2007 Trip Report

[Steve Wooler]

Without doubt, the biggest disappointment of our 2007 trip was dining out.

I apologise to my many friends in the Tobago hospitality industry, but the following comments are only voiced after a very considerable discussion with visitors and residents. It pains me to make these comments, but they need to be said - and heeded if Tobago is to become a serious Caribbean destination contender.

To be totally frank and brutally honest, we got fed up with paying London prices for quality that could, at best, be equalled or surpassed in pub restaurants in any UK town or village.

I discussed the subject at length with several restaurant owners and have heard all the arguments. Yes, almost everything has to be imported. Yes, labour costs have soared in the past three years. However, these arguments equally apply to most other popular Caribbean islands. In the words of one widely-travelled European who lives in Trinidad and visits Tobago regularly, why are Tobago restaurants twice the price and half the quality of equivalent establishments on the bigger island? I can’t comment on this claim as I have no recent experience of dining out on Trinidad.

It was perfectly clear that the restaurants were nowhere near as busy this year. This is partly a result of a downturn in tourism due to security scares, but that is not the total answer. Speak to the car rental agencies; see the number of tourists on the roads and on the beaches. There are lots of visitors. Where were they all eating? Well, obviously many of them were staying at all-inclusive hotels and dining in. However, the answer was clear every time we visited Penny Savers at Canaan or Carnbee, Morsheads or the Golden Grove Meat Shop – more and more visitors are simply buying their own produce and self-catering. I’ve never seen as many white faces in the supermarkets as I did this year.

The bottom line is that the public expect more for their money. Buying fresh fish at the Mount Irvine fish stalls and then slapping it on the barbie can be a hugely entertaining experience in its own right – and more fun than sitting in an empty restaurant eating frozen king fish at inflated prices.

Without doubt the restaurant scene on Tobago is in a state of flux. The popular restaurant, Indigo, at Pleasant Prospect is apparently due to close next month (unconfirmed as I have had no reply to my emails requesting confirmation) and, most surprising of all, La Terrazza closed for evening meals a couple of weeks ago. They are open for breakfast and lunch until 31st March but will then close permanently. Owner Stefano Monti tells me that he will be opening a new dine-in pizzeria, wine bar and deli called La Cantina in Crown Point in April. Over and above that, I also know of two top restaurants that are currently for sale.

So, who impressed and who failed to impress? Well, time prevents me from giving a full list here, but our views and impressions will be reflected in our restaurant listings over coming weeks.

Dining along the Caribbean coast can be pretty dire at the best of times. Few visitors appreciate Creole cuisine night after night, so needless to say the few local restaurants are invariably empty. The one blessing was Adam Hanlon’s new small restaurant on the outskirts of Castara – Sandcastles. We dined there twice and the food was every bit as good as we claimed in 2006. Talking about restaurants with a shop owner at the other end of the island a few weeks later, we were not totally surprised when they said that they’d heard such good reports about Sandcastles that they were even thinking it would be worth the drive up to Castara from the Scarborough area, given the lack of choice in the south-west.

We had two lovely meals at the Mot Mot Restaurant near Buccoo Junction. Offering a cross between International and Creole cuisine, the restaurant is unpretentious, welcoming and reasonably priced. We recommended it to friends a few weeks later. They thought the cuisine and cost good, but said that the restaurant suffered from lack of ambience due to an absence of customers. Pity, because it was full on our two evening there.

Finally, the only other public restaurant that impressed us was the Speyside Inn. We took to dining there because evening dining at the Blue Waters Inn, where we were staying, was seriously deficient. The Speyside Inn proved an excellent choice – friendly service, good food and reasonable prices. Whilst talking about Speyside, I must mention Jemma’s Treehouse. Regular readers will know that I am pretty anti this restaurant. However, I have to declare that I am impressed by the number of ‘good’ contacts who, over the past couple of months, have urged me to try it again and said that the food there is now REALLY good. Sadly lack of time prevented us from checking it out. I guess my best advice to readers would be to try it – provided that there are no tour buses parked outside.

