Health

Restaurant review: Bushmills restaurant is trying hard and for that, it hits an 8 on my restaurant Richter scale

If there was a Richter scale for restaurants, and by that I mean a grading by which you might measure the whole trembling package including service, food, comfort and that elusive one, mood, then I would start with high marks in Belfast for the likes of Stereo, Ox, Stock Kitchen, mrDeane’s, Howard Street, Waterman, Stove, Macau, Shimla, John Long’s, Muddler’s Club and two or three more.

Bushmills Townhouse, 45 Main Street, Bushmills. Cod and risotto If there was a Richter scale for restaurants, and by that I mean a grading by which you might measure the whole trembling package including service, food, comfort and that elusive one, mood, then I would start with high marks in Belfast for the likes of Stereo, Ox, Stock Kitchen, mrDeane’s, Howard Street, Waterman, Stove, Macau, Shimla, John Long’s, Muddler’s Club and two or three more. As a judge on one of the recognition schemes, Food & Wine Magazine Ireland Restaurant Awards, I get flummoxed by categories which, on first sight, appear to be duplicates: best chef and best restaurant.

But on close consideration, a good chef does not a good restaurant make..