Restaurant review: ‘The hosts’ welcome is warm, but if you’d rather stick pins in your eyes than share a table with strangers, it is not for you’

Friday evening and the traffic heading north on the M50/M1 can only be described as brutal. Somewhere near Balbriggan, my designated driver, hereinafter to be known as Saint Katia, takes the exit which will bring us to Whitestown House, located a few fields across the north Co Dublin countryside from McNally Family Farm, the source of some of the ingredients for tonight’s dinner. An unhappy confluence of Google Maps, poor lighting on dark country roads and an easy-to-miss entrance means we are the last guests to arrive to the Samhain edition of The Dining Club.