Last year my extended family decide to do Christmas (oh my god I mentioned the C word in January – I will now have to firebomb my own house and send myself off to the gulag for re-education – J meanwhile has probably got her tree up for C24 already) a bit differently, with pretty much the whole family going for a week in the pretty Cornish village of Portscatho on the Roseland Peninsula instead of the traditional descending on my mum’s.

Other than Christmas day dinner and hoovering up the left overs and nibbles we ate out a fair bit, which was rather nice. I like cooking (as do my sister and mother), but for 8 (other than Christmas day) it was nice to have a timeout from cooking.

Portscatho has a number of eateries and our first stop was the local pub, which we had booked for Christmas Eve (lunch).

An appetite was built up with a walk to and back from Towans Beach (an easy  – ish couple of miles on the Coastal path)

where Oscar found his brother from another mother!

Plume of Feathers, Portscatho

Slightly disappointing that they (it was a Sunday) had pretty much their standard Sunday lunch menu (seemed to be the norm, but I am surprised there is that much demand for a roast the day before Christmas day). I though this was a bit of a missed opportunity to big up the local seafood (it is a generally observed practice of my family to avoid meat on Christmas Eve  – Catholic thing I think from Irish roots on my Mother’s side). It’s not as if Cornwall doesn’t have bountiful seafood options.

My mother unexplicibly had a roast pork dinner (why, based on family traditions and with a ginormous Christmas dinner the next day, I don’t know!?), which she didn’t really enjoy.

I had the moules.

Decent portion of good quality mussels with a nice mix of the mussel liquor and wine to mop up. Bit pricey at £24, especially as they came with bread rather than chips (I ordered chips), I thought. Another reasonably successful dish (following the fishy theme) was a well received pollack dish.

Again perfectly nice, but a bit pricey at £26 I would say. I had wagered that the “Fish of the Day” on the menu would be seabass (it usually is), but was happy to be proved wrong.

Bit of money in Portscatho, lots of second homes I would wager, if prices here (and the upmarket wine on offer in the local corner shop) are anything to go by.

This is hearty rather than sophisticated fare.  Nothing wrong with that, but would say this place is better for a beer and a snack for me.

A fish finger sandwich (£10, but very large) and a few pints of Tribute in there, when I was very hangry indeed after an eventful trip down from Cardiff (with the dog being a dick, my Mum being obstreperous in terms of giving out the cottage key code and various items inadvertantly left back in Cardiff including the cheese, which had mutated into the Blob, escaped the house  and taken over the street by the time of our return – all hail the new overlord of Insole, Baron Bigod) entailing 5 stops, was quite conducive in assuaging the rage!!

Boxing day brought a trip to the Porthcurnick beach

with a walk followed by an al fresco lunch (luckily the weather was with us).

Hidden Hut, Porthcurnick Beach, Portscatho

It is called the Hidden Hut, but boy do a lot of people know about this placed based on the queues at lunch time on boxing day (they expected to, according to chap we spoke to, serve upwards of 1000 meals)

Nice looking menu, which made me wonder what they were doing Christmas Day (loads of prep work, I would imagine)

I went for the grilled sausage number and Mrs. SF the tomato soup.

Both nicely proportioned and full on on the flavour front. Three plump pork sausages worked really well with the beetroot and salsa verde. It all sat within a good, robustly flavoured, tomato and bean stew.

Other dishes had were equally as good, including a fine pasty

and a salted hake stew. All well worth the inevitable queue.

The menu changes often and this place is a must visit in the area. There is parking nearby, but there is a walk required over fields and my advice (lad and ladies) is leave your golf shoes (saw a chap in a pair, covered in mud, slipping and sliding all over the place) and heels behinds.

Wednesday took us off the peninsula (the long way as the King Harry Ferry wasn’t running due to Storm Gerrit) to Flushing.

Harbour House, Flushing

Very inviting looking menu,

with me salivating at the thought of the beef scumpet, shell on ember baked Mylor (a stone’s skim from Flushing) prawns and triple cooked chips.

After fixing in our minds what to order, the ongoing/after affects of Gerrit hit with cascading failures affecting the kitchen. First the stoves, then the fryers and finally the extractors failed (meaning even the open fire based equipment couldn’t be used in the kitchen, with the weather precluding external use).

The kitchen and front of house gamely soldiered on (I would have gone home in a huff) as it blew a hooley outside and we adjusted our menu choices to the circumstances.

Native oysters from nearby beds were some of the best (have I few in my many years of existence) I have ever had. Quite dinky in stature, they had a lovely brininess, a touch of nuttiness, and an almost metallic (in a good way) backnote taste. Perfect with the sharpness of shallots infused with cider vinegar.

