Riddle me this

Just a couple of weeks after enjoying a boozy, seafood blowout overlooking an Essex Estuary, the Ewing was particularly delighted for the chance to enjoy a second one in quick succession - this time at Riddle and Finns in Brighton’s famed Laines.

Inside features the obligatory high-topped marble tables, cool white tiles that bought to mind Soho's Randall and Aubin and Rex and Mariano (RIP, although its successor, Zelman Meats, is also very good).

Beware that if you are in a pair you have to sit adjacent to each other, like old people in garden centre cafes, and you may also have to share your table. Probably not an issue, but even the Ewing was frustrated by the woman opposite us, and her insistence on loudly instructing her builder on the kitchen extension down the phone.

Good sourdough came with homemade mackerel pare, taramasalata, aioli and... horseradish. Clearly I had zoned out when the waitress announced this nugget of info, so it made a surprise sinus-clearer when I loaded it up on a crust of bread.

We started with half a dozen oysters - rocks, as they hadn't had their first natives of the season - a mixture of Rossmore, Carlingford and their oyster of the day, which I felt sure I wouldn't forget, then promptly did.

You can add sauces and toppings, for an extra fifty pence per bivalve, from a comprehensive list including Killpatrick - barbeque sauce and bacon lardons; Porthilly - deep fried & served with pickled vegetables and citrus mayo; and the classic Rockefeller. And while I do, sacrilege, like a cooked oyster, we ate these au naturel (don't worry, we both remained fully-clothed), although I did anoint mine with a liberal splash of red wine vinegar with finely chopped shallots.

The Ewing took advantage of the excellent value set lunch menu, two courses for £14.95, picking the mussels as her starter, with a spare spoon for me. Having eaten plenty of mussels in my life - many of the best looking out at the flat, windy beaches of de Panne on winter trips to the Belgium coast - these were, with no sense of hyperbole, some of the nicest. (oh they were so plump, silky and delicious - TE).

Big and plump and sweet, but not like the tasteless green lip behemoths, with a velvety sauce that we both clashed spoons over. I also enjoyed the late addition of baby spinach leaves and cherry tomatoes, not quite as strange as it seems.

At nearly twenty quid (it's simply listed on the menu as 'Riddle and Finns fish pie') I hoped my choice of main would be worth it. But when a bubbling dish full of chunks of smoked fish and salmon, topped with a burnished carapace of cheesy mash and crowned with a king prawn and a scallop, appeared (I asked for it to be served without the pesky half a boiled egg) I knew I had made a good decision.

A slightly less successful one was to serve the whole thing on a round of slate. Not only did it make the thought of turning the molten hot pie out a rather unappealing one, but it made it nigh on impossible to cut my veg without the shiver inducing screech of metal on rock. I'm not normally overly fussy about my choice of crockery, but this time I was firmly on the side of We Want Plates.

My unadvertised veg meant we also ordered a side of samphire; entirely superfluous, but very good. Especially when the brackish fronds were dragged through the accompanying dish of ethereal hollandaise sauce. A pairing to rival the more familiar asparagus, with the sea vegetables' season conveniently running on right behind.

The Ewing's main was a kinda re-hash of her starter, but with with the addition of squid and clams and served with pasta, and was no worse for that. A generous portion, well seasoned, with well-cooked pasta and a cold glass of vino blanco - you couldn't want for much more.

Dessert - a chocolate ganache creation with a base of tonka bean shortbread and layer of raspberry and lychee bavarois, decorated with a melange of flowers, mint and berries - looked the part, but failed to deliver. The shortbread was soft and the ganache a little chewy instead of melty. The unadvertised chocolate truffle-type things, rolled in coconut and embedded in a swirl of lemon flavoured cream, were pretty good, though.

After several glasses of prosecco and a very nice white Bordeaux, double espressos were in order, taken while chatting with the - super lovely - staff about the influx of Wycombians to the town that weekend.

The total bill just nudged a ton. Yes, a fair bit of cash to drop for lunch, but well worth it for fine quality fish and seafood served in lovely surroundings. You could, of course, get out for far less and far quicker than we did while still having a thoroughly lovely time, but probably not quite as much fun.

We emerged into the daylight to be greeted by a bright and breezy early autumn afternoon, The perfect weather for a slightly pissed (well, the non- designated driver), walk along the shingle, both buoyed by another wonderful seafood lunch and already planning our hat trick. In fact, the only thing I wouldn't want to repeat was the unplanned dunking in the North Sea. Eating all that fish hasn't metamorphosed me into a mermaid quite yet.

