We’ve come from the cliffs at Sliabh Liag – 600m above sea level, the highest sea cliffs in Europe – where the land just gives up and drops off the side of the country. The view across Donegal Bay is staggering. It’s better than the Cliffs of Moher. Fewer buses. Smaller crowds. The kind of place that makes you forget about food entirely – until you get back into the car, the road curves inland, and suddenly you’re starving.
The Rusty Mackerel, nearby in Teelin, is the place to stop. With a terrace out front, a conservatory to one side and rooms upstairs, it is a favourite of tourists and hikers. A warren of rooms in the pub is filled with pints and talk. In the conservatory, where our food is served, the brick walls, timber beams and stone flag floors create an inviting ambience. Guinness and whiskey mirrors, framed adverts and copper pots anchor you firmly in Ireland.
The menu is short: seven starters, seven mains and five desserts. There’s fish and chips, a Guinness beef stew, pasta with chicken in a white wine cream sauce and a seafood pie with smoked haddock and salmon. Starters include a creamy seafood chowder, crispy chicken wings and garlic bread with or without cheese. Desserts stick to the classics: sticky toffee pudding, crème brûlée, brownies, and spiced apple crumble – all priced at €9.
The wine list is equally short, with four whites, three reds, a rosé, and a Prosecco, all available by the glass. It should be noted that the rosé is Sarah Jessica Parker’s – she drops in when she’s holidaying in Donegal. I go for the Chardonnay (€7.70); my wingman, Steve, has a Guinness (€5.90).
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We order the goat’s cheese tartlet (€14) and the prawn and monkfish (€14.50) to start. It’s a single slice from a log of soft goat’s cheese in a small prebaked pastry case, which is warmed through. It is topped with red onion marmalade, which adds sweetness - perhaps a bit too much - and underneath is a green wild garlic purée – strong, sharp and slightly overpowering.
The prawn and monkfish is served in an escargot dish – the white ceramic kind with six wells, originally designed to hold snails and garlic butter. It’s an odd vessel, but it works. The monkfish is perfectly cooked – no small achievement. It’s an unforgiving fish when overdone. The prawns hold their texture in a mild creamy sauce. The layer of melted mozzarella across the top has a wonderful cheese pull and is strangely satisfying. The brown bread that comes with it is very good – deep brown, dense, slightly sweet, served thick and warm with butter.
We’ve ordered two mains: fish and chips (€22.50) and the Guinness stew (€22.50). The fish and chips is excellent. The fish – haddock – comes in a Guinness beer batter, fried to a perfect crunch. The batter is thin and crisp, not oily, and flakes apart with a good crack. Inside, the fish is hot, juicy, and firm. This is how it’s meant to be done – the batter acts as a casing, holding in the heat and the moisture, without turning to glue. The hand-cut chips are thick, not quite crunchy, but piping hot. A small bowl of mushy peas and a ramekin of tartare sauce do the job.
The stew comes in a deep bowl, loaded with tender beef, peas, carrots and a generous dollop of buttery mash. But the gravy lacks depth. There’s sweetness where there should be something savoury – no bitterness, no dark malt character, nothing that suggests stout. It could do with a splash of lemon juice to add acidity. There’s more of that excellent brown bread on the side.
We share a dessert – sticky toffee pudding (€9). The sponge is warm and soft, but not especially sticky. The toffee sauce, poured on top and squiggled across the plate, tastes confected, like something from a bottle. It comes with soft-serve ice cream and a strawberry on top.
The Rusty Mackerel is open most days – including midweek – which already puts it ahead of much of rural Donegal. Many places shut from Monday to Wednesday, or hibernate until high season. This one stays open year-round. That, along with the fish, is reason enough to stop.
After the cliffs and the road and the cold air in your lungs, it’s not just somewhere to eat – it’s exactly where you want to be.
Dinner for two with a glass of wine and a beer was €96.10.
The verdict: A post-hike menu that gets the basics right.
Food provenance: Molloys Fish, Killybegs; Adrian Byrne Butchers; and Declan McShane for fruit and vegetables.
Vegetarian options: Goat’s cheese tartlet and vegetable curry.
Wheelchair access: Fully accessible with an accessible toilet.
Music: Country sounds such as Riley Green and Chris Stapleton.
