L'Ocean, Ile de Re (France)

We left planning our holiday rather late this year, as we weren’t quite sure how I was going to be feeling, and we had already had to cancel one trip this year. When my parents said they were taking a house near La Rochelle, and there was room for us, we decided to combine this with a few days on the Ile de Re, as we have wanted to go for ages.

After much discussion and internet searching we decided to stay at L’Ocean. No sooner had we booked it than friends turned out to have stayed there, and luckily they highly recommended it. Since we knew little about the area we booked a table in their restaurant for the first night, until we had time to get our bearings.

Everything on the Ile de Re was pretty expensive, particularly with the current exchange rate, but the set menus still seemed to offer good value. Here the three course menu came in at €24. I started with smoked salmon, which was not the most exciting option, but tasty and came with a well-dressed salad.

Then I had a cassoulette de mer. This was mixed seafood and fish, including mussels, prawns, squid and white fish, cooked in a thick tomato sauce with mushrooms and fennel. The sauce and fish were lovely, but the mussels and squid had got rather overcooked and rubbery.

For dessert I had what appeared to be a local speciality – caramalised baked bananas with salt caramel. The bananas had been split in half and sprinkled with brown sugar before being baked in a hot oven, which created a brulee-like crust on the banana. The salt caramel contrasted beautifully with the warm slightly crunchy banana. All-in-all a great end to the meal, and a good start to the holiday.