From Branscombe to Weymouth, both East Devon and Dorset are full of delicious ingredients but it’s the simple, super-fresh seafood that’s hard to beat

“Now ye toil not” says a sign outside the Masons Arms, in Branscombe (01297 680300), a classic Devon inn with views across a National Trust vale out to sea. The sign does not apply to kitchen staff who produce a substantial bar and restaurant menu that makes good use of local and seasonal ingredients. I could see the sheep on the hillside that had provided my organic lamb dish which was served with sweet potato and a fresh pea and mint mush.

Other rewarding dishes away from the pub fare bulk included a brilliant green spinach and Branscombe crab soup, local beef and horseradish sausages and a cheeseboard featuring the West Country’s finest. In winter a spit-roast takes place over an open fire in the inglenook of the bar, where you can drink Branscombe Vale Brewery’s latest draught, a newsworthy ale called Napoli’s on the Rocks. It is named after the ship that grounded in the bay earlier this year (see below).

A couple of miles around the coast at Beer fresh fish could almost flap its way from the boats of local fishermen up the slipway to the Anchor Inn (01297 20386). We ate home-made fresh Beer crab quiche with a mesclun leaf salad, and collops of monkfish wrapped with streaky bacon in the pub’s front garden overlooking the cove and adjacent to a string of allotments running up the hillside.

If you’re self catering the Wet Fish Shop beneath the slipway sells whatever comes in from the boats each day including whole lobster at less than half the price you’d pay in London and picnic tubs of vivid pink crab for £4. Local B&B owner Simon Gooch recommends tabloid wrapped fish ‘n’ chips on the beach with a bottle of chilled bubbly from the village off licence.

Shifting counties to Lyme Regis, in Dorset, we found a very cool place tucked away in colourful Coombe Street that has the louche, urban feel of communal feast-fests like Bill’s in Brighton or Esca in London’s Clapham. Wild flowers and local organic broad beans and spinach adorned the entrance to the Town Mill Bakery, a high ceilinged space with open kitchen and shared tables where you help yourself to toast, jam and butter.

The pizzas looked delicious – especially the Fiorentina with spinach and a free-range egg – and the lemon polenta cake was a moist and crumbly companion to a fresh brew of coffee. The TMB gang are off to Glastonbury to bake this week where owner Aidan Thompson, who runs breadmaking courses at the nearby River Cottage HQ, will launch a book about bread.

The town’s excellent Broad Street restaurant (01297 445792), which opened two years ago in an attempt to give Dorset some of the culinary clout that Devon and Cornwall command, used to serve the Town Mill Bakery’s honey, date and pecan bread with Dorset Blue Vinny cheese until new chef Geoffrey Beetlestone started baking his own bread. The restaurant also sources all its fresh ingredients from within a 20-mile radius of Lyme Regis – “nearer if possible and if it’s not in season we won’t use it,” adds the proprietor Franny Owen.

The market town of Bridport has a growing reputation as a real foodie hub. The farmers’ market on the second Saturday of the month is a showcase for some superb local produce including Dorset blueberries and air-dried ham from nearby Denhay Farm Farm (01308 458963) where Amanda and George Streatfeild dry-cure hams and bacon for Duchy Originals. They are renowned for their West Country Cheddar made with milk from their five Friesan herds. Dorset dwellers and TV chefs Lesley Waters and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall are sure to be on hand at the food festival, June 29-July 1.

At the boutique Bull Hotel (01308 422878), on the high street, chef Gerry Page runs a reasonably-priced gastro-pub (starters from £4.50 and mains from £11.95) using local produce. In keeping with the relaxed vibe of this 16th-century coaching inn, market day brunch is served until 3pm. For supper I had pan-seared lyme bay scallops with salsa verde, followed by wild halibut fillet with a tomato and tarragon sauce and seasonal vegetables.

Just around the corner from the Bull is the newly restored Electric Palace cinema which re-opened at the end of May. The foyer restaurant with its 1920s murals is a light and quirky place to lunch offering a select menu of carefully sourced fresh ingredients.

A mile along the River Brit to the coast again, the Riverside restaurant (01308 422011), at West Bay, is a West Dorset institution. It has been cooking simple bright-eyed fish with a hint of France for 40 years. The restaurant has wooden floorboards and is surrounded by water so you have to cross a little wooden bridge to enter. The fishy fare is oysters and simply cooked squid, mackerel, and garlic prawns.

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