Restaurant disasters? Well there were a couple. One was down to bad timing and bad luck and so it would be unfair to name them. However, I am keeping a close watch on that restaurant to make sure that our rating is still valid.

The main ‘disaster’ was Caribbean Choula – the ‘Indian’ restaurant above Melange in the Shirvan Road. I called in their one night wanting an Indian take-away. Having eaten at Caribbean Choula for the first time a year ago, I confess that it was something of a last resort. However, it was a Sunday evening and I had searched Scarborough and Crown Point for a take-away, but nothing was open and/or tempted. The Fortune Chinese at Bon Accord was closed for a private function and all other Chinese restaurants were closed. One look at the chicken in any of the Church’s turned my stomach and almost put me off food for good – but Jill was back at the villa waiting to be fed. So, Caribbean Choula it had to be.

After determining that they still did take-aways, I was presented with a menu and made my choice. Anybody used to excellent British curries should totally forget T&T equivalents. Anyway, having ordered my meal I wandered the gardens while the food was prepared. Fifteen to twenty minutes later the waitress approached and showed me to a table. I explained that I was waiting for a takeaway. She explained that my meal was ready but they had no take-away cartons, so I would have to eat it there. I am delighted to say that I kept my cool and did not voice what was going through my head. We ended up with a pizza for the second night running!

[Steve Pitts]

Without doubt, the biggest disappointment of our 2007 trip was dining out.

We ended up with a pizza for the second night running!

Good Ol' Pizza Boys

Thanks for the feedback on your eating out experiences Steve - much appreciated.

We tend to go 50 /50 between eating out in the evenings and DIY the rest of the time, so info. on what's hot and what's not is of critical importance -almost as important as where the fish are biting!

Shame about Indigo, but Mot Mot sounds like a new experience worth trying.
Might be a good idea to see how many are in there beforehand - Cafe Coco is just around the corner if it's empty (or is there something you're not telling?).

Ru-B-Lou's is just down the hill from us, so we'll never starve.

Cheers
Steve

[Steve Wooler]

Hi Steve

Cafe Coco just around the corner? Somebody's sat-nav is playing up surely?

[Steve Pitts]

Hi Steve

Cafe Coco just around the corner? Somebody's sat-nav is playing up surely?

Ooops!
Just as well you pointed that out Steve - I'd be doing circuits of Pigeon Point junction and disappearing up my own exhaust pipe.

It has been a whole 10 months, 1 week and 5 days since I was last there and my advancing years may have something to do with me loosing my bearings.

Talking of me losing spherical objects -

My kids reckon that I lost my marbles ages ago

Just so that I don't get lost for a second time - is the Mot Mot half way up the hill towards Carnbee, on the left hand side, if travelling from the Buccoo junction?

If so, it's even closer to our villa than I thought - nice.

Cheers
Steve
(Counting down with David W)

[Steve Wooler]

Yes, spot on - about 300m past the left turning that leads up Mt.Irvine and to Old Grange Police Station. Its not a place that will set the world alight, but its one of the few places we never returned from feeling somewhat dissapointed.

[Andrew W]

Steve,

glad you had a really good time.

I could not agree more about dining out. my partner and I got back Sunday. In our two weeks we ate at Sea Horse twice and Tartaruga twice. Although I had booked, we could have walked in any night; more empty tables than full. Paying around TT$750 - TT$800 for two courses, a couple of drinks and a bottle of wine is just about OK if the value and quality is there but it just isn't. Tartaruga is as entertaining as ever, there is some real skill in the kitchen and the wine list is, of course, stunning. Sea Horse has not changed one line on the menu in a year. It's just a bit dull and it really needs to shake itself up and find its edge again.

We had another couple of dinners at some well known places but drove past several more which were open but had empty car parks.

By the way, we bought a piece of mahi mahi at the sea wall at Mt Irvine and very nice it was too. However, when we arrived home with this piece of "fresh" fish it was only just thawing out in the middle. Even our local contacts were laughing over that one !

One thing that really annoyed me this time was having to pay TT$ 46 for two Stags at the beach bar at Arnos Vale Hotel. Yes, I mean forty six dollars. Yes, I double checked and no, it wasn't a mistake. Even Sea Horse only charges TT$12 for half a pint of draft Stag. Most pit stops $7 or $8.

