Quite the catch

“WE WANT TO DO THE CLASSICS REALLY WELL BUT GIVE THE CHEFS LICENCE TO DO THINGS THEY’RE PASSIONATE ABOUT”

Words: Tomé Morrissy-Swan / Images: Matthew Hague

Every day at Applebee’s, one of the team is up by 6am, ready for an online auction from Brixham Market in Devon. Bids fly in for fish landed that very same morning. Those fish will arrive in SE1 within 24 hours.

“It gives us the best produce at the best price, it’s a huge win for everyone,” says Jack Applebee, the restaurant’s CEO. “Operationally, it’s quite difficult. You don’t know what you’re going to get – it’s the law of the sea really. Hake, for example: one week a month the tides are wrong, and they can’t catch it.” But this approach is harder than simply going via a wholesaler, it means the restaurant can offer the best, freshest and most seasonal fish at the best value possible.

Applebee’s had a glamorous relaunch this February, offering a more “refined” take on a seafood restaurant, says Jack. Borough Market’s cadre of restaurants has earned renown of late, from the newly Michelin-starred Oma to Cynthia Shanmugalingam’s Rambutan. Now it has a seafood restaurant to match – one rooted in classic British and French cooking, elevated by modern creativity and flare.

A butterflied mullet comes swimming in a delicate bouillabaisse sauce. A whole stuffed sea bream is expertly cooked, flesh pearlescent and flaky, stuffed with spicy potatoes and surrounded by excellent curry sauce. On today’s specials board, a dry-aged dover sole meunière is one of the best examples you’ll find anywhere in London, with a beautiful butter, caper and brown shrimp sauce. The cooking from executive chef Frankie van Loo, who recently joined after several years working for Jason Atherton, is superb.

Applebee’s was one of the original Borough Market traders, opening in 1999 when the market was reborn in its current guise. Jack’s parents, Joy and Graham, began as fishmongers then set up a street food operation a few years later, as the market increasingly began to cater to those seeking cooked food. Jack joined in 2015, aged 22, by which time Applebee’s was primarily a restaurant, having opened in its current Stoney Street location just before the 2008 financial crash. “It seemed wise to double down on the restaurant side rather than pushing the fishmonger’s,” says Jack. “I’d love to revitalise the fishmonger’s, but it’s difficult to operate as a full-blown fishmonger with a restaurant operation.”

The ethos has always been the same: the best and freshest British seafood. Around 85 percent of the produce sourced by the restaurant is British, and the majority of the fish comes from Cornwall and Devon. By cutting out middlemen, Jack believes Applebee’s is able to offer good value while keeping the supply chain short and transparent. “We’re just doing what we can to keep the prices as sensible as possible. When you buy seafood through intermediates rather than going direct, you’re in the hands of someone, and you don’t really know the journey of the fish,” says Jack, who points out sourcing this way can result in fish that’s several days old by the time it reaches the diner’s plate.

Running a Borough Market restaurant is a unique experience in London, says Jack, who founded the family’s sister operation, a Spanish tapas restaurant called La Gamba on the Southbank, in 2023. Applebee’s location attracts a blend of regulars, office workers, hardcore foodies and tourists. The menu reflects that, mixing the likes of grilled monkfish tail and tranche of turbot with British favourites including fish and chips and fish pie.

“We’re still trying to work out the balance,” Jack explains. “We want something we’re proud of. Any of the classics we do, we try to make the best you can have. The best fish and chips, the best dover sole meunière. We’re not super traditional, but we are traditional in a way. We’ve been here around 25 years, and we want to do the classics really well but to give the chefs creative licence to do things they’re really passionate about.”

Despite its newly smartened site (Applebee’s still runs a seafood hut in the market selling more casual grab-and-go dishes) it remains a family affair. Joy does the accounts, Jack’s brother Harry is one of the restaurant’s fishmongers, and another brother, Matt, is the general manager at La Gamba. Two cousins currently work at Applebee’s. “If someone needs a job, we’re always there for them. I can’t think of a member of our family who hasn’t worked for us at least a day.”

In the coming months, Jack hopes to push lesser-known species. Britons are relatively unadventurous when it comes to seafood, especially compared with our Mediterranean counterparts. That wonderful bouillabaisse sauce is made with red mullet and gurnard, two underappreciated species the latter of which Jack is particularly keen to push. “We would love people to know what a gurnard is and want to order it. We want to bring in gurnard, whiting, things people don’t order much but can be really good. We want to educate people, slowly but surely.”

He hopes to change the menus frequently, with monthly tweaks. While the specials board will highlight the best seasonal fish based on what has been caught the day before. “If we see really good value turbot or john dory, we’re going to buy it. Or mackerel, or red mullet. Being able to do that is fantastic.”

For now, though, Jack is “very happy with how the relaunch has gone. The team has been brilliant in adapting to the changes. We’ve had some amazing feedback from our regulars.” Applebee’s 2.0 is emerging as one of the city’s best seafood restaurants – one set to grace the Borough Market scene for many more years to come.