Now My Heart is Full

When I first met my wife she announced, just after telling me her favourite drinks were Black Russians or sweet pear cider, that she only really ate fish. As a confirmed beer-drinking carnivore, who had been living with a vegetarian for five years, I would have been less distraught to hear she was a Gooner who liked pulling the wings off butterflies in her spare time. Thankfully, pretty much five minutes later, she was drinking pints of ale while gnawing racks of ribs with her bare hands. Something I like to frequently remind her about, although she tells the story somewhat differently….

Anyway, as much as she loves most sources of protein, including a manic new ‘hummus in the Nutribullet’ phase she’s going through, fish and seafood remains a firm favourite. So it was an easy decision when it came to choosing what to eat on our recent jaunt down to Brighton.

Our Sunday night fish supper was at Bankers a popular takeaway and restaurant on the Western Road that are the only company in the UK to be awarded the Icelandic Responsible Fisheries Management Award, another ethical cause close to the Ewing's heart.

Inside is clean and bright, if a little utilitarian, while the fascinating range of clientele, with their quirky social mores, made me feel like I had stepped into a modern day Orwell novel full of day-trippers and secret trysts by the sea.

Keeping it classy, as always, we started with a bottle of the muscadet and a couple of wallies. No, not us, but the gherkins that were served as a kind of aperitivo, East Sussex style. If you’re feeling really fancy then a bottle of Monopole Blue Top is yours for £28. Not far off supermarket prices.

We shared the cold platter of stone cold classics to start – smoked salmon, mackerel pate and prawn cocktail - which, at £6.50, also proved great value. There are few things I like better than a prawn cocktail (I recently made the Ewing a giant version in a trifle bowl, for Valentine’s Day) and this one was no exception. The pate and salmon were also decent and served in generous portions, unlike the triangles of brown bread, which we squabbled over as we tried to scoop up every last bit of the smoked fish.

Grilled dover sole, while a touch over-cooked, was nevertheless a marvellous treat. It’s a sweet, buttery fish that needed nothing more than a squeeze of lemon and had the advantage of coming with both a generous side salad – including some outré beetroot chunks, not seen since the 80s - and a great bowl of perfect ‘chippy’ chips.

Large cod -  traditionally battered and deep fried, skin left on in the southern style - was also pretty good, but not up to the heady heights of the accompanying pile of chipped potatoes; especially when they were dunked into the complimentary tartare sauce. Boiled peas, however, were disappointingly watery and bland. Even the Ewing sadly forwent them after trying a spoonful.

After breakfasting on kippers at our hotel, followed by a stroll around the lanes to pick up mid-morning (fish-free) pastries, we headed to the Regency, a Brighton institution on the King's Road, for lunch. Another seaside classic that's been preserved in aspic, offering everything from fried breakfasts to Sunday lunch, it specialises in fish and seafood dishes with an Italian twist.

A ‘side’ of three scallops – although a couple of bivalves had been squeezed into two of the shells – served grilled and doused in garlic butter, were joyous. At £6.95, these were one of the priciest options on the menu, but a treat that was worth every penny. A pile of these, alongside a heap of fat Atlantic prawns, are very strong contenders for the starter in my death row meal menu - don’t worry, no crime has been committed; yet….)

If the scallops were good value then my main, seafood risotto, was a steal. Tomatoey rice, packed with plump prawns, sweet clams, mussels and squid and drizzled with the remnants of garlic butter from our scallops, this is about the best fun you can have in Brighton for under a tenner (and without breaking any indecency laws).

The Ewing chose the last of the seasonal sardines, before they rush off to spawn in the springtime, served simply with garlic, lemon and virginal boiled potatoes, sullied only with a sprinkling of fresh parsley. A dish that made me think of long hot summers in the south of Portugal, eating barbecued fish while watching the waves of the Atlantic crashing on the rocky shore. Not too dissimilar from our view at the Regency. Give or take twenty degrees.

We had chosen starters the day before, but now it was pudding time And what a time to be alive, with steamed syrup pudding, banoffee pie and profiteroles, three of my all-time faves all on the menu. As much as I was tempted, who could resist the lure spotted dick, or Richard, as it’s been coyly renamed here. Steamed sultana-studded, spiced sponge drowned in thick Bird's custard, what ever it's called, is always going to hit the spot.

The Ewing finished with one of her favourites, a deep-fried banana fritter served topped with ice cream and sugar wafers. A speciality her Dad spent much time perfecting when she was young, (served with toffee cream made by mixing double cream with a can of condensed milk that had been boiled for 3 hours - TE) this was a syrup covered trip down memory lane.

