Smoking Lobster Ventnor — Restaurant in England

Hands down the best seafood / Asian fusion food we’ve ever had and for us the best restaurant in Isle of Wight!

Firstly this place is always fully booked so that says a lot, we’d been trying to book for almost a fortnight and got lucky on the second night of our stay with a cancellation.

The restaurant is quaint, quirky and incredibly welcoming, the location is beautiful on the edge of the beach overlooking the ocean waves. It has around 12 tables inside and a few more outside and most important of all the staff are just amazing.

We must have spoke to a girl named Ellie about a dozen times trying to find a table and she was lovely every time. On arriving we were greeted by a girl who’s name I unfortunately didn’t catch, she was super helpful and found us space to park our baby’s buggy and a high chair was already waiting for my daughter to sit in.

All of the staff were amazing in all honesty, all three of the girls who were waiting staff for the night came over to say hi and keep our daughter entertained whilst serving us with a smile all night.

Now for the best part, the food, mean just wow! I don’t think I can summarise in words how good it was but I’ll give it a go.

We opted for the tempura lobster and Thai fish cake for starters. The Thai fish cake was amazing, sitting on a lovely sauce almost tasting like a light Thai green curry. The tempura lobster was probably the only part of our dining experience that was a little underwhelming and that is simply down to the portion size. Taste however was great.

For mains, we had tuna katsu on a edamame risotto and catch of the day swordfish with baby new potatoes. Both dishes were incredible and some of the freshest tastiest seafood we’ve had but the honorary mention goes to the risotto which might well be the best I’ve ever had.

To end the night we had pandan doughnuts and the lemongrass key lime panacotta. Both were exceptional but the winner for me was the doughnuts, so so light and full of flavour, didn’t taste greasy at all and again might be some of the best doughnuts I’ve tasted.

For those looking for great mocktails, we had the strawberry spritzer and the Thai lemonade which were great and lasted us all night.

I think the length of my review says enough about our experience here, all I can finish with is whether you are visiting or a local you need to try the food here because it is worthy of a...

We really enjoyed dining here one evening, so much so we came back for lunch the following day.

First thing first, they only serve lobster if the supplier they use catches any on the day, we were unlucky both days and sadly couldn't try the famous lobster.

Overall the venue, service, menu choice all bode well - small but cosy restaurant facing the Sea, friendly and informative staff, the menu a seafood theme blended with Asian fusion (mainly Japanese and Malay, in a good and tasteful way), this is probably thanks to one of the head chefs/owners who grew up in a mixed cuisine household (similar to myself!). Portion size however - don't come in here expecting a hearty meal, they emphasize on taste over quantity.

So onto the food... At dinner we started with a crispy soft shell crab and Chilli ginger Maki rolls: overall the crabs were a bit over-fried, when the soft shell becomes crunchy, that's when you know it's been fried too long - tastewise however was fantastic, seasoned perfectly. The Maki I didn't enjoy but my missus did, for me it tasted too strongly of the pickled ginger (almost like stuffing a sushi with pickled ginger then frying it).

My main was a flat iron steak with onion rings and miso pepper corn sauce, overall good quality locally sourced beef cooked to an excellent mediumrare. I couldn't taste the miso in the sauce but the steak and fries were good.

We ended with a Yuzu treacle tart which was quite delicious, nice blend of sharpness and sweetness.

The next day we went for the lobster (preprepared not fresh, so it was ready to go) and salted cod tempura. The were fried to perfection and tasted amazing - definitely try to get this if it's on the specials menu.

My main however was an interesting one - teriyaki fillet steak burger with Chilli mayo. Again, the steak was cooked wonderfully and the homemade Chilli mayo was wonderful. What was odd was the filling of the burger - I might be coming across uncultured in this new crazy hipster world but I prefer my vegetables crisp and fresh rather than burnt to black crisps... I think I understood what the chef was trying to do and create a bitterness to the burger but I couldn't stomach black sheets of burnt kos lettuce.

I'd say overall I would come back and would recommend...

TL/DR: Adequate food, great location, terrible customer service.

We had high hopes for this meal. After having booked the table two weeks in advance (and only being able to do that due to a cancellation) we were expecting something exceptional, even getting dressed up for the occasion.

However from the moment we were sat down it became clear that they wanted us out in the quickest time possible.

To start with we ordered cocktails and asked that our food did not come until we had finished them. Barely one sip in and the food arrived. Under some circumstances this would be fine but I had ordered a Thai lemonade, a cocktail containing chilli that was so overpowering to continue drinking would have meant not being able to taste my food.

By the time I came back to the cocktail at the end of the meal it was just chilli water and undrinkable.

The food was ok but nothing special. Certainly not good enough to warrent a two week waiting list.

And on that, the tables around us gave in to being rushed and then sat empty, the table next to us was empty for more than an hour., all while people came to the door asking if there was space (and as one of the chefs asked "are you sure there isn't space as I know them?").

As a business they need to decide if they are a fast food restaurant (as is the impression given) or take bookings and therefore take the time to do something great. They can't, and shouldn't do both.

We stalled as much as we could to make a night of it. When we ordered coffee we were told snippily that they would need the table back in 25 minutes (that would have given us 2 hours) and we made it with a couple of minutes to spare. .

But when we walked past 30 minutes later our table was still empty.

All in all there was no reason for us to have felt rushed. We could have spent the same amount of money (perhaps more) without the pressure and come away with a much better feeling. The service was attentive to the point of being rude, even at one point trying to take plates away that we were still eating from

If the customer service had been right this would have been a 4 star review. If the food had been up to expectation it would have been 5. Based on our experience I cannot recommend...