The Boathouse at North Landing, Flamborough: 'I went to the most inaccessible place to eat in Yorkshire - and this is why you should make the trip too'

During a particularly idle time lately, my brain inevitably turned to the culinary. Where, I pondered, is the least accessible place to eat in Yorkshire?

Perhaps the thought was inspired by that marvellous Pete and Dud sketch featuring Cook as Sir Arthur Streebe-Greebling discussing his disastrous 35-year stint running the Frog & Peach in the middle of a bog in the North Yorkshire Moors.

A restaurant whose main selling point was that ‘the parking is a dream’ but ‘extricating your vehicle after your meal is somewhat more problematic.’

To answer my own question, thoughts initially turned to the Tan Hill Inn and the regularity with which guests are snowed in come the winter months.

An inconvenience, certainly, but not exactly inaccessible as to be snowed in, you have to be able to get to the pub in the first place.

Then, as if by a miracle. The Boathouse popped up on one of my social media feeds. Now that, I immediately thought, is pretty damn inaccessible. The Boathouse, you see, is situated on the North Landing at Flamborough.

And when I say ‘on’ I don’t mean ‘near’ or ‘next to’, I mean on.

An eatery that you can’t drive to, is accessed only on foot via two long, steep, uneven concrete ramps and that has to shut up shop every time the weather turns mardy.

I hereby pronounce The Boathouse the most inaccessible place to eat in Yorkshire.

You’ll note I say place to eat and not restaurant. Make no mistake, it’s not a restaurant (despite the title of this column). There are no chairs or tables, or waiting staff, or even a toilet.

It’s little more than a wooden box inside a still-working boathouse. But it has (or, rather, boss Hannah Davison has) ideas well above its station.

Hannah is deep steeped in the North Landing. She’s from Flamborough, her family run a shellfish shop in the town, her husband works a coble from the landing, and her father-in-law works two more from the same beach.

It’s like a Yorkshire Coast version of an H.E. Bates novel, with cream-dripping scones replaced by crab.

Hannah has run The Boathouse for half-a-decade now, primarily as a burger and sarnie supplier to famished beachgoers in the summer months and walkers when the winter comes.

Lately, though, either dissatisfaction bit or inspiration struck and she decided to take things up a notch. She began turning the lobster, crab, seafood and shellfish all around her into more gourmet-adjacent fayre.

Lobster and chips, seafood chowder, boils and platters appeared on the menu and, in turn, more sophisticated punters started appearing down the ramp.

Drawn partly by the food and partly by entertaining Boathouse social media posts, people realised that they had an intriguing place to visit on their trips to the coast and the past year or so has seen an increasingly steady stream of hungry sensation-seekers tuck into great quality, fresh-cooked marine creatures just a few feet from where they were dragged up onto the beach.

While there are still burgers, burritos and wraps on offer, that side of the menu is being slowly replaced by the marine options and the ‘Burger and Grill’ in the Boathouse’s moniker is soon to be removed and livery proclaiming simply ‘The Boathouse’ nailed up in place. A definite statement of intent.

For the record, I’ve tried the half-lobster and chips (£15.50), the seafood chowder (£12.50) and the boil (£13.50) and all were not only great but also great value and so fresh you could almost feel their relatives glaring forlornly at us from just below the nearby waves, hoping they wouldn’t be next.

It’s a very similar operation to the Old Lifeboat Station in Brid, which I reported from in the summer, but in a much more beautiful, dramatic and uncomfortable location.

The only places to sit to enjoy your food are the beach, a low concrete wall skirting the ramp (which is sloped at 45 degrees and impossible to get comfy on) or a couple of benches back up the cliff.

Please don’t turn up expecting cushioned seats, napkin rings, candelabras and an extensive wine list, this is an unsophisticated, honest, practical and peculiarly Yorkshire dining experience.

The Boathouse is also licensed. As it happened to be my birthday (57 – now officially and inescapably late-fifties), I decide to cheer myself up with a hot chocolate with whipped cream and marshmallows, laced with a double portion of chocolate orange-flavoured Baileys.

Not exactly high-class stuff, but with a cold wind biting my face and occasional ocean spray then dampening my chops, it was probably the most welcome libation I’ve enjoyed all year.

I pocketed one of the flapjacks displayed under a cloche on the counter and chomped it during the steep plod back up the ramp to the car park. At the top, I surveyed the scene.

The beautiful sky, the rugged cliffs, the turbulent sea, the boathouse and the beach and I thought how marvellous it must be to turn up each day and have that as your view from your work desk, with your family pulling ingredients from nets a few feet in front of you.

I wish Hannah well with her plans to take her unique diner upmarket and can’t help feeling a twinge of jealousy that she lives a life of such simple delight.

She’s lucky and I think she knows it. Dine with her at the Boathouse and you’ll get to feel the same satisfaction as her, if only for a few, fleeting moments.

Welcome 5/5

Food 4/5

Atmosphere 5/5

Prices 4/5

The Boathouse, North Landing Beach, Flamborough, YO15 1BJ (check their Facebook page ahead of travelling.)