The 'F' word..."fantastic!"

Remember the Ramsay Kitchen Nightmare episode where the multi-Michelin-star accruing controversial Gordon visited a small restaurant in Norfolk called "Rococo's"? Chef Nick Anderson had a Michelin star from a previous role and had won lots of awards after set up his own place in unpretentious King's Lynn. Trouble was, his menu was pretentious and didn't really match the local customer's needs. (Read the report from back then in Lynn's News). Luckily for Nick, Ramsay used his experience and skill and waved his magic spell on the atmosphere, menu and staff, including changing its name to a more friendly-sounding Maggie's (The restaurant falls under the shadow of St Margaret's church, opposite). See below..

This (above) is the ancient medieval building next-door to Maggie's. All around is wonderful architecture!

We thought we'd give Maggie's restaurant a try whilst staying in the city over the Easter break. Norfolk is excellent cycling-path country and the estuary is punctuated by nice, friendly, down-to-earth pubs like the Crown and Mitre. (Many of which seem to be owned by Londoners 'done good'..)

Surprisingly, there was availability at the last minute (oh dear, I thought) and at 8pm on the Saturday, we sat down to eat. But I needn't have worried, the whole place was absolutely frantic. Most tables were full and the four or five waiting staff seemed to be dashing about, but not really accomplishing much. For instance, despite having the menus to study for 10-15 mins, no-one asked what we wanted to drink; we had to wave-down a dazed-looking young lady and made an order. ..A few minutes later we were told that unfortunately the prosecco wasn't cold and did we mind waiting for it to cool down?! Needless to say we didn't bother and went straight to the wine-list instead. But the very kind (reassuringly, French) sommelier offered J's cold beer on the house. A bit strange, though, I thought - to have Prosecco on the drinks menu when it's not in the fridge (?)

Another strange thing happened when we ordered the food. The menu was straight-forward and varied, with the odd "fancy" thing here and there (e.g. fois gras with a starter) (see their rather strange and amateurish web-site for an example). J decided on the game terrine to start with and I went for the 'shrimp and mushy-pea fritters' (!) (Just out of interest more than anything else really)! The waiter informed us that there had been a "complaint" this evening about the game terrine: apparently it was very "gamey" (!!!) Not sure how to react to this statement - we just looked at the apologetic-looking waiter with raised-eyebrows...."And..?"!!!
I wasn't sure what the point was of mentioning this. Perhaps he would've been better advised to offer it as a complement, rather than as a complaint. Anyway, as it turns out, it was very, very good and much more exciting than my (rather bland) "fritters" - which, (sorry, Nick) were crying-out for a sweet chilli sauce to spice them up a bit. The mains were better - and by this time, thankfully the atmosphere in the restaurant had relaxed quite a bit (but there was still no sign of the staff pouring any wines at any of the tables (despite a large table of 8 behind us). The happy chattering from customers in the quite spacey, but still cosy rooms was interspersed with the occasional clattering and shouting from the kitchen (the door was wedged open). I caught glimpses of Nick and his colleagues sweating their guts out. For some reason many people had arrived at about the same time - leaving alot of orders going in together...

Service was good - their was just enough of a wait between courses. And each plate was well-presented, but not over-the-top. J had the steak (of course) which was cooked to perfection (or so he said) and I had the salmon (the only other options were Ox tongue (yuck), Grey Mullet (who on earth serves that nowadays, rather than its so much better tasting red brother) or Brill - which I can never get enthusiastic about. The salmon was nice, but served on a mountain of raw celeriac and cabbage (inedible) which I had naively expected to be blanched or served with something else..luckily the steak came with a marvellous bubble and squeak mixture which saved the day.

Puddings were lovely with lots of flavours and Eastertime chocolate. Shame about the Stinking Bishop cheese on the board. We had been warned about the diminishing quality of this cheese on our food tour at Winteringham Fields, and the other cheeses served were not particularly local or inspiring - a bit of a wasted opportunity. (We feel a bit like cheese experts after our visit to Lincoln's Cheese Society)!!

However, overall it was very, very nice. And not particularly expensive. There is something quite 'homely' about the atmosphere and service at Maggie's. Like the coat-hooks by the glazed front-door, the pine furniture and the magazines on the side-tables. I was quite surprised, for instance, to find in the (single) ladies' loo, a washing machine, semi-hidden by a white linen table-cloth!

Judging by our experience, the feedback from the locals and the bustling atmosphere that we witnessed - looks like Maggie's is a real success. Can't help thinking that King's Lynn is another of those places that has relatively undiscovered potential.