Sargasso, Margate Harbour Arm, Stone Pier, Margate CT9 1AP (01843 229270). Small plates £7-£11, giant plates £9-£19, desserts £6, wines from £25
It's the easiest of dishes: half a dozen fats Cantabrian anchovies, the color of well-varnished teak, lie in a pool of deep inexperienced olive oil, dotted with glowing droplets of what seems to be lemon juice. On the face of it, little or no has occurred to get this to our desk. Some severely good anchovies, meaty, salty and highly effective specimens with a lingering depth of flavour, have merely been taken from their resting place, dressed and despatched on their means. However there's a lot extra happening right here; one thing that goes to the very coronary heart of the very best eating places. It's an expression of exquisitely good style. Sargasso, in Margate, is sodden with the stuff.
It won't be everyone’s thought of excellent style. Some will have a look at the squat, previous redbrick constructing it calls residence, and roll their eyes. They’ll dismiss as ugly this low-slung bruiser of a block hunkered by the ocean wall alongside the harbour arm because it reaches out into the water. If they're of a rectally challenged demographic and acquainted with sure over-the-counter ointments, they could whine in regards to the onerous, spindly stools that you're invited to sit down upon when you eat on the counter, or on the excessive window tables. This common eye-rolling could possibly be prolonged to the monogrammed plates, the restaurant’s identify realised in a blood-red font that recollects the late 60s futurism of Joe 90. And let’s not neglect the document participant and the gathering of 70s jazz funk vinyl cuts by the likes of Idris Mohammed and George Duke, which play upon it. The album cowl is all the time displayed behind the bar so you recognize precisely what you're listening to when you eat.
If all of this doesn't sound like your plate of Cantabrian anchovies, don't come right here. You shouldn't take the high-speed practice from London’s St Pancras, as I did, for an early supper. Go elsewhere. The remainder of you, get in. Sargasso, which is the second restaurant from chef Ed Wilson and the staff behind Brawn on London’s Columbia Highway, makes the easiest issues look quite simple. The menu, divided between half a dozen small plates and the same variety of bigger choices, manages to mirror completely its hard-scrabble coastal setting.
A few of it, like these superb anchovies, to be eaten with the springiest of hard-crusted sourdoughs, is merely in regards to the elements. Don’t neglect to mop. There are others which have demanded extra thought. Whipped cod’s roe, a wistful fondant-fancy pink, has been piped in buxom whorls throughout a thick piece of oily toast. Throughout that could be a garden of well-dressed peppery watercress. It's topped with a boiled egg, allowed to return to room temperature, however nonetheless with a sundown of runny yolk that pours out throughout it if you reduce in. It appears like each severe consideration to element and big look after £8.
From that fishy aspect of the ledger comes a salad of crab, with finely shredded wild fennel, chives and different inexperienced herbs on a thick pond of sauce thickened with brown crab meat. You can, in fact, merely stand exterior on the harbour arm, and sniff the air right here because the tide pulls out; take within the gull-clawed wind, wealthy with the saline pong of uncovered seaweed and previous boat diesel. Or you could possibly sit in right here, at a excessive high, staring out on the view and eat a candy and funky expression of it. The enjoyment, in fact, is that by taking the stroll to Sargasso you get a mix of the 2. Add a bowl of their clams, with thick, smooth slices of garlic and handfuls of coriander. Accurately, they bring about a spoon so you may end the ripe, snout-thumping broth prefer it’s a soup.
There are different nice issues. As a result of it's the season, there's asparagus, served heat with a glass dish of lemony melted butter. Friggitelli peppers, Padrón’s longer Italian cousins, are given a bit of warmth to assist them wizen and soften, then dressed with flakes of sea salt and chilli. Parmesan fritters are squash-ball-sized béchamel croquettes, with centres of pure molten cheesiness, served sizzling from the fryer below a micro-planed drift of the very best parmesan. It's finger meals, designed by somebody who believes a plate needs to be cleared. I get the message. I clear the plate right down to that shiny monogram.
A lot of the wine record, which is as cautious and intriguing a range as at Brawn, is obtainable by the glass and carafe. Behind the bar is a set of spirits, together with Aperol Spritz and Fernet-Branca; issues that you simply would possibly assume are a good suggestion after just a few carafes of the gentler wines. You’re an grownup; make your individual bloody selections. There are additionally piles of cookbooks, titles by Nuno Mendes, José Pizarro and, most pleasingly of all, Keith Floyd (on Italy). It’s that good style factor yet again.
Someplace in a evaluation of a restaurant in Margate there are supposed to be a few paragraphs musing on a seaside city with a status for scruffiness, now present process gentrification. It’s such an apparent level it’s barely value making past saying that sure, the coin arcades are nonetheless right here on the entrance, and so is the Turner Modern. There are bucket-and-spade outlets, and ironic takes on the bucket-and-spade tradition. And there’s Sargasso, which in July shifts from opening on a Thursday to opening on a Wednesday. Maybe throughout the summer time they’ll be capable to open all through the week. I do hope so.
Generally, once I inform folks I play jazz piano, they inform me they hate jazz, as if it’s a mark of some type of intelligent, reverse sophistication. They usually appear shocked once I inform them that’s high-quality. I really feel completely no have to argue the case or convert them. They're those who're lacking out. Their loss. I actually do really feel the identical means about Sargasso. I can predict the reactions in opposition to it from those that flare their nostrils at what they regard as posturing. All which means is that they received’t get to eat these anchovies or that crab salad, in that constructing with these sounds and that view. On the finish, with a ultimate good nod to the bucket-and-spade tradition of Margate, there's soft-serve ice-cream, both with strawberry sauce or chocolate and hazelnuts. It suggests a lower than vigorous curiosity in desserts by the kitchen right here, however after such an important meal, they are often forgiven.
Information bites
Sargasso is about to get a brand new neighbour. Staple, an unbiased bakery which launched its first outpost on the former village publish workplace in Broadstairs in 2020 earlier than increasing into Westgate-on-Sea final yr, is to open two extra subsequent month. One is in Ramsgate and the opposite is within the constructing proper subsequent to Sargasso on Margate’s Harbour Arm. The menu, overseen by chef and baker Stephen Gadd, contains numerous sourdough loaves, their very own croissant and Danish in addition to a spread of basic muffins (staplestores.co.uk).
Clay’s Kitchen, the Indian restaurant in Studying which developed a nationwide following throughout lockdown for its residence deliveries, has launched a crowdfunder to lift cash for its new residence. Sharat and Nandana Syamala have taken on the lease of a former Wetherspoon’s pub in Caversham and, having raised £250,000 themselves, are in search of the identical once more to complete the job. They're providing a bunch of rewards together with vouchers, cooking lessons, membership membership subscriptions and venue rent. Discover out extra right here.
After 18 years, chef Marc Wilkinson is closing the much-admired Michelin-starred Fraiche in Oxton on Merseyside. Wilkinson, who famously cooks by himself, has stated that each one current reservations will likely be honoured however no extra will likely be launched. The final service will likely be on the finish of September. The Fraiche identify will then be used for different initiatives (restaurantfraiche.com).
This text was amended on 26 June 2022. An earlier model referred to “Calabrian”, fairly than Cantabrian, anchovies.
Electronic mail Jay at jay.rayner@observer.co.uk or observe him on Twitter @jayrayner1
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