We are often asked ‘Where is the best place on the Island to go for seafood?’. This is a very popular question, particularly of summer visitors, who seem to imagine that the Isle of Wight should have its equivalent of Rick Stein, Padstow’s dominant fish peddler. Years ago we... Read more
It’s been a while. Let’s be honest and say that when we last visited Morrison’s cafe in Newport, our experience was memorable, and the subsequent review involved the words ‘horrible’, and ‘groll’. So it took fourteen years before we worked up the courage to try it again. Needing a... Read more
The distinction between street food and takeaway could simply be semantics. By literal definition, a takeaway is eaten away from its place of origin – perhaps your home or car. Whereas street food is consumed… well, on the street, alongside where it was created, whether that’s a hot dog... Read more
Matt can trace his own love of eating out back to his parents, who bravely managed to take their offspring to enough dining-out venues that some vague idea of how to behave therein was instilled in them – no mean feat in the 1970s and 80s when children in... Read more
What if a few food wagons got together and made a food court, where you could just go along and choose from a range of takeaway food? This is an idea that is popular on the mainland – even as close as Southsea – but despite a few valiant... Read more
Gorblimey! Now we know how Mary and Joseph felt a week or so before Christmas. (Christmas? Perhaps it was simply known as ‘Mas’ back then.) Trying to get dinner without a reservation at the height of the Island’s staycationing summer might be considered to be misfortune, to aspire to... Read more
You’ve got to have some sympathy for The Hambrough. Everything the venue subsequently does is compared to its early triumph with Robert Thompson at the helm. The talented chef won the Isle of Wight’s only Michelin star this millennium at The Hambrough in 2006, aged just 23, before going... Read more
Over the long, long months, even years of the COVID-19 crisis we’ve been consistently amazed and delighted by the spirit and optimism of the Island’s food and hospitality venues. Not just keeping open in difficult circumstances, some restaurateurs have even gone so far as to set up entirely new... Read more
One of our favourite games is ‘Either/Or’, which is inspired by the famous conundrum of whether you would rather fight a horse-sized duck or one hundred duck-sized horses. Our version is, naturally, more food based. For example, if you could only have one thing to accompany your desserts for... Read more
One thing which the Isle of Wight does, and has always done well, is be an incubator for enterprise. Much has been said about the death and resurrection of the high street, but if you were hoping for a return to the butcher, baker and candlestick-maker, the old model... Read more
