Restaurant review: Irish soul food graced with Dede's brand of Turkish delight in Baltimore

I’m obviously a fair weather visitor or have a deeply selective memory for, over four decades and more, almost every time I fetch up in Baltimore, the sun seems to be splitting stones while the dotey little West Cork fishing village swans around the place like a sea port on the Cote D’Azur.

On another glorious August evening, the best seats in the house at Dede at the Customs House are in the rear courtyard. Sunglasses for all westerly facing diners are a necessity, not an affectation, as is our glass of fine fizz (Stephane Regnault, Chromatique 2018).

If previous visits ever revealed frailty, it was in an always charming yet betimes amateurish service, but somehow business partners chef Ahmet Dede and owner Maria Archer managed to entice Joey Scanlon to the southerly tip of the island. 

Scanlon’s CV as a sommelier/restaurant manager sells itself in a select handful of proper nouns, namely: Thornton’s, Chapter One and Restaurant Patrick Guilbaud; there is an immediately apparent rise in professional standards, the team moving with swish, confident efficiency like interlocking parts of the one machine.

Control freak that I am, I too often second guess suggestions from sommeliers but tonight we have little choice because the tasting menu is only presented at the end of the meal; noting any allergies or food preferences, each dish arrives as a complete surprise, an exercise in trust.

The first dish banishes all trepidation, buttery brown foam of spiced lobster bisque, submerging manti, a toothsome Turkish dumpling of sweet brown crab meat, on top, almond and garlic crumble and this season’s favourite ingredient for Irish fine dining chefs, premium caviar.

A ‘taco’ of potato bread is smeared with fermented chilli kosho, topped with brown shrimp, preserved lemon and nasturtiums, leaves and flowers; a delectable mouthful.

Next is a variation on a Coolea theme Ahmet Dede has been playing since his days in Mews where he earned his first star. Rich fondant of aged Coolea cheese sits on a fungal mushroom biscuit, topped with pickled onion and Isot crisp. Featherweight in stature, sweet caramel of cheese, mushroom’s umami, and smokey isot pepper, has it punching on the palate like Tyson, flavours pulsing in waves.

If Dede’s Turkish culinary heritage hitherto registered as subtle grace notes adorning a hyper-locavore take on superb West Cork produce, it is now bustling to the fore. Sogan Dolma (stuffed onion) is a Michelin take on a traditional Turkish dish, sweet onion, poached in onion stock, then confited in olive oil and stuffed with Turkish rice, dried apricots, mint and spices, topped with smoked buffalo yoghurt, caviar, and chive flowers. 

It is an elegant presentation yet eats with the comforting wholesome simplicity of a homecooked dish, sweet fruit and caramelised sugars of the onion, unctuous, smokey yoghurt, chive’s nip, all melding into one. Snacks over, we ‘jump the fence’ into main courses with fine crusty house bread with Gloun Cross butter and a sublime Turkish olive oil.

Raw langoustine is chopped and dressed with oil and salt, layered up with tabasco and tomato jelly, buffalo sour cream, celery, marinated tomatoes and mustard leaves. Alongside, a skinned, quickly pickled tomato, dipped in smokey spices and served in tomato water. Paired, it explodes in the mouth like a flavour bomb, acid and salt supercharging individual flavours. Gentle medicinal astringency of Thai basil from Cape Clear presides over all with the calming authority of a motherly matron patrolling the ward, unifying a cacophony of sensations into a singular, very special dish.

Black sole is gently steamed, served in sauce flavoured with vibrant fruity sumac, cemen, and mussel liquor for oomph. On top, barbecued lobster, al dente fresh peas and parsley. Again, gorgeous.

Saddle of delicious tender pink lamb, silken, gamey fat adding emollient depths, is stuffed with preserved lemon and served with carrot and isot. A side dish of freekah includes crisp, verdant sugar snaps and peas, doused in a foam of freekah miso. If this is a classic Michelin-style dish, all buttoned up in Sunday finest, an alternative take on lamb, Adana kebab, is a down and dirty brawler, classic Turkish street food oozing pungent, potent flavours, served on flatbread with red pepper puree and wild garlic yoghurt. You’d eat five without thinking; Scanlon’s inspired pairing of bright, hoppy Saison Dupont, would have you wanting 10.

A royal procession of sweetmeats and treats follow, honourable mentions to: strawberry lokma; yoghurt parfait and meadowsweet ice cream; and sütlac baked rice pudding tartlet. The nicest dessert I’ve eaten in some years is the Red Berry vacherin with pomegranate, immaculately spanning the spectrum of sweet, sour and texture with a divine little ‘flower’ of meringue, red fruits, and the zing of wood sorrel, lemon verbena and dianthus.

The bubbly, effusive Scanlon presides over all with deceptively casual charm and his wine picks, both from Domaine des Ardoisières, smokey, mineral and citric Argile Blanc 2020 of breathtaking purity, and grippy, agile and sprightly Silice Rouge 2021, all red fruit and pepper, perfectly pair between them with almost the entire meal, a delicious Joh Jos Prum 2016, Gracher Himmelreich Spätlese, covering desserts.

With an entirely Turkish team in the kitchen, Dede has moved beyond the deferential eye over the shoulder to culinary traditions of his adopted Irish home, instead confidently surging forward with his own genuinely original Hiberno-Turkish fusion, further enhancing modern Irish cuisine. 

His trademark precision and technical nous are still evident but his cooking is now flush with the exuberant vitality of a chef mining his soul on the plate. Overall, it is another level again; might we now be entering two star territory at Dede at the Custom House?

The Bill: €325 (tasting menu, €125 pp, plus wine pairing, excluding tip)

The Verdict

Food: 9.5/10

Service: 9.5/10

Value: 9/10

Atmosphere: 9/10