Birthday Boy Meets Fin Boys

There are innumerable quotations about food, not least because food is intimately linked to other sensory experiences. As Virginia Wolf observed, ‘one cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.’

We (Tony Hopkins and Lyndsay Wright) certainly dined well at Fin Boys fish restaurant. We paired a special occasion, my birthday, with a special taster menu, which consisted of eight varied courses. The ninth course, cheese, is optional and should appeal to those in training for the Food Olympics.

The wide range of ingredients could be seen as an example of fusion but is better described as cosmopolitan because the chef has drawn on Korean, Japanese, Thai, and Spanish sources, as well as those from Britain. The restaurant explains that the fish is ‘mostly native and wild and sustainably caught by day boats using targeted fishing methods.’

Thus reassured, we worked our way through the menu. Each course is suitably varied and tantalisingly tasty. Mid-way through the eighth course, however, we faltered. Other diners might be able to consume the whole menu with room to spare. George IV, known as the Prince of Whales before he ascended the throne (with difficulty), would have been ready to start again. Fortunately, the restaurant offered to pack the dessert as a take-away, so we lived to eat another day.

The Fin Boys in question are Richard Stokes and Jay Scrimshaw, both of whom are armed with impressive credentials earned in noted restaurants. They opened Fin Boys in 2021 as a fish shop, or butchers, as well as a restaurant but closed the shop in 2023 and expanded the restaurant to its present size. The layout, which is still limited, consists of a long bar, which in Japanese style abuts the preparation area, and conventional chairs and tables. A striking feature of the restaurant is the expertise and friendliness of the staff. Each member of the chef’s team is capable of preparing every dish on the menu and is happy to explain the choices on offer. In these days of equality, it is worth noting that the ‘Boys’ now have their counterparts in ‘Girls’. The atmosphere is informal and relaxed; the absence of musak indicates that the restaurant is on the side of conversation.

We decided not to opt for the wine pairings but to select one bottle from the large range of New World and other wines. We chose a Bordeaux Blanc by the famille Perrin, who own the Chateau de Beauscatel in the Rhone Valley. The birthday boy is not a connoisseur but happens to know the wines of the famille Perrin, which have stocked the cellars of Pembroke College for many decades. As with food, so with wine: the staff are well versed in the wines they carry and are happy to offer guidance.

Fin Boys is at 2 Mill Road, which is about 15 minutes on foot from Kingsley Walk. At the end of the meal, we were still able to walk home. Thus satisfied but not satiated, we felt we had, as Kafka put it, ‘solved all questions for the time being.’ Fin Boys is almost certainly the best fish restaurant in Cambridge. We are fortunate to have it close to hand.