Still a great destination and it will not stop us going back, but dining out is almost becoming a problem rather than the attraction it should be.

Andrew W

[Mary G]

I cannot agree more with the posts above. Having just spent our first holiday in Tobago, the food was the only disappointment. We found it to be poor quality, overpriced and served by people who really didn't seem to want to be there! When anyone has asked if we enjoyed our holiday our answer has been: "Yes, apart from the food!".

We stayed in Castara and ate there most of the time so I shall post my comments in the Castara restaurants post.

Apart from Castara, we ate at a good value roti cafe in Charlotteville (two veggie rotis and two Caribs for TT$40 - the best value all week!) and La Tartuga in Buccoo which was good food but very expensive, especially the wine.

[Gary]

I can only agree with all that has been said before a vast proportion of the places we ate in were very poor with the worst service we found being the "Blue Crab", believe me it's not worth walking up the hill for at all, we will be returning to Tobago but not for the food thats for sure. Ok we did not try many of the better class restaurants as we ate at the appartment a fair bit (one reason for that was we were often looking for food mid afternoon. . . . Ha ha ha no chance !) but of those that we did try the "Bamboo Mile" faired very well both at lunchtime & evening.

Sad but true

[Gill M]

Thanks for your post Steve - I was beginning to wonder if I was being over fussy about food as it was my first visit to Tobago!

We too spent much of our time "eating in" at night because of the restaurant quality but, thanks to David's post of 6 March, we dined at the MOT MOT which was good and quite reasonably priced. The host is very amiable too but it was a pity that we were the only ones dining - we do tend to eat quite early though so could well be the reason.

Patino's (Enchanted Waters) seemed very popular and we enjoyed the meals and the pretty evening setting. Staff seemed happy too. And how can one resist Shore Things even after just eating ice cream at Ciao Cafe?

The freshly caught fish at Mt Irvine were great too as was the meat from Golden Grove Farm (very reasonably priced). Morshead imported Angus fillet steaks at around 8 UK pounds for an 8 ounce steak were a little more pricey but absolutely melt in the mouth.

[Sharon Keeler]

Just returned from two wonderful weeks in Tobago. Wanted to chime in on the restaurant scene. Couldn't agree more that the restaurant prices have risen to a level that kept us at home base. We noticed this last year and the biggest problem is that the prices don't necessarily warrant the food, ambiance, or service. You can have an excellent meal, excellent service in an excellent setting and a mediocore experience in another and be charged the same. They haven't seemed to figure out how to price things yet. The other thing I think is totally ridiculous is the high prices charged for fish and chicken dishes (I understand beef or lobster). I bought two chicken thighs in Penny Savers for about $11TT, yet a restaurant will charge $90TT for a chicken meal. Likewise with fish -- about $10TT for great mahi mahi fresh at Mt. Irvine, and again about $90TT at a restaurant. Insane. Especially when I can spark up the barbie and prepare it myself.

That said, we figured out a way to enjoy the great Tobago food at a bargain. We ate a lot of late lunches! Had great meals at Bonker's and Bago's Beach Bar. Also had great take-away at After Hours near the airport. All for $40TT and under per meal. And don't forget the doubles at the airport for breakfast, $3TT each. Yum!

For dinner, we had an excellent meal at Cafe Iguna. Appetizers, dinner, drinks and a bottle of wine cost $900TT or $150 US for four -- reasonable for the quality of food and excellent service. The shrimp and fish dishes were outstanding.

Also want to report that the cafe at Sandy Point Beach Club in Crown point serves exceptional breakfasts, lunches and dinners. Fry bake and flying fish for breakfast was excellent. Most dinners ran about $85-120TT for a three-course meal. The pea soup and shrimp were my favorites! As was the cheesecake and chocolate cake. And Caribs and Stags are $7TT at the Sandy Point Beach Club bar.

My advice for those on a budget....limit dinner at established restaurants and check out the smaller joints, especially for late lunch. More places seem to be doing take-away so box it and save it for dinner.