The Cannery
Seafood in the building where Newport’s first commercial fish cannery opened in 1921, right on the Rhine Channel.
3010 Lafayette Ave., Newport Beach, CA 92663
Long before Cannery Village was a place to eat, it was where Newport’s fishing boats came in. The first commercial fish cannery went up on this stretch of the Rhine Channel in 1921, and at its busiest the plant turned out 5,000 cases a day before it closed in 1966.
The building was rebuilt as a waterfront restaurant by Bill Hamilton, the founder of Clean Harbor Day, and later bought by local resident Jack Croul to keep it from being redeveloped. Today it’s run by restaurateur Ron Salisbury, and the menu sticks to what the building was made for: seafood.
Ask for the heated patio off the main dining room if you want to watch the channel, or the upstairs room if you want the view from above. It’s an easy walk from the Rhine Wharf and Lafayette Avenue piers.
