The Foveran

Stunning sea views accompany the food at this ‘welcoming’ restaurant-with-rooms, where the dining room overlooks the sheltered waters of Scapa Flow and the southern Orkney Islands. It is a family affair, run by Paul and Helen Doull, in the kitchen and front-of-house, with Paul’s brother Hamish and Hamish’s wife, Shirley, in charge of maintenance and administration. Simple, ‘spotless’ ground-floor bedrooms have Scottish fabrics, neutral decor and Duck Island toiletries. In the dining room, with its watery, big-sky views through floor-to-ceiling windows, a handwoven tapestry is by cousin Leila Thomson. Paul works with local, seasonal, traceable, sustainable produce – the distinctive, seaweed-grazed North Ronaldsay lamb, Orkney beef and shellfish – to create short menus of such dishes as baked fillet of sole, smoked olive and lemon tapenade, and fillet steak topped with caramelised onions and haggis under a puff-pastry lattice, with whisky cream sauce. Breakfast brings salted porridge, home-baked bannock, Orkney sausages, salmon smoked by Jollys of Kirkwall with buttery scrambled eggs, or a vegetarian full Scottish. Reports, please.