A la Colthard / Andalucia, Worthing

I have heard only good things of Andalucia opened in 1988 by Manuel Quirosa and his wife Susan in the seaside town of Ferring just next to Worthing and when I went there yesterday I was mightily impressed. So many restaurant critics are London or metro driven that restaurants in the provinces will only get a review on opening. Yet I would say Sussex offers eclectic dining at a reasonable price worthy of greater attention.

I was the guest of a couple I know from Worthing. The restaurant itself is small and basic and very Spanish. We went for the lunch menu of olives, bread and chorizo and ham and Manchego  cheese; meatballs in tomato; a sort of tomato on toasted focaccia; spicy potatoes; fried creamy cheese parcels; fried fish; we finished with coffee and Santiago (almond) tart. Every dish worked and you can hardly grumble at the price of £15. My hosts ordered a Rioja and brandies, all sensibly priced.

I remarked to them that in my adolescence, when I was not partying furiously, I used to visit a family I knew with a second home there. After lunch we walked the seafront, Patterson  promenade. I recognised the home of Teddy and Lola Sieff, the Scion of the family that owned Marks and Spencer, where we would swim and after texting my friend, rather dishy as well as his father who had the stiff courtesy and looks of A mittel European actor of the forties that made my knees tremble, I located the house too. Rather like John Major in that ad when he sees his old Brixton home (“it’s there, it’s there”) I felt that sudden charge of nostalgia.

This is a double excuse to return to Andalucia inthe Summer. I could find no fault  in it at all from service to price, from comfort to cuisine. Instead of walking into polluted air, traffic and roadworks and people walking into you whilst texting, all part and parcel  of metro life, a decent meal and walk by the sea is a Godsend.