Top Restaurants in Rottingdean
Top Things to do in Rottingdean
Countries
Top 8 Seafood food in Rottingdean, United Kingdom
Discover Restaurants offering the best Seafood food in Rottingdean, United Kingdom including Riddle And Finns The Lanes, The Brighton Shellfish & Oyster Bar, The Little Fish Market, Riddle and Finns The Beach, Saltdean Fishbar, Bardsley's, English's of Brighton, Nostos
Things to do in Rottingdean
8. Nostos
Overall Ratings
5 based on 98 reviews
A place where a nostalgic feeling of the past meets a delightful smell of the present and a grateful smile for the future. Open for bookings seven days a week from 12pm - 11pm, Nostos is the ideal place to enjoy your delicious meal in Brighton and Hove.
Reviewed By dimitra1K
Fantastic food which wakes childhood memories up. Amazing "trachanoto" and "tsoureki" with mastic flavour ice cream; the absolute Greek Easter-time dessert.Very friendly and welcoming staff. Overall amazing experience!Thank you so much for your kind words and i am so glad it brought up memories from when you were a child! take care
7. English's of Brighton
Overall Ratings
4 based on 1554 reviews
Reviewed By John F K
No gastronomic visit to Brighton is complete without a visit to Englishâs, Brightonâs best fish restaurant.Our favourite place for oysters and a glass of champagne whenever we can think of an excuse to celebrate Dear John F KThank you for taking the time to write this review. I am so pleased you enjoyed your recent visit to English's of Brighton and am happy to help you come up with an excuse for your next reason to celebrate!Kind RegardsAndre
6. Bardsley's
Overall Ratings
4 based on 376 reviews
Reviewed By 500dank
Our next door neighbour studied in Brighton and recommended this restaurant. From what the waitress has told us, itâs under new management since a year. Located just of London Road, in Baker Street, we almost walked by the restaurant. Interieur is basic. Ecstatically, thereâs fish and chips look absolutely fantastic. Taste wise, there very good. The batter is crispy, the fish fluffy. But the fish could be seasoned a bit more, as the taste is quite neutral. Nonetheless, service was very good and attentive. We were seated at a table were our peak could fit. You can order fish & chips in three portion sizes, so the review calling the portions small is factually incorrect.
Where to eat Cafe food in Rottingdean: The Best Restaurants and Bars
5. Saltdean Fishbar
Overall Ratings
4 based on 37 reviews
Reviewed By nannybrigh2n
This is a lov chip shop in saltdean , food is always good and the owners are very friendly and courteous, there is room to sit inside to eat too . Only have fish and chips as a treat, as I find it to be expensive , hence 4 stars , spotlessly clean too
United Kingdom Food Guide: 5 French food Must-Eat Restaurants & Street Food Stalls in Rottingdean
4. Riddle and Finns The Beach
Overall Ratings
4 based on 2301 reviews
Now open on the beachfront â Riddle & Finns II is the sister restaurant to the highly acclaimed Riddle & Finns in The Lanes.
Reviewed By VickyB852
Really good meal. Interesting and different menu choices. Loved the special starter prawn tacos! Fab! Friendly service too. Would definitely come back.
United Kingdom Food Guide: 10 Bar food Must-Eat Restaurants & Street Food Stalls in Rottingdean
3. The Little Fish Market
Overall Ratings
5 based on 333 reviews
'The Little Fish Market is a 20 cover Fish Restaurant. We serve solely a 5 course Taster menu of exciting modern fish dishes. The restaurant holds 3AA rosettes for culinary excellence the only restaurant in East Sussex to hold this sort after accolade.
