Former Allta chef to open new Dublin restaurant on Frederick Street

A new restaurant, Library St, is to open next month in the premises previously occupied by Allta, off South Frederick Street in Dublin city centre. Library St will be run by chef Kevin Burke, who previously worked in the kitchen at Allta, and before that was head chef at The Ninth in London.

Chefs Niall Davidson and and Hugh Higgins set up Allta in 2019, and ran a hugely successful meal kit venture from the premises during last year's lockdowns. Last summer they launched Allta Summer House, in a lavishly constructed outdoors structure at Slane Castle.

They now plan to open Allta Winter House, as part of an ambitious redevelopment of the Trinity Street car park in Dublin 2. Building work is ongoing on two storeys of the car park, with an art gallery and cocktail bar called Glove Box on the first floor and Allta Winter House, which will operate on a similar basis to the Slane venture with a ticketed 12-course seasonal tasting menu for €95, on the second floor.

We have ambitious standards: from crispy chicken wings stuffed with scallop and tarragon mayo to whole baked bass with fennel and mussels

“We decided not to reopen in the Frederick Street space; we had completely outgrown it,” Davidson says. “We need to keep moving forward.” According to Davidson, the Trinity Street car park project will launch within weeks.

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Library St will offer a sharing plates menu of Irish seasonal food, along with a wine list featuring smaller growers and sustainable producers. “We will encourage the sharing of classic dishes done simply using great produce sourced from all over our beautiful island. We have ambitious standards: from freshly baked baguettes to crispy chicken wings stuffed with scallop and tarragon mayo, whole baked bass with fennel and mussels, to lamb marinated in yoghurt, honey and rosemary,” Burke says.

Library St will open in early November and is part of the hospitality group that also includes Trinity Townhouse hotel, Sheen Falls Lodge in Kerry, and Castlemartyr Resort in Cork.

There is another major Dublin restaurant project opening next month in nearby Molesworth Street. Six by Nico, a 56-seat restaurant serving a six-course tasting menu that will change every six weeks, will open in the former Pain Quotidien premises, adjacent to The Ivy. This will be the ninth opening in the brand’s portfolio, with other outlets in Belfast, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Manchester, Liverpool and London.

The tasting menus at Six by Nico are each “focused on a different place, memory, or idea”, and past inspiration has come from such diverse sources as “street markets of the Middle East” and “a journey across Route 66 in America”. The Six by Nico restaurant in Belfast’s Cathederal Quarter is currently serving a Guilty Pleasures menu, with six courses for £32.