Rossi's Cafe, Westcliff : a time honoured institution, but cannot make coffee.

27th September 2014
You don't go to Rossi's cafe on the Western Esplanade of Southend on Sea looking for gourmet food. This is a seaside cafe, and most visitors love it for being this. It has changed so little over the 35 years I have been visiting, and the prices are still unbelievably low. I have the same dish every time I go there, not because it is the only one I like, but it is because I cannot find steak and kidney pie like this anywhere else. There is no web site, and the TripAdvisor reports are mixed as people go there looking for different things. The bottom line is if you want a cheap and cheerful cheap lunch in Westcliffe (they do not open for food in the evenings) then this is a place to try. I have heard stories that the family are connected to Francis Rossi of Status Quo. Their ice cream is ubiquitous in the area and rightly so. We sat outside watching the frustrated traffic trying to find parking spaces on the seafront. It used to be until April 2013, there was a Saturday night cruise of modified cars up and down the seafront, but that has gone now. Not picturesque, but part of the show.
This is what you get when you order Rossi steak and kidney pie with chips.

The vegetables are not really up to much having come from a communal boiling pot presumably. The other thing that fascinates me, and I have no inside knowledge of this, is whether the pie top and the contents of the dish are only ever introduced to each other at the point of serving.

The pie is hot, very hot, usually scoring 9+ on the CHOF scale. There contents are definitely steak and kidney, and probably more kidney than most pies. Chips are seaside chips. This is a good meal at a very reasonable price, and hot with it. The one thing I have never had at Rossi's is a decent cup of coffee. What is available is a dash of strong coffee into milk, and then heated with steam. The locals love it, and I have known one local who when given a proper cup of coffee ask why it was not milky. It's a take it or leave it affair, so there is no point arguing.

The other big deal with Rossi's is the ice-cream. On a warm day, which this was, there is a long queue for take away ice cream. Legendary in the area. You must try Rossi Ice Cream. Not like the upmarket Gelupo or similar, but better than average honest sea side ice cream