Reviewed By richardh_se
Based on reviews and the difficulty in booking a table, The Little Fish Market is a highly promising destination for an evening out. Front of house is faultless and highly professional. In fact I would go so far as to say that the success of this place may be primarily due to the very pleasant and highly skilled young man who is in charge of service, that and the presentation of front of house and the quite decorative nature of the food, which in flavour and composition manages to appear interesting yet fails the reality test by being strangely unsatisfying and lacking in cohesion. The six-course tasting menu being the only option, that's what we were having. Ahead of the first course some little amuse bouche goodies turned up. For me, these were the highlight of the meal - they were really good, imaginative, hitting the spot in taste by sparking in all sorts of directions in a little trilogy format. A mini tartlet with some green stuff and vaguely fishy sauce within was nicely balanced. What looked like a crisp (?) with some (I think raw) white fish with a tiny blob of sushi-type sauce on it was interesting, though the highlight was a tiny highly aerated miniature eclair with some kind of confection of mackerel paste and what may have been dark chocolate smeared on it. So with our palates primed for more (we hoped) similar delectables we were looking forward to the courses to follow. Unfortunately, it all proceeded slowly downhill from there. Course 1: mackerel, avocado, cucumber. This appeared to be about three really tiny pieces of cold wet dead fish in a thin sort of greenish liquid which didn't taste particularly inviting. I'm not against eating undercooked or raw fish but there does have to be a reason - in other words, not being Gollum, I generally prefer fish cooked, but sometimes it can be made quite special for being raw or partly so, in which case the rawness can be a good thing. However this seemed to be uncooked (undercooked?) purely for its own sake. The dish was only really the sum of its parts, in other words not creating a harmonious assembly. Course 2: crab, hazelnut, apple. A few tiny pieces of crab in again, a thin and unremarkable liquid, with a slightly acidic tang, giving in my view a faintly unpleasant aftertaste. The crab meat itself being utterly devoid of any taste whatsoever. Tiny miniature cubes which may have been apple(?) were quite one-dimensional (in taste if not in physical form) and failed to really add anything. I've never made a point of seeking out crab in restaurants but if this is what it is meant to taste like at its best, then I wouldn't bother. Again, not more than the sum of its parts. Thumbs down from me once more I'm afraid. Course 3: monkfish, carrot, curry, lardo(?): after the thin, wet, puritanical diet-camp misery of the initial courses I had been visualising some kind of break in the clammy room-temperature monotony of unrewardingly plunking about with tiny sad remains of humble sea creatures in the prospect of (in my mind's eye! forgive my imagination!) perhaps some lovely goujons of lightly charred juicy squidgy monkfish sitting in a splodge of oozing Keralan curry sauce all rich, coconutty, sweet and tangy with shavings of tangy fruit bits of bark and subtle Indian herbs or green Thai curry et cetera. How I longed for some joy and bounce on the palate. But, it was not to be. Third course was another tiny piece of fish (monkfish) kind of rolled up with some crunchy bits and pieces on top and underneath and again the whole being a bit flaccid and unremarkable. I have had much better (tastier) monkfish cooked in so many different and enjoyable ways in other far less ambitious establishments - pan fried rolled up with pancetta balanced with quail's eggs pan-fried asparagus or in a rich sauce and trails of tapenade - so many hints of joyful monkfish memories. It is I think difficult to trash monkfish in the cooking as its built-in flavour is distinctive but somehow... overall I found this dish again insubstantial in flavour and faintly depressing. Also quite baffled as to what the word "curry" was meant to imply in the description. Course 4: Salmon oyster risotto: this was a little better - it actually had some warmth in it, in temperature as well as in flavour, and decent binding, though a little slimy with the bits of oyster, but was overall starting to turn into something more than the simple pieces of its assembly. However in my view the choice of herbs and seasoning was ultimately adrift, a little too much sharpness with not enough depth or anything at the lower kind of "umami" level properly to carry it, the choice of herbs tending to overpower whatever faint oyster taste may have wanted to remain, so again, it failed to really hit the spot. And, as before, portion size was laughably diminutive. Course 5: wild bass nicoise: this was the best of the lot, although still lacking in the way it was composed in my opinion. A certain disjointedness and "separateness" of constituent parts with no ongoing cohesive consolidation is the only way I could describe it. Assembled around a tiny piece of fish were (among other things) half a tiny boiled potato, sitting on its own. I thought to myself - do I need to be reminded what half of a very small boiled potato tastes like? A few tiny plainly boiled light coloured whole beans (maybe haricot or similar) - like they had been counted out and kept apart for a game of