Mixed bag at the Orange Tree

Several people had mentioned the Orange Tree in Maynooth to me over the past couple of months so last week it was time to give it a try. Maynooth is a pretty place and the Orange Tree is at the picturesque end of town near the college gates, where students and priests strolling through add to the atmosphere.

The restaurant is tucked away in the basement of an old, cut-stone building facing the river on Mill Street, but what looks like the bright, lit-up exterior is actually an off-licence. The entrance is at the back and is flanked by bay trees in pots giving a passable impression of being orange trees. Steps lead down to a porch with orange trees painted on the walls and trailing over the door. Inside we found a long, low, cellar-like room, with tables on one side only, and some set into alcoves - making it ideal for couples, illicit or otherwise, or for business. We certainly couldn't hear anything going on either side of our table, which was big enough to sit at side by side instead of facing each other.

The evening was in full swing when we arrived and there seemed to be several large family and business groups which gave it a nice, busy atmosphere. One of the waitresses was whizzing around, singing along to the Cole Porter-esque music. Booked in for 9 p.m., we were probably on a second sitting because our table didn't look as fresh as it might. It had a gold-coloured cloth overlaid with a green cloth and neither was perfectly clean. There were a couple of nasty brown stains on the overcloth which I wasn't going to scratch and sniff. Then the laminated menus felt a little bit grubby, as did the underside of the heavy ceramic dinner plates . . . but that's the worst of the criticism over with.

Foodwise, the theme is Mediterranean and Irish, and that doesn't just mean pesto or tomatoes with everything. Turkish and Tunisian dishes appear between such Irish staples as steak and salmon and several main courses have tremendously exotic trimmings. Calamari, for instance, comes with tamarind-flavoured watercress.

The set menu at £26 is a trencherman stuff - four courses including soup - so, if you're not ravenous, the a la carte is probably a better option.

A lot of the dishes sound very elaborate, maybe even a bit too elaborate - such as baked salmon with pepperonata, jalapeno chillies and pecorino cheese accompanied by a spicy potato cake with garbanzo beans and coriander. Or squidink linguini with rempah, warm leek, olives and cardamom. Wha? I hear you ask.

Eivlin found the starters a little too fancy and so opted for a perfectly plain dish - light, spicy tomato soup. It arrived almost immediately in an ordinary white cereal bowl. A soup plate would have looked more elegant, and a dash of cream or a few chopped-up herbs wouldn't have gone amiss as decoration, but the soup itself was good and fresh and definitely spicy.

Bread was offered from a huge, round basket and while Eivlin scored with a nice crumbly brown bread, my curry-flavoured roll was an unlikely pink colour and was not thoroughly fresh.

My black-pudding fritters with potato and apple salad looked great on the plate with the three fritters surrounding a little heap of salad leaves, thinly-sliced red onion, discs of waxy new potato, all with a delicious dressing that tasted of garlic, cucumber and mint. The fritters were delicious, except the skin had been left on the black pudding and had to be dragged out of the fritter which spoiled the overall effect.

By that stage, we had both warmed to the house red, a J. J. McWilliams Inheritance Shiraz Cabernet from Australia that was rich, spicy and tasted distinctly of blackberries. All for £11.90 and 13 per cent proof at that. It's a reasonably priced list with just a few French wines priced over £20 - notably a £39 Chateau d'Arche Haut Medoc - with most bottles hovering between £13.50 and £16.50. There are helpful notes with each entry so that even if you know virtually nothing about wine, you won't make a fool of yourself.

Eivlin's main course was enormous. It was a nicely cooked pork fillet that came hidden underneath a big latke. This was a thick potato cake, more of a dumpling, flavoured with caraway seed. The meat was surrounded by a creamy pumpkin sauce - but of the beetroot chips listed on the menu there was no sign. Even after so light a starter, this was a heavy main course and quite a bit of it got left on the plate.

My Tunisian, lemon-marinated poussin was perfectly cooked, extremely tender, and wonderfully flavoured with lemon and herbs. It came with a light garlic and chilli sauce that didn't overpower the bird.

The vegetables were not particularly good, though. I got a tiny dish with broccoli, cauliflower, red cabbage and stewed onions all crammed in. The broccoli was unpleasantly soft and tasted as though it had been cooked with too big a pinch of bread soda to keep the colour. The red cabbage tasted sour, but the onions were good. We also got a generous dish of boiled and gratin potatoes. Normally I fall on gratin potatoes, but these were covered in a really thick, floury sauce that was just too heavy.

Meanwhile Eivlin had ordered a dish of parsnips roasted with honey and these were fantastic - cooked to a deep brown, meltingly soft inside and truly tasting of honey. It was hard to believe they came from the same kitchen as the vegetable medley.

The restaurant emptied fast after 10 p.m. and by the time we ordered dessert there was only a couple of tables left. Most of the kitchen staff had exited too, and there was the generally relaxed air that you often get when the boss isn't around.

We shared an ice-cream bombe for dessert. It came without its meringue base - they had run out - but a big spider's web of chocolate on top made up for it. The bombe was chocolate, vanilla and banana ice-cream brought together in a hard ball, sitting on a big tuile biscuit, with pretty, but unnecessary, squiggles of berry and mango coulis all around.

The service was excellent and friendly all evening from the moment that iced water appeared on the table with the menus, to the serving of two good frothy cappuccinos.

After so many nights out in the centre of Dublin, the bill seemed almost ridiculously low - £55 for three courses, wine and coffees.

The Orange Tree, Mill Street, Maynooth, Co Kildare. Tel: 01-6291229

Orna Mulcahy can be contacted at omulcahy@irish-times.ie