Russian Tavern at The Port Royal Hotel

Marius van Rijn (23 November 2008)

Sailing the west coast of Scotland in August-September 2008, we discovered this great stopover on the Isle of Bute. At Port Bannatyne, The Russian Tavern is right on the seashore. There are guestrooms and a good selection of beers, but it is outstanding for its fine cuisine. The seafood is truly fresh; we saw it when it landed. There is also plenty of good fresh fruit and vegetables. Everything we had was cooked fresh from obviously well sourced materials. The Russian dishes we had were excellent and everyone in the place seemed excited they were having a well crafted meal. The French seemed particularly satisfied they had found a restaurant to their expectations. Well done to The Russians. Finding Port Bannatyne really made the holiday, so this review is a thank you.

Michael Greenbaum (12 September 2007)

The location of this village inn is simply stunning on a tiny yacht bay looking over the water to the Argyll Mountains. So sitting down for lunch on our tour of west Scotland, really, the view was great. We expected the usual micro waved factory food with a bit of cut up tomato, but did we have a surprise! In walked the fisherman, Ivan. That is quite a good name for Russian Tavern. With him were buckets of live crayfish (most of which he sells to the truck from Spain,) and a great pile of flapping fresh fish: flounders, codling, plaice, herring, Pollack, can't remember when a restaurant had that, quite a long time ago I think. It was just great, the fine wine was well under-priced for its quality and the ambience was like one of those Mediterranean Taverns where the quality of wine and food are taken for granted, and people have come to meet and chat without any pretensions, not a table-cloth to be seen. This is quite out-of-the-ordinary for West Scotland, and if you like me need a good feed and company after a day in the great outdoors then stop off there. They had very economical rooms too, but we'd booked on the ferry and sadly left Port Bannatyne, laid down with good wishes, bottles of Russian beer and a Russian doll for my daughter. The experience simply not only made our day but the whole of our vacation.