Review
Eat @ Massimo is the latest venture from Jp McMahon and Drigín Gaffey, the dynamic twosome behind Galway’s excellent Cava and the wonderful and Michelin Star winning Aniar. Unbelievably Cava is no more, and Galway is the poorer for it, but Eat @ Massimo keeps some of the flavours alive, and this gastro pub offering is all things a gastro should be; interesting, inventive, exciting and very good value for money.
Massimo is in Galway’s West End, that’s over the Corrib in the City Centre. The bar itself is large and was already a popular spot before the food offering, and apart from Eat, it is a popular music venue.
Just inside the doors, there is a warm fire blazing on a cold spring day. There is a smattering of locals, and there are plenty of nooks and crannies, as well as some larger circular booths for a larger group.
The menu is interesting and broken down into sections; there’s little bites, tapas, platters to share, brunch at weekends, big eats desserts and there are some daily specials on the blackboard.
There is naturally a good selection of dishes, and they range from the traditional to a good selection of Spanish dishes - the tapas obviously but some others as well – all made using produce from a listed section of good suppliers.
There are too many to try to list, but there are scallops with pork belly and cauliflower puree, tapas include Basque style monkfish and lemon mayo, platters feature Serrano ham and Manchego cheese while a homemade pizza might tempt you with Irish chicken fillet, piquillo pepper and Wicklow Brie.
In addition at the Big Eats end, there are traditional fish and chips, rib eye steak with Irish whiskey and smoked bacon sauce or free range sausages and truffle mash. On a recent visit, and while being fairly peckish, we murdered a starter of pan fried chicken livers with a red pepper puree and followed it with a delicious seafood paella made using scallops, squid and prawns. There was a depth of flavour here you rarely find outside Spain, and
Eat @ Massimo is a true gastro pub; there’s no fuss, just great food that’s well made and staff who look like they want to be there, meaning that service is friendly and very good indeed. For a casual meal Eat is hard to beat, the prices are very reasonable and with a menu that has this many things on it that I’d want to eat, you won’t get easily bored.
