This family-run business has been well known in the area as a supplier of top quality Irish fish and seafood products since 1996 and, since the recent opening of their ‘seafood emporium’ in the centre of The Spa village, it’s now reaching a much wider public.
Here, the Walsh family have not only a fishmongers shop, but also a delicatessen and a seafood café, so customers now have the choice of buying fresh produce to cook at home (advice and recipes readily supplied), purchasing ready-prepared dishes such as seafood chowder, fish cakes, fish pies and seafood lasagnes for quick meals at home or in self-catering accommodation – or heading upstairs to the café, where a tempting menu is offered.
Very simple in décor and ambience, the cafe quickly earned a following for the food, value and very friendly and helpful staff.
Except for offering a single vegetarian starter and main course (a caesar salad, perhaps, and a pasta dish) the menu is all based on the fish and seafood sold in the shop and deli below.
Among the starters you’ll find gems like their own smoked Irish organic salmon, local seafood chowder (a mix of local fish in a seafood velouté flavoured with dill and parsley), oysters (native, when in season), prawn cocktail (made with proper Irish prawns, ie langoustines), and homemade fish cake, whilst main courses might include fresh local prawn scampi, with tartare sauce, salad and homemade chips, home-smoked haddock and spinach tart, crabmeat and roasted pepper risotto, and classic fish & chips (delicious cod, in a lovely thin batter)...
Everything seems equally tempting - vegetables are good too, and desserts (mostly made in-house) might include treats such as a classic French apple tart with crème anglaise, or marinated strawberries with balsamic Valentia Island yoghurt sorbet.
At night they put the specials on a blackboard, and there’s a very adequate wine list too, including four good house wines, all available by the glass, a rosé and a prosecco as well as eight or nine well-chosen reds and whites.
All round this is a place that really hits the spot, offering quality and value along with simplicity and a lovely friendly ambience. No wonder everybody loves it.
Seats 47 (outdoors, 12). L & D Tue-Sun, 12.30-5 & 6-9pm. House wine from €18.95. Children welcome (high chair); air conditioning; parking (15). Closed Mon, also other days off season (call ahead to check). MasterCard, Visa, Laser.
