Beware the North Raleigh Hibernian Pub

A fixture of the restaurant scene in downtown Raleigh for some time, the Hibernian Pub served reasonably tasty pseudo-pub fare at reasonable prices. I've eaten there several times over the years, and my meals have always been at least decent.  A fire closed the original location, which remains closed while the owners renovate it.  A North Raleigh location is even closer to me, and at least one friend had eaten a couple of good meals there, so it was a natural place to head for dinner before seeing The World's End, a movie that involves quite a few pubs. 

Big mistake.  My dinner was easily the worst, nastiest meal I've eaten--at a restaurant or in a home--in a very long time. 

I almost never write entirely negative reviews, mostly because I'd rather spread good news than bad.  I can't recall the last time I put out a completely negative restaurant commentary.  I even debated for quite some time whether to write this one.  I finally decided to go ahead with it because the food was just that bad. 

I had consumed only about 200 calories prior to the early dinner, so I was hungry.  I didn't know this location, so I went for what I thought would be the simplest dish to prepare:  breakfast for dinner. 

The sheer number of ways the kitchen managed to ruin this meal is amazing.  The whites of the eggs over easy were not cooked all the way through.  The beans (this was supposed to be a sort of mash-up of an English and an Irish breakfast) were cold, straight from the can.  The black and white pudding pieces were chunks of carbon, literally cooked to blackness all the way through.  The sausages were overcooked to the point of crunchiness.  The two chunks of bacon were oddly pink lumps of what I assume had been meat folded onto themselves and then transformed into masses with the consistency of heavy cardboard that was soaked and then dried hard.  And so on.

I had also ordered a side Caesar salad.  What arrived was a large plate with three pieces of lettuce on it, each one covered with half a dozen croutons you could have used in any stone-throwing contest.  Someone had painted on both sides of each lettuce strip a thick yellow dressing.  (I ignored the crouton rocks, scraped off the dressing, and ate the then merely nasty lettuce.) 

I'm serious:  the worst meal I can recall.

I certainly won't return to this Hibernian location until multiple people I know have taken that brave step and returned with good news.  If you decide to be one of those intrepid individuals, good luck.  I fear you'll need it.