five-stones or something. Some other bits and bobs plopped around, including something that looked and tasted of garlic mayonnaise but left an unpleasant slightly stale aftertaste which I generally get when preserved or not-quite-fresh garlic from a jar has been used. I'm unsure what was "nicoise" about this dish as I don't recall there being any olives or anchovies or whatever is meant by the term - maybe they were so tiny or disappeared into some or other faint smear of drizzly sauce I must have just missed them. On balance I had realised that this was about as close to something substantial and rewarding to eat we were going to get and it was, in parts, actually rather good. The bass was cooked perfectly and the supporting cast for the rest of the dish, aside from the slightly jarring bit of cold chewy acidic tasting artichoke, was fair enough, if a bit one-dimensional when taken on their individual merits. If I had that as a starter in most restaurants, I'd be happy to give it 7 out of ten. But let's be clear here - £69pp for 6 courses? Five of which would struggle to feed a thin mouse on a diet... mostly average and really nothing to excite the tastebuds - being generous they'd be worth no more than £6-7 a dish as mini-tapas or "fine dining" tasters, which means circa £30-35 for the only dish of any substance being this pleasant little starter dressed up as the main attraction? Good value it isn't. The thing about tiny portions is that they are fine, provided it is allied to a hyper-amazing taste experience. Something that really pushes the boat out and raises the bar. Which regrettably I did not find to be the case. Sourdough bread (chewy, nice crust) and butter was pleasant enough. Californian red wine (The Crusher pinot noir) likewise drinkable and enjoyable though the wine list is limited for red, and the prices seem quite fantastical - I'm not sure what the markup is on wine in this restaurant, but it must be fairly extreme as there seems to be nothing under around £40 and mostly they are kicking up to £60-80 a bottle. I'm fairly sure the wine we had would be around £12-15 (if it were available) in Waitrose so I guess there's a fairly serious margin being put on top if they need to triple or quadruple the cost. Course 6: mirabelle plum tart. This was OK but in my view a bit squidgy, bland and indistinct and a missed opportunity to do something interesting with the plum jam/paste perhaps offset a little bitter plum fruit with some caramelisation or something more like a tarte fine. Pleasant enough as a little bit of patisserie with impossibly thin crispy pastry but otherwise nothing particularly remarkable or inspirational. Generally, I like to eat out at lots of different places to taste new food which pushes the boundaries and makes me think "I could not have cooked that" but on reflection, there was nothing here that pressed my buttons in any inspiring or meaningful way. Aside from making me reflect that perhaps the popularity and good reviews really is all about the service. Most places give such miserably bad service these days that - how about this for an idea - if you just make the service thoroughly excellent, and use high prices as a barrier to entry to create a kind of virtuous cycle in the hope that it may perpetuate itself, then maybe it ceases to matter that the food is a bit average? Maybe that is the secret. Make people feel lovely and charge them plenty of money to create the illusion of value (less is more, darling, of course!) and it becomes self-justifying and self-referential - nothing else in terms of relative comparison then really matters. I can not help having the nagging feeling that this is a case of "Emperor's New Clothes". It seems to have had some commendations from respected reviewers (AA, Michelin?). And plenty of flowery and wildly congratulatory reviews by other ordinary bods - which is generally a good indicator. However although trying not to be cynical I wonder if it has become like one of those experiences you should jolly well make sure you are being seen to loudly and publicly be appreciative of otherwise darling you're a total philistine with a brutal and uneducated caveman palate just dreadfully unable to appreciate the finer things in life such as tiny bits of cold wet dead fish in a weedy sauce somehow reminiscent of pond water that if you're not rapturously appreciating then oh just forget it darling you're really beyond redemption. Like that horrible modern discordant music they sometimes play on Radio 3 that you're supposed to like to be seen to be "cultured", or going to the Tate Modern to see the (mostly) pointless modern art, as in the emperor's new clothes, you'd better be getting a meaningful experience standing in front of that painted white box with purple sprouting bits of metal for half an hour and tune into the artist's emotional pain and what a deep and meaningful reflection on life it is and for heaven's sake don't be the little boy who pipes up that it's a load of piffle and - hey, look the joke's on you because - he's really got nothing on! Eating out should be a pleasurable experience; food should deliver pleasure, perhaps comfort, maybe joy, something to excite and invigorate; opening the mind to unexpected exploratory windows to different zones, perhaps surprising, perhaps reassuring, but to be outstanding involves pushing the envelope and forging new taste boundaries. It's always a good thing to experience