Westbury, British, Modern Restaurant Guide

Set in “delectable surroundings” on the Longleat estate – this “traditional pub with rather better food” (from an “interesting menu”) is “an altogether enjoyable and relaxing experience”. It even has a ‘treatment cabin’. Dating from 1736, it’s now part of the Beckford Group and offers 16 bedrooms along with “quality service”.

2023 Review: A “quirky and interesting” local with a “good atmosphere” serving a “creative menu, with cooking of a consistent high standard”. It makes a “fantastic pub for Sunday lunch”, with “outstanding roasts”.

2023 Review: The “food and wine are always interesting” and are “still as good as ever” at engaging Anglo-Scottish chef Gordon Jones’s former sandwich shop on the southern edge of town. There’s “a single tasting menu available” (the only choice is whether to have 7 or 9 courses) and it comes as a complete surprise, with each dish introduced as it arrives at your table (and no vegetarian or other options).

Harwood Arms co-owner Mike Robinson’s “superior steakhouse” is the fancier of two dining options in the “formal setting of a well-restored Georgian house, now hotel” (from the “modern and quirky” Indigo chain). A visit begins with cocktails in the vault-based speakeasy, before heading upstairs for a seven-course dinner during which “the star is game” – and “oh, the venison! Sourced from the chef’s local estate”, it’s “melt in the mouth” and “just brilliant”. “Good value for money” too – just “go there and enjoy a magnificent meal in this lovely city”.

2022 Review: Taking afternoon tea in this “wonderful Georgian setting with a trio playing during the meal” – and the Roman baths next door – is to wallow in English history, with literary visitors from Jane Austen to Charles Dickens as your guides. The nibbles – “beetroot-cured smoked salmon with homemade blini”, perhaps – are a secondary consideration, “but well worth having!”.

“One of the best in Bath” (that “tourist city largely dominated by chains”), founded in 2016 by Chris Tabbitt, whose CV includes stints at London’s Bibendum and the Old Bridge hotel in Huntingdon, where he met his FOH wife Sarah Olivier. It “seems quite European in the interior” (down to being “fairly cramped”), but that only befits its “excellent French-inspired” bistro cooking, which is offered for a “reasonable” price.

Independent wine shop off Queen’s Square whose dining room and heated wood-framed marquee offer a “casual” setting for a rather superior small-plates menu (crab soufflé, beef shin croquettes, pan-roasted pigeon breasts, cod with pork-braised cannellini beans and chorizo, veggie options, cheese boards and desserts) to pair with vintage Burgundies or other discoveries in the fine-wine selection.

“Top-quality ingredients, expertly cooked, and very warm, attentive service” are much appreciated at this Regency-era townhouse venue from accomplished chef-patron Rob Clayton, who trained under the legendary Nico Ladenis and headed the kitchen brigade at Bath Priory. His “classical style is perhaps a bit old school, but there’s nothing wrong with that…” – “don’t be fooled by the simplicity of the menu, or what could be perceived as high prices: this is worth every penny!”

This decade-old wine merchant and sharing plates restaurant is the flagship of the Beckford Group: a six-strong outfit based in Wiltshire and Somerset (and whose side arm is hit bath and body product brand, Bramley). Perhaps, it’s “more about the wine and ambience than the food” (there are over thirty wines available by the glass, and relatively cheap rates for corkage), and perhaps it’s “a little expensive”, but then again this feel-good place is, according to all reports, “one of those restaurants where you don’t really mind”. Top Tip – the outdoor tables make a “great place to catch the early evening sun come summertime”.

It’s “been around for ever”, but this “quirky” bistro in a fine Georgian house happily “still keeps its standards very high”, with newish owner Matthew Lisanti (who took over from the longtime former landlords in 2021) overseeing the “short, simple and superb” modern European fare. “Great, friendly service” and an interesting list of indie wines also make it “a cut above” in these parts.

Handsome Georgian pub near the Royal Crescent with a relatively ambitious seasonal menu, “excellent wine list” and “stunning Sunday roast”; the courtyard garden is an added attraction in the summer. (“I don’t get to Bath enough but next time I do, this will be on the shortlist for sure!”).

2024 Review: “Outstanding views from the dining area” and “lovely garden” over the surrounding countryside (top walking territory) characterise this well-liked stone gastroboozer; there are plaudits too for its “small menu of good classics” (plus latterly small plates).

