How Prawn on the Lawn reels in customers

10 August 2022 by

An unexpected property purchase saw Prawn on the Lawn owners Katie and Rick Toogood expand their brand to Cornwall. Here's how they reel in customers

A surprising set of events saw Katie and Rick Toogood pack their lives into a van and leave London for Cornwall in 2015. The couple bid farewell not only to family and friends, but their beloved fishmonger-slash-restaurant Prawn on the Lawn, which had opened only two years previously, and was placed under the stewardship of their restaurant manager and head chef.

A near-decade-long adventure for the Toogoods had started with the Islington fishmonger, where customers were served fresh oysters at an eight-seat bar while waiting for their fish to be filleted. The move to Cornwall saw them open a 20-cover restaurant in Padstow, followed by a second small plates restaurant and an alfresco venue on a nearby farm, which kept the business afloat during lockdown and saw the pair sell a whopping 30,000 scallops in the summer of 2021. Not to mention a wedding on an oyster farm and three children somewhere inbetween.

Hard work has seen Prawn on the Lawn (POTL) expand even in the face of the adversities of the last few years. Under design-trained Rich, who oversees the food offering, and Katie, who has a background in music marketing and looks after front of house, POTL has gained something of a cult following. As well as a cookbook there is a range of branded merchandise, from beer and potato seasoning to T-shirts, baseball caps and tote bags, all emblazoned with the restaurant's cheeky tongue-sticking-out, emoji-like logo.

Image: Steven Joyce
Image: Steven Joyce

"When we opened the doors in London, people just came," says Katie. "Rick did this amazing fish counter display and that was the big difference. Elsewhere you'd walk past a fishmonger and it would be all stainless steel, the ice might have melted and it wouldn't have a massive selection."

Rick adds: "To me, that made a fish shop really cold and unwelcoming, so we created a counter out of Corian, which is similar to marble, and designed the worktops around that so it softened it a bit. And this approach definitely carries on throughout everything we've done – Katie with her background in music marketing and mine in design means we both come at things from a different angle from most restaurateurs and look at things differently."

The couple's move into the industry was not as unexpected as it may seem. Katie's parents owned a catering company and she worked in hospitality before moving into music, while Rick's love of food came from his mum, who he says is a brilliant cook. After university he fell into office jobs, which he hated, and after returning home from a job in China, at a loss of what to do with his career, his mum told him to write a list of three things he was passionate about, and top of the list was food.

"I worked in a local restaurant front of house and became assistant manager three months later," says Rick. He then moved onto FishWorks – the fishmongers and restaurant in Marylebone, established by Mitch Tonks – where during his breaks he would jump on the fish counter and start filleting fish and "everything seemed to click into place".

POTL came to fruition a few years later, setting up home in an old butcher's shop in Islington, refurbished with a £50,000 inheritance from Rick's grandmother. However, Rick quickly realised he wanted to offer customers more than prepared oysters with a side of lemon and shallot vinaigrette. After exploring the cellar, they found a Victorian kitchen, complete with original brickwork and a fireplace. With a little love, the space gave him the perfect setting for 16 covers across four tables.

"I started messing about making small plates from the fish we were getting every day, but because of our retail licence we couldn't cook food to order, so it was all cold dishes like ceviches, cures, salads and pickles – it was about being quite creative with what we had."

A Cornish dream

Rick and Katie have always sourced their day boat and line-caught seafood from Cornwall, partly for sentimental reasons as both their families holidayed there when they were young. On one of their frequent trips to meet suppliers (see panel), the couple were watching a demonstration of a Japanese method for killing fish, when the host asked if they wanted to buy his restaurant.

"We said we'd love to, but we've only just opened a restaurant in London two years ago, and all our friends and family are there," says Katie. "But we went back to London and kept thinking about it."

The couple put in an offer, on a slight whim, of half of the asking price, and to their astonishment it was accepted. "It was really scary, but super-exciting," Katie says. This quick change of direction left the future of the London site in question, but after speaking to their manager, Daniela Bevilaqua, and head chef, Patrizia Pesavento, the two agreed to take on the day-to-day running of the business. The next minute the Toogoods were on the A30 down to Cornwall.

"It was a series of things that happened very quickly –there was no barrier to stop us doing it," says Rick. "We bought the 26-cover Padstow site for £90,000 and spent £25,000 refurbishing it. We don't have any investors whatsoever; we just reinvest and the business has grown naturally."

A few months later the London site moved a few doors down the road to a bigger location. No longer just a fishmonger, the 32-cover restaurant added a private dining room for 14 and a menu of small plates inspired by the couple's memories of food eaten on holidays and Rick's travels in China. Dishes focus on seasonal and sustainable seafood and include the likes of mackerel, beetroot kimchi and black spice; Porthilly mussels, clams and manzanilla; and scallops, Thai marinade and Thai basil, as well as whole fish and shellfish priced by the kilo.

The Padstow restaurant takes a similar approach, serving sharing plates and whole fish alongside a blackboard menu that sometimes only lasts a few hours before being changed. Rick also experimented with meat and veggie small plates in Barnaby's, a second 20-cover Padstow site that opened across the road in 2018, but which closed earlier this year.

Johnny Murt with Rick Toogood
Johnny Murt with Rick Toogood

"In the nine years of the business it was the hardest decision," says Katie. "But in all honesty, the building wasn't fit for purpose, and the availability of staff was, and is, a huge problem in Cornwall. And we had three kids and couldn't drop everything and work like we used to."

