," said my guest - and especially for the fact that it offers exceptional value for money: a four-course dinner menu costs only £19.80, with a couple of dishes carrying a £2.50 supplement.
Eglantine Restaurant, 32 Princes Street, Cork, phone 021-270668. Open 12.30 p.m.- 2.30 p.m., 6.30 p.m.-10.30 p.m, Tues-Sat. Major cards.