Hardens Guide to the Best Restaurants in Wokingham
Hardens guides have spent 33 years compiling reviews of the best Wokingham restaurants. On Hardens.com you'll find details and reviews of 60 restaurants in Wokingham and our unique survey based approach to rating and reviewing Wokingham restaurants gives you the best insight into the top restaurants in every area and of every type of cuisine.
Featured Wokingham Restaurants
1. The French Horn
French restaurant in Sonning-on-Thames
“Three generations of the same family have been pleasing visitors” to this Thames Valley bastion of traditional haute cuisine, owned by the Emmanuel family since 1972 and with a first-class position overlooking the water at Sonning Eye. The famous signature “roast duck on the spit is the best”, while “the fab wine list is worth taking home to salivate over”. While a minority of reporters caution that it is “very good but too expensive”, most feel the high quality justifies the investment.
2. Caldesi in Campagna
Italian restaurant in Bray
Old Mill Ln - SL6
Giancarlo & Katie Caldesi’s country venue – a counterpart to their Marylebone flagship – offers classic Italian cuisine in “a lovely atmosphere with fabulous service”. It’s “good-value”, too – at least certainly compared to the nearby Fat Duck and Waterside Inn…
3. The Bottle & Glass Inn
British, Modern restaurant in Binfield Heath
Bones Lane - RG9
“Everything you want in a country pub” according to fans of this thatched free house on the Phillimore Estate, a short drive outside Henley-on-Thames and on the edge of the Chilterns. Run by David Holliday and with chef Alex Sargeant – both ex-Harwood Arms in Fulham – it has a “delightful dining room with food that’s at the top end of gastropub grub” and for less ambitious fare, head to the adjoining ‘burger barn’.
4. Orwells
British, Traditional restaurant in Binfield Heath
Shiplake Row - RG9
“Just a thoroughly super place to eat innovative food, beautifully presented, enjoy good company and feel thoroughly pampered!” – Ryan & Liam Simpson-Trotman’s rural star has firmly established itself since 2010 as a major highlight near Henley. Set in a converted pub, service is charming, but the root of its appeal is the “outstanding” modern European cuisine, which is available à la carte during quieter services but is usually presented as either a six-course tasting menu for £100 per person or ten courses at £150 per person.
5. Caprice at Crowne Plaza Reading East
British, Modern restaurant in Reading
Wharfedale Rd, Winnersh Triangle - RG41
New luxury 4 silver star Crowne Plaza Reading East, provides a stylish, contemporary look and feel to suit the business traveller, leisure and spa guest. The hotel, set in landscaped podium gardens, delivers exceptional dining experiences. Serving both modern British & authen...
6. Sindhu
Indian restaurant in Marlow
The Compleat Angler - SL7
“Atul Kochhar’s Marlow outpost is in the charming Compleat Angler hotel by the side of the Thames” – a marriage of traditional British setting and Indian cuisine that’s proving enduringly popular. At night the room is less characterful, “whereas in daylight, there is the fabulous view of the River Thames’s Marlow Weir”. “Service is top notch and very welcoming” and the cuisine “is an inventive fine-dining take on Indian cuisine, beautifully presented” – “every element is spiced marvellously and cooked perfectly”. There are “interesting wine pairings too (I’d never previously heard of mango wine. I certainly wouldn’t have ordered it had it not been selected for us… it worked well!”)
8. The Crown at Bray
British, Traditional restaurant in Bray
High Street - SL6
2023 Review: “Still going strong” – this comparatively un-foodie pub has thrived in this gourmet village by offering an attractive and traditional backdrop for easygoing British cuisine, realised with wit: fish finger sandwich, steak, top burgers and so on.
9. Glaze at Crowne Plaza Marlow
British, Modern restaurant in Marlow
Fieldhouse Lane - SL7
Experience excellent food and fine wine in the 4 silver star Crowne Plaza Marlow’s newly refurbished Glaze Restaurant in Marlow, AA Rosette awarded for its culinary excellence. Having recently undergone a huge refurbishment project, the Glaze Restaurant is no...
10. The Vanilla Pod
French restaurant in Marlow
31 West St - SL7
“Out-performing many more feted restaurants” – Michael Mcdonald “runs a fantastic family- run restaurant that never fails to hit the spot” at this “quiet and discreet” fixture, which occupies part of a house that was once home to TS Eliot. The dining room itself is “small, but well laid out” and buoyed along by its “very good, friendly and professional service”. “The menu is limited, but every dish is enticing” and all-in-all it provides “a proper dining experience” that’s “consistently great value” (and one of the 100 most-commented-on outside London in our annual diners’ poll).
