I eat in far too many beige- and oatmeal-coloured dining rooms, almost as if no one involved could commit to an actual colour. But in this current restaurant landscape, where so many play it safe with the decor, The Blue Pelican in Deal, Kent, is definitely not a subscriber. It’s more like walking into Hokusai’s Great Wave off Kanagawa, a cacophony of tasteful blues, chilli pepper-coloured chessboard floor, striped cushions and, on one wall, a large mural of that very same wave, though this one is not by Hokusai but by local artist Tom Maryniak and it laps against the Deal seafront.
Rarely do I mention a restaurant loo so early in proceedings, but at the Blue Pelican they’ve painted the tiny, under-the-stairs space such a vivid, fiery terracotta and lit it so gorgeously that it’s very possibly the prettiest place to spend a penny in 2024. You may not be surprised to learn that one of the founders, Alex Bagner, once worked for Wallpaper* magazine, or that, alongside her husband, Chris Hicks, they also run Deal’s Rose hotel and restaurant, which is equally aesthetically pleasing. Their new venture, meanwhile, is a Japanese-inspired, seafront townhouse restaurant and boutique yoga studio.
Those two operations, I’m happy to say, do not overlap: not a single woman in a LuluLemon leotard went into a downward dog over the course of my Friday lunch. Instead, there was a busy room of locals, many of them just popping in for cocktails at the sit-up bar. And, despite it being the dankest, brolly-blowing winter’s day, the place was full of diners enjoying sesame tofu with daikon and three-cornered leek, and a rather boozy, sake-laced broth with chicken tsukune meatballs and hedgehog mushrooms.
This is one of the most intriguing and punchy menus you’ll come across on the entire south coast, with chef Luke Green clearly excited and influenced by the Tokyo dining scene. Expect a skewer of pork collar with preserved greengages, clay-baked rice donabe with braised short-rib or, for vegetarians, roast chestnuts and rainbow chard, and halibut with clams, monksbeard and white miso. There are sides of pickles and ferments, bowls of cucumber and seaweed salad, and one quite unforgettable offering of utterly heavenly roast pink fir potatoes with walnut miso and cavolo nero.
Nothing on Green’s menu is bland or pedestrian, and his cooking is one hefty poke after another of sake, mirin, soy, cumin, bergamot and whiffy, aged things. Even a plate of delica pumpkin, wreathed delicately in tempura, came stacked high, drizzled with fermented honey and dusted with a dark-green seaweed powder. It was excellent, and absolutely worth undoing every calorie ever burned off adopting a warrior or sun salutation pose. A slice of painstakingly rolled, sansho pepper-enhanced tamagoyaki, or Japanese omelette, came topped with smoked eel, while jerusalem artichokes and kale tops turned up in a glorious barley miso.
Service is utterly unpretentious – rather, they’re friendly, knowledgable and quite clearly aware that the chef here is a real talent. The Blue Pelican could easily just have served pricey fish and chips for tourists to eat in a seaside setting, but instead they’ve gone out on a limb and set up a very classy, experimental, neighbourhood Japanese restaurant that I expect the locals will not feel like sharing with down-from-Londons clutching their yoga mats and eating all the halibut with calçots. For me, that halibut and calçot dish was the absolute highlight, a hulking great meaty lump of fish on the bone, perfectly timed, lying on a pile of sweet, caramelised onions and made pretty and even more fishy by vivid red trout roe.
The pudding list, however, is not a list – it’s just the one offering, and on the day we went that was a kinako-flavoured creme caramel with kumquat. Take it or leave it. We left it. Fill up instead on those glorious walnut-miso potatoes. We ordered one portion to share and, due to my predictable behaviour around any sort of fancy spud, the atmosphere on the train home was rather frosty. Deal has got itself a little smasher of a place to eat dinner. Come for the food and, if you’re anything like me, steal all their ideas for paint and wallpaper.
The Blue Pelican 83 Beach Street, Deal, Kent, 01304 783162. Open lunch Thurs-Sat, noon-2.30pm, dinner Wed-Sat, 6-9.30pm. From about £50 a head à la carte, plus drinks and service
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