If you blink you could miss Hamilton's newest eatery.

The entrance to Aggie's Garden Cafe is through a gate and down bricked steps lined with potted plants. You could be forgiven for thinking you were trespassing on a quaint waterside home, but for those who know, the steps actually lead down to what owner Judith Wadson touts as Bermuda's "fresh food" restaurant.

The waterside cafe is tucked away on Pitts Bay Road in an area which is better known as Hamilton's insurance and reinsurance district. In fact, the restaurant, which is on the bottom level of Falconer House, shares the building with Arrow Reinsurance.

But there is nothing corporate about Aggie's, with its pumpkin walls, green trim (one customer said it was like being inside a cantaloupe) and stools lined up at counters.

The restaurant opened in August without much fanfare, and Ms Wadson said Hurricane Fabian almost put paid her plans when it ripped off Falconer House's roof. Although Ms Wadson was yesterday able to laugh off the storm - which smashed windows and flooded part of the restaurant despite heavy sandbagging - at the time she could have cried.

One to be made stronger by adversity, Ms Wadson was forced to close down the restaurant for three weeks but said she is now ready to face anything.

Back on track, Ms Wadson said: "I work with what is growing locally and seasonally. It is all fresh and what is available dictates the menu," adding that all produce came from her brother, farmer Tom Wadson, "because his produce is grown, as much as possible, without any pesticides".

All in all, Aggie's - which is named after Ms Wadson's grandmother who used to live on the property - is the culmination of Ms Wadson's life long dream to be a chef.

"I have wanted to be a chef ever since my boarding school days but I was discouraged (from that) and encouraged to go to university."

Ms Wadson said that, instead of going to culinary school, she studied for a journalism degree.

"I love writing and photography but that desire to be a chef never left me," she said.

Years later, Ms Wadson made good on that dream by going back to school, this time to Peter Kump's New York Cooking School. She followed that with an internship at Chez Panisse, the Berkeley restaurant of acclaimed chef Alice Waters.

Ms Wadson, who wasn't paid for her time at Chez Panisse, yesterday joked that she was more a slave than intern but that the experience she gained there was invaluable.

"Alice taught me that you don't need much. If you have the finest produce, and the best olive oil and vinegar you can make those eating your food really, really happy. That is what I want to do with Aggie's," she said.

Aggie's is open from 10.30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday and from 9 a.m. on Saturdays. Ms Wadson also plans to offer special Harvest Dinners on Saturday nights during Bermuda's produce season, from November to May. Those events will be open to 15 diners on a pre-booked basis.