something that makes you sit up and rethink the parameters of food, which is why it's worth trying to seek out places like this where something quite different is meant to be happening. However on balance the Little Fish Market fails to hit the spot on too many levels, in essence the food is mostly just the sum of its parts, and therefore I wouldn't recommend it, or bother going back. As an aside The Gingerman round the corner is in my view a much better bet for creative fine dining, in this immediate neighbourhood and similar price point. A further point is that while the front of house is very nicely done, the underside of the establishment is less so. The solitary toilet is shabby and extremely gloomy, the light fitting appears to be exposed and broken as there is only a very little cold blue light within, and the thing that holds the toilet paper wobbles and appears about to fall off the wall. It all looks uncared for and in need of a serious deep clean and some maintenance - or is that too much to ask for in a restaurant charging typically £100 per person (with wine) for set dinner? Under the stairs in the basement while waiting for the lavatory I noticed a build up of what appears to be black mould against the basement wall under the flight of stairs - being hypersensitive to mould this gave me a mild adverse reaction while waiting there for a few minutes. If this was my establishment I would be down that basement ASAP with a bucket of bleachy water and then get a proper work-crew on site to have the place cleaned, cleared out, the lighting sorted, do some maintenance and tidying things up, perhaps taking a look at long term damp-proofing or at least getting some mould spray or UV light or whatever necessary to remove the offputting grubbiness of below-decks. As for value, at £69 for 6 courses that's balancing out at £11.50 a course - which is a bit ludicrous giving the hilariously tiny portions of courses 1 thru 4 inclusive and although the amuse-bouches made up for it a little, it's still on the extreme side. Course 5 (the largest, comparatively) being equivalent to a smallish starter in most restaurants. If we take The Ivy as a benchmark (I know, now it's a chain, predictable and overpriced) but it seems bizarre that the Little Fish Market is pricing comparable with establishments at that level, yet failing to match in either quantity or overall quality, and the grubbiness of the downstairs bit is really not on, at such a price point. Also for a three-hour stint the chair I was sat on did seem pretty hard-edged and unforgiving. Reminded me of a school chair. Probably handy to have the hard wooden edge digging into your thighs to bring you sharply back to reality as you fight the overwhelming urge to fall asleep in physics class after lunch, but less welcome on a (relaxing?) evening out. I try not to be an overeater being a regular kind of 72 Kilo man but on getting home I needed bread and cheese and a piece of cake before going to bed as, despite finishing off all six "courses" (nibbles), it all felt like a somewhat protracted series of over-elaborate snacks spread over three hours with quite long delays in between, and an hour or so afterwards, I was still hungry. A post-script. Having been asked what I thought I relayed some of my views to the waiter (nice front-of-house man) and a little time afterwards the chef came bouncing up the stairs in an apparent state of agitation as I had made some less than admiring noises about the food. He was trying to put me on the spot as to where else I had eaten in order to possibly have earned the right to even contemplate having the gall and temerity to draw such obviously nebulous left-field comparisons or dare to pass judgment on his amazing eatery? Presumably because he wanted to impress upon me that I was clearly an uncouth and uneducated numpty who probably never thought of straying to anything more adventurous than scampi and chips so how could I possibly justify not appreciating his amazing concoctions for their self-evident wondrousness! I always find such on-the-spot interrogation rather difficult to deal with - especially at nearly 11 in the evening (aside from the diminution of mental facility following consumption of a little over half a bottle of wine) - a bit like on the spot maths when you are at a checkout and your mind goes blank and you forget your times tables. On reflection having been to so many excellent restaurants in the last 30 years it does need some quiet contemplation to remember even a fraction of them, also given that I'm excluding and generally forgetting all the boozy work-related meals out (often at highly rated venues of the day) in the 80s and 90s. Of quieter moments there are so many benchmark experiences: Manoir au Quat' Saisons (circa late 90s when it was amazing); Chez Nico in Park Lane (before it closed!); Pont de la Tour (when it was still a trailblazer rather than an also-ran); Bank (before it was replaced by a hotel); Coast in Mayfair; Waterside Inn at Bray; Waldo's among others at Cliveden (in its day it was Britain's highest rated hotel); Rules (still even these days usually good despite occasional off days) just to think of London and surroundings, and more recently so many other wonderful establishments, running into the thousands when I include all the small restaurants, independent eateries, gastro pubs, cafes and bistros in England and abroad some of which I may have even submitted