Category: Out door seating

Rooftop Bars : Margate & Ramsgate

(July 2026) 

We  visited two of Thanets rooftop bars, one in Margate and one in Ramsgate – both very different but lovely in their own ways.

The Rooftop Bar @Guest House No 42 : Margate 

With it’s stunning views of Margate Beach and the hotels highly professional service, indulging at The Rooftop Bar is a real treat. To get to the bar you speak to the receptionist at the Guest House No 42 Hotel (High Street entrance), they check if there is space. They don’t operate a booking diary for the roof, so it’s first come, first served. Be warned you do have a bit of a climb (six flights of steps). Our visit wasn’t at sunset (which is the peak time), we simply had some pre dinner drinks. They serve cocktails, local beers, and a small, quality-driven wine list where bottles generally run over £60.

Noa Rooftop Bar @The Granville : Ramsgate

There’s only one flight of (external) steps to get to Noa, the rooftop bar at the Granville Theatre. It’s not a large venue, you can do a walk in for drinks but it’s essential to book a table if you want to eat there. They serve handcrafted cocktails (highly recommend The Pain Killer), delicious sourdough pizzas and roasts in the autumn and winter.

The staff are efficient and friendly and the place has stunning sea views. There’s indoor and outdoor seating.

It’s a popular pre theatre venue.

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Vincent’s : Ramsgate

Latest visit May 2026

Currently open every day (9:00am-3:00pm), it’s a lovely spot for breakfast. They also have a good selection of cakes.

Update (November 2025) :- Vincent’s will shortly be under new management, so likely to be menu & opening time changes.

October 2025 :-

An Instagram post for a black pudding & omelette roll called ‘Vincent’s black & gold roll’ drew my attention back to Vincent’s, it’s somewhere I usually just pop in for mint tea & cake if I’m passing by on a sunny afternoon. However now they’re doing breakfasts from 8:30am Wednesday to Saturday and from 9:00am on Sundays.

 

The black & gold roll was really good, cheesy egg omelette and a large slice of black pudding, served on a surprisingly large roll (I’m keen to return to see if they’re as generous with their bacon rolls). Their Coffee was excellent too, so Vincent’s is now firmly on my list as a regular breakfast venue. The café is located in a really attractive, charming decorated hut overlooking the local Tennis Courts in Spencer Square. They have several tables inside and plenty of outside seating available when the weather permits.

Update :- Returned to checkout their Bacon rolls. We thought £7:50 for a Bacon roll was excessive, well above the average price, but seriously it was an absolute bargain. Easily twice the size of a typical bacon roll, it was huge, loads of good quality bacon cooked to order, one roll crispy, the other not, options for streaky or unsmoked back bacon. I’m absolutely stuffed. Highly recommended.

 

First visit  (May 2023) :-

Vincent’s is a gem of a cafe in Ramsgate, one you would struggle to find without local knowledge. It’s located in Spencer Square in the little hut overlooking the Tennis Courts, I didn’t even realize that it had inside seating, but it does and it’s surprisingly spacious. It’s a friendly place serving good Coffee and homemade Cakes. The outside seating is on both sides of the hut, so you can also sit overlooking the rather stunning Vincent van Gogh sculpture.

 

Spencer Square leads into Addington Street where you will find some interesting independent shops, see the Addington Street section of the Ramsgate Shopping Guide for details.

Vincent’s is also located at the start point for the Vincent van Gogh self guided walking trail.

 

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Njord – Scandi Style : Cliffsend Pegwell

Latest visit (September 2025) :-

Njord had to close for several months this Summer due to flooding, but thankfully it’s now open again, completely renovated and with a new chef and new menus. We popped in for breakfast, ordered a Full English and Chef’s Toast (almost a Full English on toast – it didn’t exactly match the menu description as it included Chefs rosti rather than pickled red onion, but I was fine with that). I also couldn’t resist some post breakfast Apple pie. It’s great to see this excellent cafe back on its feet.

The (seasonal) 69 Open-Top bus can be used to get here from Ramsgate, the Viking Ship bus stop is only a few minutes walk from Njord.  

First visit (May 2024) :-

I’ve wanted to try out Njord for a while now, I mean a Scandi style place overlooking Pegwell Bay is so intriguing. So we headed out on a lovely sunny day (it’s only a few minutes away from Ramsgate by car or bus) and about a 40 mins walk if you’re feeling energetic!

Njord is in a great location on the edge off the Pegwell Bay nature reserve, it’s rather lovely inside, with a mix of comfy lounge style seating & coffee tables, dining tables with bench seating and bar stools at the window overlooking the bay. There is also some outside seating and lots of bike racks for cyclists.

