Restaurant review: Dada

When my husband and I got married two years ago we skipped all the engagement ring nonsense and bought these crappy silver wedding rings with the view that we would go to Morocco, pick up two really snazzy rings and take in the exotic sites at the same time.

Well, we still haven’t got our act together and made the trip so for our eleventh anniversary we severely compromised with an early bird at the Moroccan restaurant Dada on South William Street instead.

Pathetic really, but I figure by the time we do make it out there it will be all the more exciting – or we could well be divorced by then!

Dada is hit and miss. They have gone to great effort on some of the decor with authentic looking arches, tiles and lanterns a go go but then they have these mid-nineties looking terracotta washed walls that let the look down.

The early bird menu is also hit and miss. For €19.95 you can get a starter and a main followed by mint tea. The starters include Fried spinach with preserved lemon, green olives and spices, Marinated chicken kebab and harissa dip and Grilled merguez sausages with spicy tomato sauce. I had the Harira, soup with lentils, chickpeas, vermicelli and coriander which was a hearty fill but nothing special. My husband had the Filo pastry mini cigar sardines with charmoula marinade which were quite unusual and very fishy but great.

For the early bird, the mains include Okra and preserved lemon tagine with courgette, peas and fava beans, Merguez sausage couscous with caramelised onions and a Tagine of hake fillet and ginger marinade, scallions, tomatoes and peppers. I went for the Braised chicken supreme with preserved lemon, Moorish olives and saffron sauce with potatoes which was deliciously heavy on saffron but no sign of the preserved lemon. My husband Spicy kofta meatballs tagine with tomato sauce and eggs was the biggest let down and practically devoid of flavour, it was more like meatballs in tomato soup and had little herbs or spices – it lacked effort.

We left feeling jolly, no thanks to the mediocre dining experience but because we spent the entire time planning our trip to Morocco –

Do you find early bird menus often lack bite?