Hardens Guide to the Best Restaurants in Medmenham
Hardens guides have spent 33 years compiling reviews of the best Medmenham restaurants. On Hardens.com you'll find details and reviews of 20 restaurants in Medmenham and our unique survey based approach to rating and reviewing Medmenham restaurants gives you the best insight into the top restaurants in every area and of every type of cuisine.
Featured Medmenham Restaurants
1. 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...
2. 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!”)
3. 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).
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. 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’.
6. Hurley House Hotel
Italian restaurant in Hurley
Henley Road - SL6
2022 Review: This ultra-stylish boutique hotel reopened in late 2016 after a multi-million-pound, two-year renovation. Its “lovely food choices” run the whole gamut from Japanese dishes through to sourdough pizzas, and a large garden contributes to what's “an ideal spot on the way to Henley”.
7. The Little Angel
British, Traditional restaurant in Henley-on-Thames
Remenham Ln - RG9
This “very old pub in a great location next to Henley Bridge” has been a scenic boozer for yonks, but now comes in a “fabulous new incarnation”, having been taken over by seasoned restaurateurs Matt Dockray and Phil Renner, who relaunched in late 2022. The hugely stylish interior (not least in the vaulted dining room, strewn with trinkets) makes it a “great place for a first date”, and there are positive early reports on the elevated pub classics by head chefs Joshua Wilde and George O’Leary – both previously senior sous-chefs at Tom Kerridge’s Marlow joints The Coach, and The Hand and Flowers.
8. 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”.
9. Villa Marina
Italian restaurant in Henley-on-Thames
18 Thameside - RG9
Set on the water by the town bridge over the Thames, a “typically old-school” outfit that’s “family-run”, “long-established” and “excellent value for money” for what is “authentic Italian food”; you dine in a smart, tiled room with a “nice buzz” and “well-paced service”.
10. Bistro at The Boathouse
British, Modern restaurant in Henley-on-Thames
The Boathouse - RG9
“Perhaps the best located restaurant on the Thames” in these parts provides a “great river view and a good buzz”. Run by Shuan Dicken, it provides an all-day menu that offers an easygoing selection of straightforward dishes, especially a “top breakfast”. It used to offer fancier fare, though, and the odd reporter feels the ambition is a little “basic” nowadays.
11. The Hand & Flowers
French restaurant in Marlow
126 West Street - SL7
What to make of TV-star Tom Kerridge’s Thames Valley pub, which helped catapult him to stardom in 2012 when Michelin awarded the place two stars. The choice of this ordinary-feeling inn on the edge of town was always “a little quirky”, but for many years satisfaction levels here held up even if the “ambience varies depending on where you are sat, as it can be nice and atmospheric, or you can feel very much shunted to one side”. But for the most part, folks historically didn’t quibble: they just focused on the down-to-earth style and “very high-quality British cooking”. The latter is still sometimes applauded, even if dishes can seem “more traditional and less interesting/exciting than expected”. But the overall tide of sentiment has turned in recent years, with a growing view that “it’s such a pity that what was a fantastic restaurant has now become overpriced and overrated”. Even those who still hail it as “quite possibly the best gastropub in Britain” can still view it as “seriously overpriced and certainly not worthy of two Michelin stars”. And that’s still the upbeat verdict. More representative of feedback are those who say it’s “horrendously overpriced for what is only reasonable pub food” (“two stars? I’m sorry, but that really is a case of the ‘Emperor’s New Clothes’”). Despite this being one of Michelin’s worst ongoing conclusions, with their history of kowtowing to TV celebrities we’re not betting on a re-rating any time soon.
12. H Café
Sandwiches, cakes, etc restaurant in Henley-on-Thames
22 Market Place - RG9
2021 Review: Henley residents can now save on the rail fare to ‘The Smoke’. Hot on the heels of opening a luxury food court in Harrods, the famous store’s first café outside London is to open in late 2019 on the market place of this chichi town (in what was formerly a branch of Nicolas). We are promised an experience akin to the new food hall approach recently adopted in SW1: ‘a menu of dine-in and dine-out options, replicating the current food-to-go and deli offering’ in Knightsbridge.