The breakfast/brunch menu is mainly muffin, sourdough & croissant based dishes. We rather fancied the less conventional breakfast of Cochon Pulled Pork with Sundried Tomato & Chorizo Tapanata and Poached Kentish Free Range Eggs on a toasted English Muffin with Hollandaise sauce & chilli flakes. However they’d ran out of pork and were doing a pulled Chicken recipe instead, so we ordered that and Americano Coffees. The Coffees were served quickly and were excellent, I even had some left when the breakfast muffins arrived, the pulled chicken muffins tasted as good as they looked too, nicely spiced from the Tapanata and very filling.

Njord is also a Bar with an excellent drinks menu, lots of different brands of rum and gin is always a good sign. They also serve a few cocktails to enhance your breakfast/brunch experience.

The cakes at the Bar looked really good as well, they’re from the Beardy Baker in Canterbury, so I’ll certainly be back to try those.

Attractions in the area include the aforementioned Pegwell Bay nature reserve and the Viking Ship Hugin, which is a great photo opportunity and I guess sort of in keeping with the Scandi style at Njord.

 

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Staple : Ramsgate

So nice to see a business like Staple Stores commit to Ramsgate. Moving from thier tiny shop at the bottom of York Street (which they have  converted in to a soft serve ice-cream shop called Scoop), they’ve taken over and revamped the former Corby’s Tea Rooms at 18-20 York Street. Which means they are now a proper café with plenty of tables inside and outside in the courtyard.

On our visit we had some of thier excellent coffee and shared a pastry for breakfast, you pick the pastries yourself and pay at the till. We bought two different pastries, a coffee yum yum and a filled cruffin, planning to share them, but we were so full from just one pastry, we had a takeaway as well. Staple are very much geared up for takeaway, with lots of pre wrapped items.

The Ramsgate café is open every day from 8:00 am to 3:00 pm.

On subsequent ‘takeaway’ visits we’ve tried lots of different cookies (all good) and  a lovely mango custard & strawberry tart.

They also moved their bakery operations to nearby Manston Business Park in March this year and have another café and shop there.

Staple : Westgate-on-Sea

If you’re in the area, the original Staple in Westgate-on-Sea is worth a visit. You won’t find it in passing as it’s well hidden down an alleyway (St Mildred’s Walk) off St Mildred’s Road. Friendly efficient service and the usual selection of Staple treats.

 

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Frog and Scot : Deal

The Frog and Scot is a popular small plates venue in Deal, so it’s best to book your table a few weeks in advance.  The bookings are timed for 1 hour 30 minute slots, which means you need to order all the small plates you want in one go (they’ll come out of the Kitchen in stages as they are prepared). It’s not really practical to order extra small plates if you find there are some dishes you especially like or if you want more than originally ordered.

Three Small plates per person is recommended.

We started with one of the bar snacks, some tasty ‘Cantabrian anchovies, tomato concasse, pickled garlic’ and ordered seven small plates for three people.

The quality of the dishes varied quite a bit on our visit. The stand out dish for me was the ‘Gnocco, burnt red pepper aioli, parmesan’. The ‘Bayonne ham croquettes, green romesco, basil’ and the ‘New potatoes, coronation mayo, coriander, pickled shallot’ were very tasty too. The ‘local heritage tomato carpaccio’ and ‘Trout tartare, kohlrabi, cherry, ponzu’ were fine, but the ‘Courgette ribbons, mint, pistachio, buttermilk’ and the ‘Burrata, charred peach, basil, toast’ were not so successful.

Time slot bookings are a bit of a pain if you’re looking to have a relaxing meal, ideally I’d have liked to have had time to order dessert and perhaps try one of their cocktails, but as we only had 15 mins minutes left in our time slot and rather than rush our dessert, we decided to just get our bill and have Cocktails elsewhere.

Our meal with a bottle of wine was about £40 per person.

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Le Pinardier : Deal

Le Pinardier in Deal High Street is a great place to chill if you’re into wine and cheese. It’s a Wine Shop/Bar with a fabulous selection of wines (mostly French).  There are several tables in the shop area and a few outside. We took refuge from the baking sun and grabbed a table inside on our visit. We ordered a cheese board (Comté, Brie & Camembert) and a bottle of Vouvray from the extensive wine list.  It wasn’t very busy, so we had excellent service and stayed for an hour or so, happily people watching.

Definitely recommend this place if you’re visiting Deal.

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