On first glance, The Blue Pelican is an unusual little spot. A restaurant on Deal’s blustery sea front should surely be churning out fish and chips to beach walkers and huddled families, sheltering under awnings and parasols. You’ll find no battered sausage here though - instead, Deal is the lucky recipient of an absolutely cracking Japanese restaurant.
Japanese-inspired, we should say, because owner and chef alike are very conscious that they’re not trying to be authentic. Peering in through the windows, you wouldn’t immediately peg this as a Japanese restaurant. Burnt orange chequerboard floors meet a slick cornflower blue paint job, and artwork that pays homage to Hokusai’s famous wave, transplanted onto Deal’s sea front. In the evening, paper lanterns and candles cast flickering shadows around the restaurant. Like the rest of The Blue Pelican, it’s daring, and clearly the work of people who know what they’re doing. Blue Pelican owner and former Wallpaper Design Editor Alex Bagner is responsible for the interiors, and it shows - they’d make a fabulous two page spread.
Chef Luke Green spent a number of years living and working in Japan, and his love for the country shows across a menu that includes skewers flashed over a hot grill, claypot rice dishes, pickles, tempura and a hulking pork katsu. Like all great Japanese food, Luke’s cooking is bold, but measured. Some dishes - like a glazed eel tamagoyaki - are full-throttle, peddle-down flavour bombs. Others are more elegant, showing contrasting restraint - a chicken tsukune meatball, for example, comes alongside a subtle, smoked dashi broth that would be very welcome on Deal’s colder nights. From front to back the food is exceptional, as is the service and wine list, consummately assembled by the good folks at Uncharted Wines.
Frankly, there’s very little not to like about the whole place, except for the three hour round trip if you’re coming from London. Every town and city in the country should be lucky enough to have a restaurant like The Blue Pelican.