Sumas
Jersey
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Out on the far eastern coast of Jersey, sheltering under the promontory of Mont Orgueil Castle, which makes a splendidly Wagnerian floodlit backdrop after dark, Sumas is very much a one-off. Its entrance is on a rising road, but the restaurant faces the marine view (best caught when there is at least a little water bobbing about the boats), with a few tables on a little balcony for the luckiest. The kitchen continues to maintain the house style of straightforward modern bistro food, attractively delivered with positive flavours. Goat's cheese whipped up with truffle oil and honey makes a fully loaded starter, adorned with beetroot and carrot. Cured salmon offers soy-darkened strips of firm fillet in ponzu dressing, needing only more (or some) of the advertised wasabi in the mayo to finish it off. Treacle-glazed beef fillet and braised short rib (in full bourguignon array) benefit from creamy dauphinoise, wilted spinach and a rosemary-redolent jus, while breast of black-leg chicken comes with home-style mash (more stiff than fluffy), perfectly timed asparagus and a sage-laced chicken jus. Finish with textbook raspberry tartlet on crème pâtissière or chocolate namelaka (Japanese ganache) on a Breton sablé biscuit. The wines are a reasonably enterprising bunch, the star of the whites being the dazzling Mâcon-Azé of Domaine des Terres Gentilles, which almost tastes as though made, like so much else, with Jersey butter.