11. Meimo
Moroccan restaurant in Windsor
69-70 Peascod St - SL4
Meimo's is one of Windsors finest restaurants
Meimos Restaurant has an extensive menu with dishes that will suit all tastes and a friendly atmosphere. A real locals' favourite and definitely not a tourist-trap!
With popular dishes such as Lamb or Chicken Tagine with exotic...
12. The Bull Inn
International restaurant in Sonning-on-Thames
High St - RG4
“Cracking Sunday lunches with football-sized Yorkshires” are the culinary highlight of this “pretty village inn” in a glorious spot just by the Thames (which gets a mention in Jerome K Jerome’s classic ‘Three Men in a Boat’). It’s a notably “stylish” and “buzzy venue” with a “lovely outdoor area” but has never been a particularly foodie destination. Local heart-throb George Clooney was rumoured to want to buy the pub when he moved into the area with his wife Amal – he told Graham Norton “it’s fantastic and we drink all kinds of pints and things”.
13. The Beehive
British, Modern restaurant in White Waltham
Waltham Rd - SL6
The “elevated food” served at Dominic Chapman’s smart village-green venue is “certainly worthy of its top cooking grade”, and “takes Home Counties pub fare up a level – the amuse-bouches and petits-fours make a pub lunch here a real occasion”. “We hope to return when there’s cricket on the adjacent field”.
14. Latymer, Pennyhill Park Hotel
British, Modern restaurant in Bagshot
London Road - GU19
“Steve Smith hits all the right notes” in this opulent dining room: “a real treat that’s expensive but worth it”. “While the hotel may feel a bit big and corporate, The Latymer just feels special. From the moment you walk in, to the time you leave. Each course is craft-fully mapped out with little cards explaining what it is and where it originated from”. On all accounts this year, its six-course menu – for which you should allow three hours – delivers an “outstanding” experience for £175 per person.
15. London Street Brasserie
British, Modern restaurant in Reading
Riverside Oracle, 2 - 4 London Street - RG1
2022 Review: “Reliable cooking with a buzzy atmosphere” makes this 20-year-old city-centre outfit a useful option; it also gives vegans a decent choice of dishes.
16. Thames Lido
Spanish restaurant in Reading
Napier Road - RG1
Located in the “quirky but fun setting” of a refurbished Grade II listed Edwardian swimming pool, this venue is an “oasis of decent food in the wasteland of Reading”, serving “very good Mediterranean-style food across all three courses”. With views over the pool through plate-glass windows, it’s “great to eat while watching others exercise!”.
17. Marle, Heckfield Place
British, Modern restaurant in Heckfield
Heckfield Place - RG27
Aussie chef Skye Gyngell’s “ambitious establishment” – a Georgian country house dining room in a “beautiful location” overlooking a lake and parkland. They are “very conscious of their environmental responsibility”, with “almost all ingredients locally grown or reared” and served in pared-back style. But while it received strong ratings all-round for its luxury hotel setting, a couple of reports did note “a feeling one has to be on one’s best behaviour!”
18. Carpenter’s Arms
British, Traditional restaurant in Sunninghill
78 Upper Village Rd - SL5
2021 Review: This smart village pub with a garden incorporates a very French dining room, ‘La Cloche’, which serves bistro classics with a nod to the hearty dishes of the southwest, along with a good selection of wine and beer.
19. The Crown at Burchetts Green
British, Traditional restaurant in Maidenhead
Burchetts Green - SL6
2023 Review: In June 202, Dom Chapman took on this well-known Thames-valley pub (he also owns The Beehive in White Waltham, see also), which had been run by the Bonwick family for the previous nine years. It opened too late for feedback in our annual diners’ poll, but an early report from fooderati insider, Andy Hayler, suggested that Champan will be continuing the high quality of The Beehive and also the Bonwicks’ former regime here: “service… was excellent. Overall, this was a very enjoyable evening, The Crown offering a very appealing menu and generally well-made food. … this is already shaping up to be a charming restaurant, and based on the chef’s track record I expect the food to progress further from this solid start”.
20. The Greene Oak
British, Modern restaurant in Windsor
Deadworth Rd, Oakley Grn - SL4
This smart boozer is a “great all-rounder with reliable gastropub fare and a fine garden with covered seating”. It’s the flagship of Brucan Pubs, a small group of ambition founded by a pair with strong credentials, ex-Savoy, Ivy and Groucho club chef Jamie Dobbin and James Lyon-Shaw , formerly operations manager at the ETM group.
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