Steak tartare was on point

with a good texture (not too finely chopped) to the top quality beef (this dish lives and dies on the quality of the beef used) with that tart yet rich savoury flavour. I am an arch food traditionalist (OK, a boring old stick in the mud), but I rather liked the pickled jalapeños which added an extra level of piquancy (on top of the dijon mustard) to the dish. Nice crisp bit of cracker bread to pile it all on. Really enjoyed this.

A cold roast beef sarnie (not exactly our first choice as we had had a hulking bit of roast beef only 2 days before, but needs must) comprise of very good quality, nicely rare, beef.

My only qualm was the horseradish was a bit lacking in the requisite nasal clearing department.

Mrs. SF had the beetroot, which came with a sort of queso fresco and hazelnuts

From the small taste I was begrudgingly allowed (Mrs. SF is not at all keen on sharing food with me), the dill (frongs and oil) really made the dish (loved the medley of anis it bought to the beet) really made the dish. Nice contrast of texture too.

My sister enjoyed the burrata

The charred leeks worked particularly well, adding a nice alium sharpness and smokey char to the creamy burrata.

Despite the kitchen trials and tribulations, the food here was very good. Love to return to try the hot stuff. God I so wanted those Mylor prawns.

We flushed out the calories with a walk around Tresslick (Gerrit having blown through)

Back over the water to Falmouth the next day and a visit to an old favourite

Verdant Seafood Bar, Falmouth

A favourite from previous visits down South this was as good as ever,with a lovely looking menu on both the food

and booze front.

Complimentary cheese beignets (get these even if you just come in for just a drink) were a strong start, with exemplary Fal estuary oysters (au natural, with just a squeeze of lemon and a few drops of tabasco)

and loads of fried stuff made for a very fine meal (forgot to take a photo of the star of the show buffalo shrimp dish, although the photo’d crab fries and oysters ran them close for top spot), all washed down with some fine beers (and a very serviceable picpoul de pinet for Mrs. SF and my mum).

Final full day took us back to the Roseland

After a yomp across the field from St Just in the Roseland to St. Mawes (and, for some of us, back),

we sojourned to Gerrans (a village just up the hill from Portscatho) for a late lunch.

The Standard, Gerrans.

Lovely, really cosy, pub with a rather enticing menu.

I went for the smoked lamb on toasted pillow bread (no me neither).

Very nice dish this with plenty of slow cooked lamb, with a rich deep flavour, light smoke and lovely crispy fat. A good chimichurri, with a pleasing mix of freshness, sourness and heat, and pickled red cabbage added nicely to the mix. 

The pillow bread wasn’t what I really expected (not sure what to expect to be honest), being a slightly puffed up flat bread. Regardless, it operated as a very effective sponge for the meat juices

I added a house salad,

which was beautiful in its simplicity. Just crisp lettuce, parmesan and a very good French dressing. Perfect with the rich lamb dish, I admire a kitchen that has the balls to not overcomplicated a side salad.

Other dishes ordered included a top notch seafood stew (all seafood cooked on point), good fish (lemon sole) and chips (although I am still dupious as to the benefit of keeping chips skin on, other than as a labour saving device)

and some French dip grilled sarnies (smoked beef and a turkey BLT). Latter sarnies were said to be very nice, but seemed a bit pricey in comparison to the other dishes

Nice looking wine list, with some reasonably interesting stuff on it and not too leery on the mark ups

Those of us having wine split between a pleasant Jumilla monastrell (£39 on the list and £14.95 retail) and a picpoul de pinet (£39 on the list and between £14-£15 retail).

Very nice pub this, cosy inside for the winter but with a nice and expansive outside area (where they do high end BBQs etc.) for the warmer months.

Good coffee and patisseries (as well as brunch items and pizzas) – eat in and takeaway) – can be had at Thyme and Tide in Portscatho

Nice for brekkie/brunch or for an evening drink if you don’t fancy the hustle and bustle of the pub. Pizzas were nice enough, but could have done with a crisper base and a more bubbly top for the prices being asked.

My sister et al (but not Mrs.SF and I) ate at The Boathouse of a lunch time.

Said they enjoyed it.

The details

We generally go down further south in Cornwall (to Porthleven or around St. Ives Bay) in the spring or early Autumn (try and avoid summer holiday months like the plague), but the Roseland certainly has its charms as a winter destination (bring your wellies) being less crowded and thus more relaxing. With the fickle British weather, you are as likely to get good weather in the winter as the summer, with more likely some splendid isolation (we had many a beach to ourselves. Prices for Cottages etc. (if you take Christmas and New Year out of the equation) are a lot cheaper too.

Good food, good booze, good company and plenty of invigorating fresh air (the South West coastal path makes for many a good walk here, with plenty of beaches for the dog to romp around on) made for a rather lovely winter festive break.

Accommodation wise, we were mainly based at Roses Cottage (very nice), right in the centre of the village.