SOMEWHERE beneath the inky blue, undulating surface of Christchurch harbour, lurks my lunch.

Although I don’t know exactly what I’ll be eating yet, it will probably come equipped with fins and gills.

For I’m on a Hook It and Cook It fishing expedition with Alex Aitken, head chef at The Jetty restaurant in Mudeford.

He believes that fish tastes best when you’ve caught it yourself.

“You just need to know how to prepare and cook it,” he explains.

And so we’ve got just under an hour on a 38ft-long, local fishing boat called Offshore Rebel, learning the rudiments of angling, before heading back to the restaurant for a cookery demonstration followed by a fishy feast.

Our skipper Jamie Russell starts up the engine and we head out across the bay to a spot known as the Christchurch ledge.

Jamie hands each of us a rod with four “lures”. Each lure is a hook adorned with slivers of silver tinsel and feathers to fool the fish into thinking it’s food.

We are shown how to control the release of the line by keeping our thumb on the reel and letting the weight take the bait into the watery depths for a count of four seconds.

Then we wait. Based on my previous experience of fishing trips which weren’t exactly fruitful, I’m prepared to be patient.

But all of a sudden – less than 30 seconds later in fact – there’s a firm tug at the end of my line. Bingo! I’m quite unprepared for the feeling of sheer adrenaline mixed with a sense of disbelief.

Surely I haven’t caught something already?

My hands are almost shaking with excitement as I start to reel it in and sure enough, there’s a foot long silvery mackerel wriggling around at the end of my line.

Jamie quickly pulls the hook from its gaping mouth and deposits the fishy – soon to be on my dishy – into a small water tank on board.

A few seconds later Alex winds one in and then within a few minutes of casting my line over the side I feel another bite and then another. This time I’ve hooked two mackerel on one line.

After about 10 minutes Jamie starts the engine again and we head a little bit further out along the ledge.

Thanks to some clever tracking equipment on board the boat, Jamie is able to identify a large shoal of fish a few feet below.

Soon we are reeling in so many mackerel it's difficult to keep count but Jamie reckons we have caught around 30 fish between us.

It's very addictive and I could have happily stayed out there for hours but time was against us and soon we were heading back to shore.

The Jetty restaurant is just a short walk from the harbour. The kitchen is already a hive of activity by the time we arrive and we watch as Alex goes to work deftly removing the guts and bones.

Within minutes the fish fillets are placed on some fresh fennel from Alex's garden on a buttered dish, drizzled in olive oil and left to sizzle under a hot grill.

We are then shown to our table in the restaurant with its timber frames and floor to ceiling windows overlooking the bay.

Alex prides himself on food is simple, seasonal and local. He likes to know where his food comes from and that it's fresh.

He even rears his own pigs at his home near Sway which will soon be appearing on the restaurant menu too.

And fish doesn't come much fresher than this. Hooked and cooked in just over an hour and so tender that it practically melts in the mouth.

Alex serves the fish on a slice of toasted home-made foccacia bread topped with a tangy tomato compote and a wedge of lime. It is one of the tastiest fish dishes I've had in a long time and as Alex points out mackerel is packed with essential oils so it's good for you too.

Although I've not eaten at The Jetty before now, I can't wait to go back already. I guess you could say I'm well and truly hooked.