In an age of bland homogenisation, both restaurants are proper seaside gems that are well worth a visit - offering forgotten classics with old-fashioned prices to match. Whether you're after a takeaway tray of cod chips or a slap up lobster thermidor, despite the Ewing's very best efforts there's still plenty more fish in the sea.

64 Degrees and Tilly Gingerbread

Last week saw the Ewing's birthday and after taking her wine tasting, when she had to drive, giving her a t-shirt emblazoned with cats which, even as a avowed feline lover, she has vowed never to wear in public, and then spending the rest of the bank holiday in a caravan in 50 mph winds I thought it only proper to take her out for a belated celebratory meal.

The venue of choice was 64 Degrees in Brighton chef Michael Bremner's small plate pean to dehydrators, blow torches and water baths (the restaurants name coming from the temperature that they cook their hen's eggs). Sat at the snazzy space age counter, a perfect vantage point to watch the chefs work, makes quite a change from the previous week's fish and chips on the beach and pints of bitter in front of the log fire (gas fire).

The menu has three short sections labelled 'Fish,Veg and Meat', obviously we wanted everything. To help while deliberating I enjoyed a Spirit pale Ale, a worryingly new ageish sounding beer from Hug Brewing whose tasty tropical hoppiness belied its low ABV. The Ewing got stuck into a spritzy white from Sussex, served in strange IKEA like tumblers that I nearly accidently topped up from the water carafe several times.

We started with new season's asparagus served with pink grapefruit, hollandaise and almond. Any shred of decorum left went out the window as we attacked this with fingers, harder than it looks when your sitting on a stool and sharing a plate; luckily both shirt fronts and dignity were left intact. A dish with a real spring in it's step, both literally and figuratively.

Next up was tuna, seared and sliced and served with a passion fruit emulsion, pomegranate, radish and micro coriander. Again a plate of fresh simplicity, the clean, sweet fish holding up well to the funky, sharp notes of the fruit.

Croquettes of sticky shreds of compressed pork cheek encased in breadcrumbs, came hot and crisp from the fryer and were served with a mushroom ketchup of deep fungal depth, even if it wasn't much of a looker. Alongside was yet more fruit, this time in the form of charred lime, and a tangle of pickled onions which both cut through the richness admirably.

The final savoury plate of smoked chicken, peas and whelks was a late switch that saw us jettisoning a lamb rump and seaweed dish. The Ewing was scared by the whelks, after being scarred several times previously - most notably during a 'romantic' meal in Paris that saw us grimacing over blubbery pigs trotters and rubbery fruit de mer - but thankfully it turned out to be a very sound move.

It may not have been the best looking thing we ate, but I think the pea mousse/foam, as Exorcist like as it appeared, was the highlight of our whole meal (it was divine!- TE). The sweet whelks were chopped finely enough to avoid being their usual briny choking hazard and the gentle smokiness of chicken rounded out proceedings. 

The rum jelly bear has already become a bit of cult choice for pud; it's boozy, jellied deliciousness only improved by a Tony Montana-esque pile of citric sherbet served alongside it. Proving that you can still have fun as a grown up.

There was also espresso and, very good, chocolate truffles for the the more adult amongst us, although I think the Ewing felt a little pang of jealousy when she saw the impressive looking chocolate malt desert make its way to an adjacent table (looked amazing-had serious pudding envy - TE).

As we were paying the bill one of the charming team of staff asked us what our plans were for after lunch. After being so well fed, even we felt a little embarrassed to say 'going for an ice cream', so we cited the less greedy sunding option of 'going for a walk' instead. Before then feeling obliged to valiantly stretch our legs along the seafront, so we could at least try and blame the sea air for sharpening our appetites so quickly.

Fortuitously Boho Gelato, a experimental micro ice cream parlour renowned for it's quirky flavours such as bourbon and bourbon (biscuit and whiskey), beer sorbet and cucumber and rose. The Ewing surpassed herself with a triple scoop of licorice, chocolate cherry pavlova and Small Batch coffee sorbet, and easily dispatched the towering mountain of ice cream.

When I came to pick my flavour, there could only be one choice. The blackberry, gingerbread and white chocolate (with a scoop of cinnamon and fig on top) as, after an impatient nine months of baking, we had heard the exciting news that the Gingerbread baby - nicknamed after my brother-in-law's 'strawberry blonde' hair - had been born in Sydney the day before. A very memorable way to mark my sister's first (Australian) Mother's Day.

Obviously, being the loveliest baby that you ever did see, I'm obliged to share at least one picture of little Matilda Rose. And this one, with a very proud Grandad Tom, is a favourite. I'm already looking forward to sharing a few bottles (milk to start with, of course) with her.