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Jersey is famous for its early crop potatoes and the richness of its cream, but the island is also home to a whole host of top notch ingredients.

In an age where the emphasis is on localness and seasonality, it’s surprising that Jersey is not better known for the quality of its ingredients.  Of course we’re all familiar with Jersey Royals, a crop harvested before their counterparts in the rest of the UK, but Oysters, Crabs, Scallops, Mussels, Sea Bass, Lobster and even the meat from Jersey cows seem to have been a closely guarded secret for a long time. The island is tiny, just 9 miles by 5 miles, and this means that restaurants are never far from their producers, so they can guarantee the freshest of ingredients.  Add to this a microclimate which extends the growing season and chefs find themselves with an embarrassment of riches on their doorstep.  Small wonder that I had some of the best fish and shellfish I’ve ever eaten.

A good place to start is Vicky Jackson’s stall in St Helier, down in the harbour, right by the sea. She’s been here for 11 years and in that time has built up a relationship with the 30 or so boats which make up the local fishing fleet. Nothing here is frozen and the day I was there, she had Sea Bass, Lemon Sole, Bream, Ling, Plaice, Cod, Turbot, Oysters, Scallops, Lobster and Crab. And it doesn’t just stop at seafood – there were also local tomatoes, strawberries, plums, potatoes and eggs, as well as freshly picked Samphire. Vicky also supplies local restaurants so a good tip is to ask what she’s sold to who, and then order it for lunch. That’s exactly what I did and enjoyed the freshest line-caught Sea Bass at the Castle Green Gastropub and a fine piece of Turbot, next day in the Oyster Box.

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Another good source of seafood is Faulkner Fisheries at the other end of the island.  They’re right on the coast in a converted WW2 German bunker which houses their tanks of live crabs and lobsters.  The water is refreshed directly from the sea and they also use if for cooking their shellfish.  Lobsters meet their maker in a huge boiling vat of sea water with the odd bay leaf thrown in for good measure. Outside on wooden benches they’ll serve you any of their produce, barbecued or boiled as you request, and a whole crab and a plate of steaming mussels made an excellent lunch.

Mark Jordan is head chef at the Michelin starred Ocean Restaurant in the Atlantic Hotel and he uses Faulkner’s as his fish supplier.  They’re so close that they can get fish from sea to kitchen in less than 8 minutes and he can have it on the table soon after that.  His is the only restaurant which serves Jersey beef on the island and this is a result of building a relationship with Darren and Julia Quenault of Manor Farm in St Peter.  Milk from their Jersey dairy herd is used to produce their own organic creams, a range of cheeses, yoghurts and ice creams. Their Classic Herd farm shop in St Peter has all these on sale, together with their own range of pork products and Jersey beef.

 

Andrew Baird, the chef at Longueville Manor has to travel even less distance to source his produce.  In the grounds of the hotel he’s got a kitchen garden to plunder.  Of course all his salads come from here, as well as the usual vegetables, but asparagus, artichokes, quince and figs are some of his more exotic garden produce.  The large Victorian greenhouses have been restored to their original glory and there’s even an underground smoke house where they process their meat and fish. He still has to venture out for his fish and has a network of locals who net or spear. All his scallops are caught by divers who can collect up 200 of them in a dive when conditions are good.

A great success story of the last few years are Jersey oysters which you can see at low tide in great rows on the seashore together with hundreds of Mussel poles. In the 19th century there was a huge oyster industry here growing the British native flat variety, but overfishing and disease killed them off. It all started again in the 1970’s when the Pacific Rock Oyster was introduced and they seem to thrive in the clean clear waters around the Jersey coast.  So far most of them been exported to France but now the Jersey Oyster Company is about to send get them into British supermarkets, branded, unsurprisingly, as “Jersey Oysters”.  I must say that picking them straight from the sea, and opened in front of you, is an unforgettable gourmet experience.

Just down the road is a far riskier enterprise. For centuries one of the staple foods of the Channel Islands was a shellfish called the Ormer, a cousin of Abalone. They were known as the “Truffles of the Sea” and, after opening the shell, you bashed them flat and then cooked them for 12 hours to make a nutritious stew. Sadly, in 1989, the whole population was decimated by disease and the lowly Ormer was no more. Justin Surcouf decided that, almost singlehandedly, he was going to bring them back from the dead and now is trying to farm them.  It’s a time consuming enterprise and he’s busy 16 hours a day, 7 days a week and. to grow Ormers to full size. will take 3 years.  It’s not been without its setbacks but Justin is adamant that there’s a market for this delicacy and he’s now convinced a Jersey firm of venture capitalists to back him.  The Ormers I saw were too small to eat, and I had to resist the temptation to put a handful in my mouth.  Perhaps I’ll be back in another two year’s time.

 

Jersey makes an ideal weekend destination as it's only 50 minutes flying time from London. The climate is mild and spring starts earlier and winter later than the UK. Since the island is so small you can easily get around by bus or bicycle and the airport is 10 minutes away from St Helier.

 

 

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