When it comes to the British seaside holiday, there are certain time-honoured traditions you mess with at your peril: flip-flops, grumpy landladies, donkey rides... Less worth preserving, however, are the squadrons of extraordinarily dreary cafes that you usually find littering the seafront, offering everything from battered fish to battered sausages. It’s something of a tragedy, given that there’s nothing nicer than dinner spiced with a whiff of ozone, or a proper bacon butty as the sun rises over the waves.
Thank goodness, then, for a new generation of cafes upping the gastronomic standards along the coastline. Old hands such as Rick Stein and the Venus Café chain (which serves local organic food, including fabulous breakfasts, on three idyllic beaches in Devon and Cornwall) have been joined by the brand-new Fifteen Cornwall, near Newquay. And this week sees the opening of the East Beach Cafe, in Littlehampton, which has been modelled by the designer Thomas Heatherwick on a piece of driftwood. The menu, however, is the reverse of wacky, featuring traditional favourites such as potted shrimps, crumpets and, of course, fish and chips.