Mark Taylor meets Mitch Tonks, the founding father of the FishWorks chain, and gets a taste of his latest venture in the West

IT would be almost impossible to find a chef who talks about fish with more passion than Mitch Tonks. In fact, it would be pretty difficult to find anybody who talked about any food and drink with as much enthusiasm as this former accountant turned self-taught chef.

Best known as the creator of FishWorks, the group of fishmongers with restaurants attached, Mitch lives and breathes good food – the sourcing, the cooking and the eating – so it comes as no surprise that his first post-FishWorks venture is a distillation of years of experience, whether it's cooking or eating in some of the world's best restaurants.

Walking into the Seahorse, which overlooks the River Dart in Dartmouth, it feels as if it has been there for 50 years. With its leather banquettes, art deco lights, shelves of wine bottles and dark wood tables, it has the timeless quality of those great restaurants tucked away in Paris, Rome and Venice.

The Seahorse opened in April and it has been pretty much full since it opened the doors. Although not just a fish restaurant, seafood plays a major part in the menu and most of the fish comes from Brixham, a few miles away. It's the freshest fish you will eat, short of catching it yourself and cooking it on the beach.

A joint venture with fellow chef Matt Prowse, old school friend Mark Ely and their wives, it is the restaurant that Mitch always said he would open once he had stepped back from running FishWorks.

Now that he is no longer involved in the day-to-day running of FishWorks, Mitch now splits his time between cooking at the Seahorse, writing books (another fish cook book is due later this year) and working as a consultant for Young's Seafood.

But it is the cooking that remains Mitch's number-one passion, and this was evident from our meeting over lunch at the Seahorse.

I've known Mitch since he opened his first restaurant, Green Street Seafood Cafe in Bath in 1995. That was pre-FishWorks and it was basically a fresh fish counter and small cafe upstairs, but you just knew he was destined for big things.

For me, the Seahorse feels very similar to those early days, before he became the TV chef and rightful heir to Rick Stein's crown as Britain's fish and seafood expert. In the intervening years, Tonks has succeeded in making fish and seafood more accessible to the masses through the fishmongers and the restaurants, but also through regular fish cookery classes and his excellent books.

His straightforward, straight-talking approach to cooking has made him hugely popular and respected with both the public and fellow chefs and he attracts huge respect from his peers.

Over a succession of fabulous dishes – spaghetti with veal and porcini ragu, charcoal grilled chicken livers with wild garlic and sage, local Dover sole and charcoal-roasted wing rib of pure South Devon beef – I asked Mitch about how the Seahorse came about. Did he always have a plan to work with Matt Prowse post-FishWorks?

“Ever since I've worked with Matt, we always said one day we would get our own restaurant with just us in the kitchen, so the Seahorse is the realisation of that dream.

“Matt and I are such a strong team and we have an extraordinary relationship. We respect and trust each other totally. In the seven years I've worked with Matt, I don't think we've ever had a cross word.

“We wanted to create a restaurant that would be here forever. We want to be cooking here when we're old.” The thing that immediately strikes you about the Seahorse is just how simple the food is. Tonks has invested wisely in a Josper charcoal oven and grill and most of the fish and meat is cooked over charcoal to give it that slightly smoky barbecue flavour.

But cooking so simply takes a confidence and knowledge. Why don't more chefs take his lead?

“It's about understanding what's good on a plate. The best steak I ever had was in Milan where it was cooked over a fire served rare with some beans and it was fantastic.

“Chefs can't justify themselves if they do something simple, they've always got to prove themselves. Most chefs don't get simplicity and they wouldn't have the balls to serve a piece of grilled hake or a veal chop on its own with no other accompaniments on the plate.

“A lot of chefs say they cook simple food but then they overcomplicate it. You have to be brave to be really simple. For me, grilling a piece of fish over charcoal and serving it with a simple salad and a wedge of lemon is the best way you can eat a piece of fish. It's not stuffed with a mousse and it is not served with some reduction or foam. It's as it is, which is how it should be.”

One of the qualities that makes Tonks such a great restaurateur is that he understands the magic ingredients that make a restaurant great, rather than simply OK. It's something that has clearly rubbed off on him from his travels.

“I think I needed all this time to gain experience and the more you eat out and travel, the more you know about restaurants.

“When you walk into a restaurant in Piedmonte and its speciality is bollito misto and the waiters are in white jackets but the place is a bit scruffy, it's all about the sense of occasion and that was the inspiration behind the Seahorse.

“This is not a temple to worship food, it's a place to come along with your kids, relax and enjoy simple food done well.

“Restaurants aren't rocket science. You greet people with a smile, you put good food on the plate and you leave them with a smile.

“We do what we do and we're cooking for the customers not the critics. We just want to serve great food. This restaurant is all about quality, simplicity and a smile.”

The Seahorse comes at an important crossroads for Mitch after some rocky times for FishWorks, which suffered financially after expanding too quickly. For Mitch, the Seahorse is like turning the clock back to the opening of his first restaurant, something that he was reminded of when he opened the doors in Dartmouth.

“I was quite tearful when we opened. It took me back to opening the Green Street Seafood Cafe in Bath. I have to say I had a very teary moment when I looked out from the kitchen on our first day.”

But despite the fact he recently resigned as director of FishWorks, he looks back at the restaurant group with a degree of fondness. Not only did it raise his media profile, but it also taught him a lot about business and management.

“The one thing I've learned is that you're only as good as the people you work with. When I won Restaurateur of the Year, it was because the people around me were magnificent.

“Even after the new management team of FishWorks came in, Matt and I were still applying the same logic, the same care and love as we always had done but, as soon as the management team became financially driven, the whole dynamics of the business changed. Personalities were no longer important.

“In the end, I learned how unenjoyable restaurants can become when they are no longer pure to themselves and you have to make compromises because it suits 'the business model', even though in your heart of hearts you know it's not a good thing.

“I had a lot of ups and downs with FishWorks, but without going on that journey, the Seahorse simply wouldn't exist.”

The Seahorse, 5 South Embankment, Dartmouth, Devon. Call 01803 835147 or visit www.seahorserestaurant.co.uk