What should we know about Brut Wine Bar?
While 2024 will forever be known as the year every café morphed into a wine bar at night, Nelly's in Drumcondra was ahead of its time, opening Brut in 2020.
Things were stop start for a while, selling dinner boxes and retail wine in Covid times, but Brut is now open Friday and Saturday nights, and after several messages from readers telling us to check it out, we booked in via Instagram DM.
What's the seating sitch?
If it's mild enough to sit outside (there's no heaters or blankets), there's a space out front that's also the pathway for people en route to Shouk. They frequently mistake it for a waiting area, and Brut's staff have immense patience with this incidental annoyance.
Seating inside is quirky and mismatched, with low and high tables, and some counter seats looking out.
What's on the menu?
It's small plates central, with the most expensive dish €12.50. You can keep it simple with bread, excellent olives, charcuterie and cheese, but you don't need us to tell you what Cashel Blue and Gubbeen chorizo taste like.
We were gleeful to see Beechpark Eco Farm's cauliflower on the menu, coming from 12km away in Clonsilla. It's served with truffle pecorino and olive oil (€6), but ours was the wrong side of al dente, needing more time in the oven - the flavours were good, but we wanted more of them. Sliced roast potatoes (€7) were too easy to eat, but the "homemade aioli" was regular mayo with garlic in it - not the same thing.
Gnocchi was the fluffy on the inside, crispy on the outside type you only get when made fresh, with the mushrooms and Parmesan giving a nicely Autumnal feel.
A creamy ball of burrata came with poached pear and almonds, which didn't cut through the cheese like acidic tomatoes would have. The light, oil-free focaccia was good for mopping up sauce, but once the burrata was gone it tasted like dessert.
Tuna "rillettes" was tinned tuna, served on toasted sourdough with a lemon cream sauce and capers. It tasted like something you might whip up for a quick, tasty lunch at home, but not what was billed. The killer dish was the last one - slow-cooked pork shoulder with courgettes and parmesan cream, the sticky sweet meat seasoned perfectly, collapsing under a fork, the Parmesan cream welcome excess.
What's the wine list like?
Decent by the bottle, less interesting by the glass - presumably to minimise waste. We started with Alvear's Oloroso sherry and El Troyano's orange verdejo (we loved both), moving onto a Burgungian aligoté and an Italian Salice Salentino (love these less so). There's more good stuff by the bottle, but it feels pieced together rather than curated, and staff struggled to answer questions about the list.
Why should I go?
Brut is a sweet place with warm service, and if you live locally it's perfect for wine and snacks. The food isn't at the level where we'd travel for it, but a few easy tweaks in the kitchen would make all the difference so that may change depending on the night.
Brut Wine Bar
40 Drumcondra Road Lower, Dublin 9
