Restaurant review: Michael Winner at Fishpot, Barbados
Barbados has many charms but it’s certainly not the culinary hot spot of the world. That’s putting it mildly. Although the Sandy Lane food dipped last Christmas-New Year I still ate 35 lunches and dinners there, only going out seven times. Two of those outings were to a restaurant I’d never visited in my 25 years of Barbadossing, the Fishpot.
It’s absolutely terrific. Far better than that so-called “great” Barbados dump, the Cliff, which is the most overbooked, second-rate place in the world. When tour operators sell their packages they suggest booking key restaurants even if it’s a year in advance. So everyone makes bookings. When they get there they change their minds. It’s chaos. Last time I went to the Cliff I got a New York steak, supposedly medium rare, which consisted of four separate slices of beef overdone beyond belief. The arrogant girls who run it behave as if they’re bestowing a favour letting you in. There are very few good tables. Usually I found myself in an alley with a high-rise rock on one side and black sea (it was night) on the other.
Source:Times Online
Restaurant critic Michael Winner rates the Cliff restaurant as “overrated”, and Daphne’s, “another useless waste of time” . Barbadians would be shocked by his assessment because the award winning Cliff restaurant is considered one of the top five restaurants in Barbados and was previously rated in the top 50 restaurants in the world, back in 2005 Fat Duck Awards. Could the the standard at the Cliff have plummeted so quickly or is Mr. Winner being overly harsh? The few times we have visited the Cliff we have always received excellent service; the food, although delivered in small portions, was always well presented and easy on our taste buds. We suggest that the management of Cliff restaurant make contact with Mr. Winner and get an understanding for the inputs he used in his assessment of the restaurant. Our tourist product cannot afford to have this kind of bad publicity directed at one of our top restaurants.
On the flip-side, Mr. Winner was lavish in his praise of the Fish Pot restaurant. Both restaurants reviewed are on the West Coast of Barbados.
Barbados Underground 