reviews in recent times on Tripadvisor, though by no means all, time and inclination being limited. Eating out regularly (upwards of 2500 times I now realise) over the course of 30 years from some of the highest rated establishments downwards I would say puts me in a fairly reasonable position to have an opinion on food at all levels, therefore. And to rebuff the inevitable (predictable) argument of "oh, maybe you just don't like fish!" it should be noted that I frequently choose and enjoy (non-farmed) fish at restaurants, and I personally cook (non-farmed) fish several times a month, including shellfish and whatever kind of available wild or otherwise non-farmed varieties that I can get hold of. Not being a food snob I am entirely happy to try everywhere from so-called fine dining to corner cafes, vegan and vegetarian, happy to try at least once every imaginable type of restaurant and international food that looks or sounds promising regardless of price point or target market. What I am looking for is new and rewarding taste experiences and sometimes they come in the most unlikely and humble places. Of course one over-riding principle is that I will try to avoid chains whenever possible, as it is vital to support small local restaurants to reward independent endeavour, encourage growth of small business and creativity and passion rather than feeding money into the corporate maw (where creativity is stifled, standards tend to be driven down over time by accountants, investors take their return, and a thin minimum finds its way down to support a demoralised drone army doing the real work.) OK digression over so back to the events unfolding. Chef was pleasant enough but seemed to take some umbrage at my constructive criticism. I understand that most English people are habitually reticent and will not speak out in public situations or say what they think in restaurants or probably any other public place, but the older I get, despite being more proudly English than a tea-stained cricket bat, I will always given an honest and immediate impression, if prompted for one. The reason being that I try to put myself in the position of the owner - maybe I am unusual, but if it were my business I would want totally honest and unalloyed truth from every customer no matter whether I agreed with their view or not. Most people will just keep quiet and then mutter darkly on the way home or just think that it must be them if they didn't concur with the perceived consensus about some shared experience that everyone is seemingly raving over (i.e. Emperor's New Clothes syndrome). But either something is pleasurable or it isn't, with degrees of rationale and reasoning in ether direction. So there you have it. Final post-script: the bill. They knocked off a bit off the bill rounding down to £135 (including wine) presumably given that we were not entirely impressed (it wasn't my intention to moan in order to try to chip away at the bill, I would add - I would have said nothing had I not been directly asked for my opinion). We left them a tip all the same and rounded to £150. Though I would guess most final bills (for two) would be in the region of £200 or a shade over that.
2. The Brighton Shellfish & Oyster Bar
Overall Ratings
4 based on 355 reviews
We are back from our winter break . Itâs time to get going again. We are staring with Finest Native Oysters (only available when there is no R in the month). WOW these are great. We have fresh filled rolls with our famous fresh lobster roll at the top of
Reviewed By solidbond67
decided to use this seafood shack as it had good value oysters and a large range of other stuff too!The owners are very helpful and recommended using there seating as they had a thing up to help prevent being mugged for food by a seagull (which happened to me another day when one bowled into my head and took the icecream out of my hand and flew off!!!)We had a selection of really good priced oysters, as they had a couple of different kinds, some mixed seafood and some prawns and they were all great! So good in fact we went back the following day for more, and very very surprisingly, the owner recognised us and said, "back for more", very impressive as they must get so busy! Just on that I'd recommend this placeCan't wait to go back to Brighton if only for this alone!So glad you decided to visit us & you were so impressed with what we had to offer. Please tell your friends if they are our way. We look forward , one day to seeing you again Regards Cliff
1. Riddle And Finns The Lanes
Overall Ratings
4 based on 1233 reviews
Our original Brighton Lanes Oyster Bar is lit by candlelight and features tiled walls and high tables and stools. You will be seated side-by-side, allowing for a focus on casual dining and ambience. We have fresh daily specials and catch of the day on off
Reviewed By Debbie H
Only having 1 night in Brighton we did a bit of research & came up with this place.Doesn't take bookings so we went earlier in the day to check it out. The high tables & stools didn't look terribly comfortable but were actually fine.All the staff we spoke to where knowledgeable and friendly.We shared a few small dishes, sashimi, prawns, shrimps it was all delicious. The larger meals looked amazing especially the crabReally nice bottle of wine for £32 - I am planning on tracking down the producer next year when I am in the area.
Where to eat Thai food in Rottingdean: The Best Restaurants and Bars
