View to a thrill

Wonderful views over the Tay are not all that Masterchef: The Professionals winner Jamie Scott’s innovative new restaurant has to offer

Even as a nipper, being told not to do something was the surest way to make you yearn to do it, no matter how mindless ‘it’ was. Not much changes in adulthood because denial still whets the appetite more effectively than the most fulsome invitation.

So after a month when half a dozen calls to the Newport in search of a Friday or Saturday night booking failed to yield one, determination took root. One way or another, we would go to Newport-on-Tay’s hottest ticket, even if it meant lunch on a wet Tuesday.

By the time we finally got around to going to The Newport, half of Fife had been, including a lot of friends. But then the profile of the place had been sky-high given that it is the love Clockwise from top left: The interior of The Newport; Jamie Scott; the menu offers a tapas-style a la carte menu and a tasting menu; Scott goes foraging; clear, crisp style showcases the main ingredients. child of larger-than-life Masterchef: The Professionals winner Jamie Scott, a young chef with more chat than Alan Carr and more tattoos than David Beckham.

At first sight it’s an odd place for the 28-yearold chef from Arbroath to be making his big splash given that he won his celebrity chef spurs making cuisine of Michelin-star quality. But Scott has returned to his roots on more than one level because The Newport also marks a return to his early years in the kitchen, when he started his gastronomic career cooking as a 14-year-old at his parents’ pub.

Anyone who knows Newport-on-Tay will know The Newport as a spit and sawdust boozer, but Scott saw its potential. Sited right