Day boats of Hastings
Old Hastings is a bit of a discovery – a beautiful little coastal town scattered with old buildings, tucked into a deep valley on the south coast. Not to be confused with plain-old-Hastings, the newer and very ordinary coastal town that sprawls to the west of Old Hastings and eventually turns into St Leonards. Of course, once you get to the actual seafront of Old Hastings then it’s all sweet shops, fish-n-chips, cheap cafes and arcades, but mixed in with this is the very much still working fishing beach, where small day-boats are winched up onto the shingle and the centuries-old gear sheds in their strikingly sober coat of black paint have been preserved. One of these sheds contains the tiny Rock-a-Nore Kitchen where they make good use of the seafood the day-boats bring in.
This is all straight-forward cooking and presentation, nothing esoteric or fancified. Maureen has potted crab and toast to start, a very pure pot of almost entirely white and brown crab with just a little fat, lemon and seasoning. I’ve gone for chicken livers in brandy sauce, also served on good toast which soaks up the lovely brandy sauce. Nothing wrong with chicken livers on toast.
Chicken livers
For mains I’ve got a dover sole. It’s a lovely sole, cooked perfectly, swimming in butter along with samphire and tiny brown shrimps. Potatoes and carrots served alongside are nicely roasted. Maureen went with a skate wing, and it’s a monster, also perfectly cooked and this time with clams. Nothing could be simpler than well-cooked fish doused in butter with some choice accompaniments, and it’s a pleasure to eat.
So that’s about the size of it. The glasses of wine we had were innocuous enough, but at £9 for a large glass they were pretty good value. That’s the case with the food as well: around £35-£40 for two courses, generous portions and good (if very straight-forward) cooking. Good value for splendidly fresh fish!
Dover sole