Rick adds: "It was incredibly profitable and it had the best reviews across all the restaurants. But sometimes you have to make a decision for your own sanity."

"It has an amazing reputation and a good bank of recipes we could reincarnate one day," continues Katie. "We want to focus on one business and POTL has been our cash cow, but also our first love."

Prawn on the Farm

Along the way, Covid hit, but rather than decimate the business, it offered an opportunity for expansion. "With Covid restrictions we could only get three or four covers in the restaurant, so we were on a dog walk one day trying to figure out what we didn't have and who had it," explains Katie.

"Our friend Ross and his parents have a farm five minutes' drive away, where we get our produce from, and they had an events field that wasn't being used because there were no weddings. So, we rented a 25m by 9m marquee for the summer of 2020 and put it up on the farm for three months."

The marquee company gave them a huge discount and, despite challenges with power and water supplies ("we had one tap to run a 60-seat restaurant doing 180 covers a day!") the pop-up was a success. It reopened in 2021 and again this summer.

Last summer, while Prawn on the Farm was in full swing, the Padstow site flipped to a fishmonger where Rick prepared the fish, but this year, he has bigger plans. "Our manager, Jonny Mutch, pulled off a report from the farm last year and realised we sold a lot of frozen margaritas and scallops.". Katie interjects: "It was an insane amount – 30,000 scallops in one summer on the farm."

So this year, the Padstow town site will turn into a taqueria, selling margaritas and tacos, with the offcuts of fish for the farm used in the toastadas. And at the end of this summer the pair will dismantle the marquee for the final time, as planning permission has been granted for a permanent home on the farm for POTL. If the taqueria proves popular in town, it too will remain in place.

Staffing in the South West

The staffing crisis is even more acute in Cornwall than other parts of the UK. Local residents are struggling to find homes in a property market primed for second home ownership, but for a business that depends on tourists in the busy summer months, Rick says it's a balancing act: "You need the second homes as the tourists keep the town going, but it's maybe gone a bit too far and needs controlling."

POTL is doing all the right things to attract staff – offering 45-hour weeks, paid overtime, learning and development and staff trips to Portugal or Spain. And while turnover is low, when a house came up to buy locally, the pair snapped it up. "It had restrictions, which meant you can't turn it into a holiday home," says Katie. "So we bought it through the profit from the business and a mortgage so we could house some of our staff, who were previously staying in grotty conditions. They now have a kitchen, lounge, dining room and a garden at a reasonable price."

Rick adds "For many years the industry hasn't treated its staff as well as it could have, but we remain hopeful. And businesses now are making a conscious effort to rebuild the reputation of the industry, and over a little bit of time, that trust is coming back."

That trust extends to every part of the business and sustainability is priority. The catch of the day dictates an ever-changing menu: "One day its small plates and sharing a lobster, another it's orzotto and fruits de mer," says Katie. Rick adds: "Only having a certain amount of a particular fish ensures we're as seasonal and sustainable as we can be.

"Our livelihood is based on fish being around for a long time. If we didn't make a conscious effort to ensure we're taking species from the sea in the correct way, we'd be shooting ourselves in the foot."

The National Lobster Hatchery

When Rick's grandmother left him £50,000 to start POTL, there was a stipulation that the money should also be used in a charitable way. When Katie and Rick discovered the National Lobster Hatchery, they felt it was the perfect fit. "We chose the hatchery as our business takes from the sea, so we wanted to give something back," explains Katie. "It's an amazing local charity with a visitors' centre in Padstow, so we can direct our customers there to find out more. We add a discretionary £1 to each bill in the restaurant, and all that money goes straight to the hatchery. "We've raised almost £70,000 to date, which is more than the initial inheritance, so we think she'd be proud! Very crudely, that equates to putting approximately 70,000 lobsters back in the sea."

Key suppliers

Johnny Murt Fifth-generation Padstow fisherman, who supplies crab and lobster from his day boat PW7

George Cleave Sources fish from day boats in Newlyn and Port Isaac.

Rock Shellfish Supplies local oysters and mussels from its farm in Porthilly, Rock

Padstow Kitchen Garden and Trerethern Farm Supplies vegetables, salad and herbs. POTL uses the farm's rare breed pigs for its nduja and its flowers for table decorations.

Trevibban Mill Vineyard This award-winning vineyard, less than a mile from Prawn on the Farm, supplies organic wine and cider.

Padstow Brewing Co A custom-built microbrewery on the outskirts of Padstow that hand-bottles its award-winning beers.

Bin Two A local wine shop that sources a range of low-production wines.

Tarquin's Cornish Gin Local gin supplier that built the Prawn on the Farm bar.

Sommelier's Choice Supplies a range of wines from independent producers.

From the menu

Small plates

  • Seared tuna, soy, mirin, chilli £10
  • Pollock, harissa chickpeas, dukkah £10
  • Brill, szechuan, mushroom £10.50
  • Scallops, Thai marinade £15/20
  • Burrata, smoked almonds, anchovies £10
  • Cornish sole, lime pickle butter, samphire £15.50
  • Ray wing, kimchi marinade, sesame £11.50
  • Hake, cannellini beans, bacon, hazelnuts £13.50
  • Lemon sole, mojo verde £10.50

Sides

  • Crushed spiced potatoes £4.50
  • Baby gem, truffle oil, Parmesan £5.50
  • Tomato and tarragon salad £5

For the table

  • Seafood orzotto £45
  • Cornish lobster £56
  • Brill £55
  • Plaice £50

Small plate prices change depending on market price and size of seafood brought in

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