Celebrating three decades as part of the Brownsword Hotels stable in 2024, this lavish getaway in two adjoining Georgian houses has much to love about it, from the four-acre gardens to the UK’s only L’Occitane spa. Dining options are split between the dining room, open for afternoon tea or a £98 per person three-course dinner showcasing “skilful cooking of delightful food”; and the more casual ‘Pantry & Terrace’ which also offers breakfast, brunch and lunch.

Born in 1740 but updated for modern times – a country inn on the edge of the rolling parkland of the Fonthill Estate, not far from Salisbury. “Too many pubs serve food that is overpriced and disappointing, but not here though” – a “fab place” where you can expect “superb cooking every time”, be it suckling pig, wood-fired pizzas or local meat and game (“a lunch featuring duck lingers long in the memory”). Want to overnight? There are plush bedrooms and lodges but the pick of the accommodation is the ‘Arch’ which sits at the entrance to the Fonthill Estate’s driveway.

Since 2006, chef Hywel Jones has been at the helm of the kitchen of this traditional, period dining room which provides a very classical country-house retreat in a rural Palladian mansion: go somewhere else if you want stripped floors and open kitchen, as here you will get swagged curtains, tablecloths, silverware and aperitifs in the lounge. Limited feedback this year, but remaining positive on its high-quality, classically rooted cuisine: there is a tasting menu, but the à la carte offers three courses for £115 per person.

“Every flavour is unique with dishes that are exciting, different and a real taste experience, but not in a whacky, OTT way – just letting the ingredients speak for themselves” – at Merlin Labron-Johnson’s acclaimed destination; which “has moved out of Bruton (about ten minutes down the road to the middle of the countryside)” – and now occupies a 17th-century coaching inn, offering four minimal-chic rooms named after rivers in Somerset. One first-time visitor was wowed by “a miracle of flavours from the simplest ingredients” (“it’s the vegetables and foraged herbs that stand out”), all abetted by “inspirational and creative” presentation. “One of those meals where you want to lick the saucy remains off every emptied dish, and the service is so friendly that you actually can!”. The eleven-course tasting menu is £150 per person (with lunch nine courses for £95 per person). Top Menu Tips – “fallow deer is especially good as is the fried parsnip (and I don’t like parsnips!)”. “‘Old favourite’ dishes such as a game pithivier and the squid, pigs head and black truffle are totally amazing. Beetroot taco with salted egg yoke – the flavours are just incredible. Another stand out is the meadowsweet icecream, so unusual and the most fabulous texture”.

“Just heaven”. “You can’t get more idyllic than a meal here sat in the most beautiful walled kitchen garden” of Darren Brown’s Wiltshire destination (est. 2016) – “out of the way (but handy for the A303)” – “it is so relaxing, and such a treat and the surroundings are so beautiful with their mixture of flowers and vegetables and herbs”. “On the Cote d’Azur it would work fine most of the year. In Wiltshire it is often cold and wet at which time you eat indoors in Spartan conditions (at which times ambience 2/5 at best)”. When it comes to the cooking (much of it over an open fire), they “really make an attempt to be green with lots of own-grown stuff, retired dairy cows for meat etc. you can even pick a bunch of flowers to take home!”. But what is plain “magical” to some, is more nuanced to sceptics, who say: “problem is, the food’s not that good, with relatively little choice in practice and combinations that are seasonal but don’t always work”. Likewise service can be “enthusiastic but not always knowledgeable”. Still, mostly the vibes here are positive. Top Menu Tip – “They bring you a non-alcoholic fizzy wine to kick things off and it’s the best thing – not sweet but deliciously refreshing. Some good bread and a dip to kick things off, then the main event, you either pick meat or veggie; then all the sides, with veg straight from the garden all so fresh and beautifully accompanied with herbs and butters”.

“A lovely traditional out-of-the-way pub with lovely traditional pub food”, this ancient thatched village inn is these days owned and run by Ben Maschler (son of restaurant critic Fay and a former operations director at Soho House) and long-term fans say “it never fails to please”, with a menu that offers hearty country dishes alongside more ‘pubby’ options.

2024 Review: This Victorian boozer on the Duke of Somerset’s estate reopened in 2021 (with rooms) after a posh refit by Andrew Kelly and James Thurstan Waterworth (the ex-European design director at Soho House). Despite the rather rapid exit of initial chef Nye Smith – to Rochelle Canteen boss Margot Henderson’s new venture, ‘The Three Horseshoes’, in Batcombe – its local/seasonal menu gained solid marks this year.