Went to the Scotch Bonnet on a Friday night without a reservation with my wife. We were given the choice to sit in small area right near the kitchen (or hatch) or upstairs. We took a quick look at the first option, then proceeded upstairs. I typically hate sitting near the noisy kitchen but the first option in from of the hatch seemed okay for some reason. This turned out to be a great seat for viewing the amazing entrees the chef was turning out.
We had a fabulous waitress (so sorry we never got here name). We may have gone a little overboard on ordering because everything on the menu sounded good. I started with the butternut squash soup (very hot but delicious) then I had the half rack of ribs. Half rack definitely enough for one person. So glad I saved my bread from my soup so I could dip it in the delicious BBQ sauce. My wife started with the calamari (which she let me try a few) They were great, lightly battered and served with a nice dipping sauce & small salad. For an entree she had the Scotch Bonnet salad which had chorizo sausage. She must have really liked it b/c all I could sample were the tomatoes. We both split an order of the Portobello Mushrooms on crusty bread with baby spinach & truffle hollandaise. This was okay. I think I was stuffed from my other dishes and I'm not a huge hollandaise fan. Since it was a big date night for us we did look at the dessert menu. Which I highly recommend you do, it comes out a rolling pin, very creative. We saw a banana split come by which looked delicious, but we opted for the ice cream and cookies. It was served in a large goblet with crushed oreo cookies on top and some kind of cake base with choc & vanilla ice-cream. It was so so, not what I was expecting, I was hoping for choc chip cookies.
Just a heads up, they do not have any draft beer, but they do have a (limited) bottle selection. I had a Warsteiner Premium Verum. They do have wine list too, most glasses range around 5.50 euro, my wife had a pinot grigio, which she said was nice.
All in all, great experience at "The Bonnett." Atmosphere was fun. Seemed like they were trying a little much to get the "American" vibe going. But we didn't mind, we're expats living in Malahide so it was cool. The food was really fantastic. I've seen some reviews about it being pricey, and yes, I guess compared to some of the places in the town, it is but I they offer weekly specials which I am dying to try. These include: Ribtickler Mondays, Chicken Tuesdays, Seafood Wednesdays, & Steak Thursdays. Most include a entree and either wine or beer. They list them all on their website. I will definitely be back to try one of their burgers. We saw a ton of them come out of the kitchen, and I read they were voted best burger in Dublin/ or was it Ireland. Anyway, they looked fantastic. But the real highlight of our night was our server, we absolutely loved her, best we've had since we've been in Ireland. She even asked the chef where he got the the giant pickles that he was putting on top of the burgers for us. Yes a strange request I know, but my wife is a huge pickle fan and we haven't been able to find any good ones in Dublin yet. Definitely give the Scotch Bonnet a try. read more