2016 Award Winners SEAFOOD RESTAURANT OF THE YEAR 2016

La Cote Seafood Restaurant, Wexford, Co Wexford

Although we eat less fish at home than might be expected for an island nation, everybody – whether living in Ireland or just visiting - seems to love seafood when eating out, so it’s an increasingly vibrant sector of the restaurant business. Focusing on provenance is key to supporting the best fishermen and producers and ensuring the best consumer experience, something that BIM have been working on for some time through initiatives like the very successful Seafood Circle (which we were pleased to be involved with), and - jointly with Failte Ireland - the recently launched West Coast seafood trail, ‘Taste the Atlantic - a Seafood Journey’ which links a number of Wild Atlantic Way seafood restaurants and their suppliers in a visitor-friendly way.

But, superb as it is, not all of our wonderful seafood comes from the West and our Seafood Restaurant of the Year is almost within touching distance of some of the South-East’s (or should I say ‘Ancient East’s’?) most famous fishing fleet, the Wexford mussel trawlers.

A first enterprise for the highly regarded chef, Paul Hynes, and his partner, Edwina, La Cote is a lovely, unpretentious little restaurant where the emphasis is on warm and efficient service and great cooking - not only of the local seafood, which is exceptional (and always includes a delicious white fish of the day among the blackboard specials), but also some great classic meat dishes - and, a lovely surprise, outstanding vegetables and vegetarian dishes, something which is still far too rare for all the current fashionability of vegetables.

This is a super restaurant serving terrific food, and at a fair price too - no wonder it’s so popular.