13. The Coach
British, Modern restaurant in Marlow
3 West Street - SL7
“The best of Tom Kerridge’s places” – his no-bookings local in the centre of the town may look “pleasant, if nothing exceptional”, but it is the one the locals head to in preference to any other. “Normally it is difficult to get excited about a soup and a fishcake” but here the “simple but excellent food makes it worth a special journey” and “service is very welcoming and professional”.
14. The Ivy Marlow Garden
British, Traditional restaurant in Marlow
66-68 High St - SL7
There’s no doubting the “wonderful location, especially in summer” at this outpost of Richard Caring’s brasserie empire, where the “lovely décor” inside is matched by a pretty garden. While caveats remain over the service and food (Caring’s venues are “never knowingly under-priced”), for the majority the overall package is “solidly pleasing” (“even for a non-chain- lover”).
15. The Butcher’s Tap
British, Modern restaurant in Marlow
15 Spittal Street - SL7
“After a minor revamp where the butchery emphasis was toned down and the pub feel improved”, this highly rated boozer (“a noisy part of the Kerridge empire”) “now has a great atmosphere”. “The meat is exceptional” too, whether you select your cut from the counter and watch as the chefs grill it, or just pop in for the “superb burgers” (including the in-demand special burger of the month).
16. Vaasu by Atul Kochhar
Indian restaurant in Marlow
2 Chapel Street - SL7
“The best Anglo-Indian food tasted this year!” is a typical view of this three-year-old venture from high-profile chef Atul Kochhar, which just might be the best of his half-dozen restaurants (which include Sindhu at the Compleat Angler, also in Marlow). Inspired by the cuisines of the Punjab and Rajasthan, it has a “lovely tasting menu” as well as shorter set and à la carte options, and serves some “interesting and very pleasant Indian wines”.
17. Luscombes at the Golden Ball
British, Modern restaurant in Henley-on-Thames
The Golden Ball, Lower Assendon - RG9
2022 Review: This cosy brick and flint seventeenth-century pub has the seal of approval from cake deity Mary Berry no less, while reports – although on the scant side – generally proclaim it for some “really good” grub (not least the two-course set lunch); extensive gardens are an added boon.
18. Dew Drop Inn
British, Modern restaurant in Hurley
Honey Lane - SL6
“What a return” – chef Simon Bonwick is back on home turf at this diminutive and “lovely” sixteenth-century village pub, not far from The Crown at Burchetts Green, where he established a stellar reputation for classic French cooking over the previous decade. His food is “fabulous” – “precisely cooked with all the flavour you expect and more” (not least the “renowned” pies), and front of house (including wife Deborah) are “delightful, warm and welcoming with a smile”. PS – the chef himself created the artwork lining the quirky venue’s walls.
19. Leiviti
restaurant in Marlow
13 Spittal Street - SL7
2023 Review: “A wonderful new addition to Marlow’s restaurant scene”, this year-old indie from the team behind the nearby Satollo Deli has made its mark with “incredible pizza made with top-notch ingredients” (mostly organic or with Italian DOP/IGP certification). “The atmosphere is pretty buzzy, too”.
20. The Oarsman
restaurant in Marlow
46 Spittal Street - SL7
This ever-gentrifying ‘bistropub and wine bar’ (their designation) was launched by Nigel Sutcliffe and James McLean, co-founders of restaurant consultancy Truffle Hunting, in 2021, and picked up a ‘Newcomer of the Year’ award from the folks at Estrella Damm. Chef Scott Smith (ex-of acclaimed haunts Arbutus and Wild Honey) oversees the carnivorous British bistro dishes and, while there’s the odd skeptical review submitted, even they acknowledge “most people seem positive as it slowly builds a reputation in the town”.
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