31st July 2008
When the Herring apocalypse comes
This unpretentious but smart seafood restaurant is housed in what used to be the public house adjacent to the Chatsworth Hotel on Worthing’s formal park area known as the Steyne. Although the interior of the restaurant looked nice after its recent conversion from pub to restaurant, all polished dark wood and brass, we decided to dine on the large raised patio area at the front of the building that gives you views of the sea, Worthing’s pier and many of the fishing boats that brought in the locally sourced produce on offer.
The menu is interesting, with attempts at modern twists on classic dishes, such as an updated Cullen Skink , and dishes taken from the all around world including the far east like sashimi and Thai fishcakes.
After some consideration I ordered Herring roes pan fried with garlic and parsley butter served on toast. A simple classic, that never goes out of fashion.
When it arrived I could make no complaint in regard to its size. There was probably enough Herring roe on my plate to repopulate the entire Herring population of the North Sea if they ever got involved in some sort of Herring death cult and went and did a Jonestown on us.
Presentation wise it was a bit bland looking and certainly could have been more enticingly plated. Two squares of toast topped with a mountain of Herring roe is a pretty uniformly brown affair, a little bit of fresh parsley added after the pan frying would have been nice both aesethically and gastronomically which leads me on to the main problem with this dish. The French have a saying – they seem to have quite a lot of them don’t they – the first bite is with the eye – which needs no explanation, but the problem with this dish was in bite 2,3,4….
It was devastatingly under seasoned, not enough salt, garlic or parsley.
Whoever had pan-fried them had not satisfactorily caramelized the butter and thus had failed to deliver that required deeply savoury kick that is the rhythm section to the roe’s creamy saltiness lead guitar. It was disappointing. It was not bad – they did not taste horrible, it was the just sort of thing you happily swallow if you are invited round for a dinner party at a nervous cook’s house and you don’t wish to hurt her feelings.
You just wouldn’t choose to do it again, especially if money was changing hands.
My delightful dining partner had rather better luck, she had ordered a fillet of skate that was cheered up by some fusion influenced dressing, which she pronounced as ‘quite nice’ which is rich praise indeed from her.
I should say at this point that the staff were all rather lovely, not a single Englander between them which probably explains the lovely bit, and all rather young. They were quick, up-beat, energetic and always on hand, however a slightly older hand guiding them might be useful as they didn’t seem very knowledgeable about the produce or the wine
When my main arrived, I secretly kicked myself for my choice. I had chosen a sashimi of Salmon and scallop with a soy dipping sauce. This dish relies completely on perfect ingredients, a delicacy of dipping sauce and the balance between them. It came with fluorescent green peas size spots of Wasabi at the side of the plate which were satisfactorily hot and really rather saved the dish as a whole, because as I expected the salmon was deeply anonymous and the scallop so subtle as to disappear behind a fog of soy sauce on my palate. The Wasabi lifted the dish from true failure by bringing a freshness and heat that you rarely find in restaurants in the UK and ensured that I ate over half of what was on my plate.
My dark paramour ordered, when she orders she orders it’s not an option, Pollack with a Parmesan crust, which she found a little dry. When she asked for a lemon to squeeze on it, one was produced with proficient speed and goodwill and ate the rest – from where I was sitting it looked a little over cooked – there was no pearlescent phosphorescence between each flake that perfectly cooked fish gives off, it had the opaque whiteness of Italian marble. The Pollack came with ‘a nice’ assortment of veg which was approved of, but the sashimi came with nothing which was a little bit of a shame as it meant that it was to stand or fall on that alone, needless to say it fell.
That said however, I have a feeling that I may have been a bit unlucky – I think there might be a number of decent dishes on this menu and I ordered dishes that absolutely rely on the best possible produce and the peak of its quality. I have had, for instance, much better scallop sashimi, but this only cost £12.75, which is till more than it was worth, but the last time I had excellent scallop sashimi was at Hakkasan in London and I paid £35.00 for the pleasure. Hakkasan, as I am sure some of you know, has one Michelin star and the dinner for two cost me over £200, it is not comparing like with like. My advice is stick with more traditional, basic dishes and you will might strike lucky. This place is almost good, it has everything right but the execution of the food – which admittedly is a big part of any restaurant – but they are closer than you think.
Finally we had a competent lemon panna cotta that was brutally spoilt by placing a melting ball of chocolate sorbet on top –which was granular and unpleasant.
I wonder if anybody has accidentally made a hot chocolate drink with water instead of milk – you know the type, some hot chocolate mixes advise that you can mix it with water, presumably because they have a milk substitute incorporated with the mix, but the older fashioned ones advise on the side of the container that you must make certain ones with hot milk. If any of you have accidentally made a hot chocolate drink with water that required milk, then you have a pretty good idea what the sorbet we were assaulted with last night. Daring combinations that don’t work shouts of ambition without the benefit of a palate. There is a world of difference between daring good and daring bad!
I shall be trying this place one more time and I shall be trying something uncomplicated – I rather fancied the whole grilled Mackerel – and shall report back.
In the mean time I would be very interested if anybody else feels the same as me, or if you think this place rocks and I got unlucky.
Anyway, Increase the Peace my brothers and sisters.
The Mighty Puma has spoken.
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