Rockfish Budleigh Beach To Open As Seafood Restaurant

Rockfish is set to reopen its Budleigh Beach seafood café in May as a full boat-to-plate restaurant, following a refurbishment of the seafront site.

The restaurant will introduce a dedicated Rockfish kitchen team and a daily-changing seafood menu, while retaining the takeaway breakfast offer that has become part of the site’s regular morning trade. Breakfast will be served from 9am to 11am, with sausage and dry-cured bacon rolls alongside hot drinks.

From midday, the restaurant will serve lunch for dining in and through the takeaway hatch. The menu will be based on the day’s catch, with fish delivered from Brixham Market and hand-annotated to highlight what is considered to be at its best that day.

Starter options will include Pot-caught ‘Disco’ Scallops with parmesan and garlic, and Crisp-fried salt and pepper wild prawns and Brixham calamari. Main dishes will include freshly landed seasonal fish cooked to order and served with Cornish new potatoes, green salad or unlimited chips. Other dishes will include Crisp-fried prime Brixham hake fillet fried in Rockfish batter with tartare sauce and Chargrilled sea bream with Greek island salad.

Dinner will initially be served on Friday and Saturday evenings, with the schedule expected to evolve as the team grows and summer evenings become longer. Restaurant opening hours will be Sunday to Thursday from 12pm to 2.30pm, and Friday to Saturday from 12pm to 2.30pm and 6pm to 8.45pm.

Interior Refurbishment

The refurbishment has been led by designer Lisa Helmanis, who also worked on Rockfish’s recent openings in Sidmouth and Salcombe. The interior has been designed to support a full dining-in experience while retaining the relaxed beachfront character of the site.

“We wanted that feeling of stumbling across somewhere magical, like the old ciderias Mitch loves in Portugal and Spain,” explains Lisa. “Rich wood, terracotta, dark leather – but never precious. Sand can brush in through the door, wet dogs are welcome, and when you walk through to the main room you can see the stunning view out to sea. In summer it’s full of light, and in winter, it glows. It’s a year-round place, and that feels very different to what was here before.”

Lisa Helmanis, Designer

Mitch Tonks, Founder & CEO of Rockfish says: “This is a space we’ve come to really cherish over time, and gradually shape it into a beachside spot loved by locals, so this next step feels like a natural evolution. It will still be a community spot where people can come down, have a morning swim, coffee and bacon roll! But we’re excited at the opportunity to now bring it in line with what Rockfish does best – a dedicated seafood restaurant by the sea, serving the freshest catch of the day.” He adds, “Budleigh has a strong sense of community, and this has been front of mind throughout. It was important to us that it still feels like a welcoming and relaxed place people know and return to, to enjoy great seafood, time and again.”

Mitch Tonks, Founder & CEO of Rockfish

South West Expansion

The Budleigh Beach conversion follows recent Rockfish openings in Sidmouth and Salcombe as the restaurant group continues its expansion along the South West coast. Rockfish first opened in Dartmouth, next to The Seahorse restaurant, and now operates a coastal restaurant estate built around fresh, local and sustainable seafood.

Mitch Tonks has led Rockfish’s development as a seafood restaurant group, with a wider career spanning restaurants, cookbooks and work connected to UK fishing and seafood sustainability.