Wined, dined and rested.

Ever since the word went round that the Lazy Lobster, with their first fish restaurant based in Chew Magna in Somerset, was going to open a branch in Castle Cary the question has been “when will they open?”.

There were tantalising moments on special occasions like the town’s winter carnival when the restaurant opened its doors for a few hours to serve an excellent takeaway fish soup, and they advertised constantly for a sous chef….. then in August 2024 everyone punched the air in excitement as – could it be true? was this really happening? – it actually seemed, gasp, to be opening as a restaurant.

Understandably, in a small town of foodies and wine-lovers, there was a rush to book a table and that rush included us so at our allocated time on our allocated evening we presented ourselves to be seated.

The décor is wood and dark colours, with bright lights. Very bright lights.  Very bright white lights. Of course you need to be able to see the food and read the menu, but you shouldn’t need to reach for the RayBans in order to do so.  I wonder if the fluorescent lighting behind the cornicing is a step too far?

I was struck by the parquet floor matched by the parquet tables, although I couldn’t decide if that was a lovely touch – one material echoing the other, bringing it all together etc, I can hear the interior designer now – or a confusing one – do I eat off the floor and dance on the tables??  I kept my self-control and avoided tabletop salsa.

I loved the fishy-themed paintings around the walls, standing out beautifully on the dark walls – but look at all the lights!

Then there was the noise – with no noise-damping upholstery or ceiling tiles, everybody’s happy chit-chat becomes a fusillade of sound-bullets bouncing around until it’s difficult to hear even the person next to you.

However we hunkered down over our menus and shouted food suggestions to each other. Our young waitress explained that the menu was made up of small sharing plates, so we would probably need about two each; we went for brown shrimp and Sichuan pepper on a crumpet, grilled octopus on squid ink and smoked applewood risotto with fennel purée, lobster and crab fritters, then as sides we had seared hispi cabbage, butternut with pickled clams and avocado cream, and crispy spiced new potatoes.

We ordered, the waitress brought us a carafe of water and we sat back, shored up by the wall of sound around us. I had to restrain my dining companion from swigging water straight from the bottle, and eventually managed to acquire the two glasses that hadn’t come with the carafe.

We scoured the wine list for inspiration but inspiration did not really strike us; most were middle of the range in price, with several familiar faces like Pulpo and Guv’nor. There was a Petit Chablis at the higher end, but we opted for the Provence rosé, a vin de France from the Var region, which was nice.

The kitchen is open to one of the dining areas so we kept an eye on when our dishes would arrive. Our first to dish to turn up was the brown shrimp with Sichan pepper.

It was carefully presented and tasty, although neither of us discerned any Sichuan pepper. Perhaps it had been “dumbed down” for what they might have thought would be wimpish Somerset diners, but for us this was a little disappointing,

Next arrived the lobster and crab fritters, and the grilled octopus. It was hard to spot the difference in flavour between the lobster and the crab parts of the fritters, but perhaps that was the point. The octopus was well cooked; it was just right, not rubbery, and the squid ink risotto was truly delicious, lifting the whole dish.

The butternut squash was also good, although I think the avocado cream should have been more important on the plate than a squiggle. The outside of the crispy new potatoes was lovely, crispy and delicious whereas the inside was a little doughy.

There were two puddings to choose from – dark chocolate mousse or passion fruit sorbet – plus a selection of cocktails, clearly considered here as pudding.  A thought scudded through my mind about rewriting dictionaries to include cocktails in the definition of the word “pudding”, or “dessert”, but it was immediately followed by another thought in which I told myself that this would throw school catering into  what could only be a downward spiral of expense and depression. I shook myself out of it and ordered a dark chocolate mousse.

Looking at this picture I probably need to explain that this plate was on the table, not the floor – see the parquet confusion? – and that the mousse was accompanied by salted caramel ice cream and honeycomb. The dark chocolate came through well, though the quantity was enough for two people.

So overall it is wonderful that there is a restaurant in Castle Cary, and I would go again. I’d much rather take my own wine than have to use their wine list, which was frankly disappointing, but the food was generally all right and, well, it’s somewhere that the residents of Castle Cary can walk to. The physical surroundings need a little tweaking, I think – many others have commented on the sound and the light levels!

If you’re near, give it a try and let me know what you think.

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