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20th December 2016
12:10am GMT
In the last 18 months, you could have eaten in three different restaurants within the one location at 20 Montague Street.
It used to be the home of the wonderful longstanding Il Primo, which is sadly missed.
The location was then home to Porndog, which has to be the worst named restaurant in history and also one of the most short-lived. It barely latest six months before closing. It looked so bad I couldn't even bring myself to go and review it. To be honest, Una Mullaly said all that needed to be said.
The latest business to set up shop here is Wishbone, which dedicates itself to one of our favourite food types...chicken wings. The menu is short and feature four types of wings, as well as some tenders that basically taste like wings but come without the messiness of dealing with the bones.
At first glance, I thought "fuck me, the prices are outrageous".
The wings are all €12, sides €4 and sauces €2. I was getting ready to shout "outrage" before I saw that they had a great lunch offer. Wings or tenders with chips for 11 yoyos. That was more realistic and we both picked that deal.
You can't really get away with justifying more than that price at lunchtime and judging by the busy tables of young professionals around us, they'd pitched it just right.
The portions were absolutely huge. Desperate Dan huge. I'd have been happy with about half the size but nobody is ever going to complain about getting too much food, especially when it comes to chicken wings.
The wings were plump, tasty and perfectly sticky. I opted to carve up my delicious moist tenders with a knife and fork while watching Graham, my dining partner, struggle to keep his mouth and clothes clean as he tackled the wings. We were two happy bunnies indeed.
I'd have some worries about a restaurant that just does chicken wings. Will people eat them all week for lunch and on quieter nights of the week when not drinking or hungover? Will the Dublin obsession with wings pass?
For the most part, I think Wishbone will be just fine. I see the amount of traffic that comes to pages on this website dedicated to chicken wings and it is insane. Irish people are very very passionate about their wangs and can't seem to get enough of them.
I'd expect this place to be packed all weekend, before nights out, for brunch and around big matches etc. The fact that the margins on wings are usually seriously high and they won't have tons of waste with such a small menu helps as well.
Overall, another wonderful addition to the city. If chicken wings are your thing (and they probably are), then it's time to come and worship at the new Dublin church of chicken.
