The UK's best restaurants: where to eat in 2024

Laghi's

This long-lived Italian restaurant in Edgbaston has recently hired as its chef former MasterChef: The Professionals winner Stu Deeley, says Tom Parker Bowles in The Mail on Sunday. And he "can really cook". His menu is "traditional Italian, by way of modern Britain": fat pig's-head fritters; queenie scallops in a buttery espelette sauce. The pastas are "seriously" good – the equal of anything at The River Café or Locanda Locatelli, and at a "fraction of the price". Properly al dente campanelli is coated with "just the right amount of fierily porky 'nduja sauce"; rigatoni cacio e pepe is "robustly sharp and salty". No single pasta dish costs more than £11.50, which is "astonishing value for cooking of this quality". Birmingham is full of good restaurants – and I've discovered "yet another true Brummie beauty".

Catch at the Old Fish Market

"It was not with the lightest of hearts" that I set off for my lunch in Weymouth, says Giles Coren in The Times. My previous two trips out of town had been ruined by train cancellations – and I worried that I'd again be forced to endure a nightmarish journey home. But the trains turned out to be "perfectly punctual" and, better still, I came back wondering if I'd been "to the best restaurant in the world". Situated on the first floor of Weymouth's Old Fish Market, Catch offers a "constantly changing" set menu – which at lunch comprises four courses, and costs only £40. Every dish came close to perfection. A "beautiful piece" of grilled local trout was served with a warm potato salad, puréed watercress and a "warm, golden brioche" that may have been the best bread I've ever tasted. Flakes of barbecued gurnard were piled, along with sliced morels and slivers of raw apple, into a staggeringly light and crispy pastry case. I asked Mike Naidoo, the "exec chef and co-owner", how he managed it all for £40 – and he explained that since they have their own boats, this "knocks out the soaring price of fish". My trip to Weymouth – which I initially so dreaded – proved to be "one of the happiest working afternoons of my life".

Liu Xiaomian

I've been to this restaurant three times since it opened last month, says Charlotte Ivers in The Sunday Times – which "pretty much tells you all you need to know". It began life as a market stall run by two flatmates – both expats from the Chinese city of Chongqing – before moving to the basement of The Jackalope, a pub in Marylebone. While it continues to operate there, it now has its first purpose-designed site: "a bright, no-frills little canteen" just off Regent Street. As its name suggests, it specialises in xiaomian – a type of spicy noodle dish popular in Chongqing. The thin wheat noodles come in a broth; you select toppings – pork, beef, vegan, pig trotter – and spice level. Noodles are a "competitive field", but these are perhaps the best I've ever had. I choose the minced pork and chickpea topping, requesting "mild": the dish is "pretty much perfect, and still blissfully, joyfully hot". You can also have wontons (also served in broth), which are equally outstanding. My walk home takes me past a ramen restaurant – and I "feel sad for everyone inside". Total for two, excluding service charge: £46.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

The Small Canteen

The name of this restaurant "isn't whimsy", says Jay Rayner in The Observer: situated on a residential corner in Newcastle's Sandyford, it occupies a space that used to be a sandwich shop. But while its proportions are diminutive, the "classic bistro" fare served up by chef Sam Betts could hardly be more "rich and generous". A light and springy double-cooked cheddar soufflé sits in a "lake of chive-flecked, cheese-boosted béchamel". A slab of confit pork terrine – served at perfect room temperature – has the "thickness of a big Stephen King novel". Mains are similarly abundant: "fork-tender" braised beef cheek on a "duvet of mash" comes with roasted shallots and "slabs of smoked bacon"; three butternut squash ravioli, served with beurre noisette, are "each the size of saucers". Everything is "bloody marvellous", and it's surprisingly good value too: starters and puds are £8; mains are "around £18". In fact, that's my one worry about The Small Canteen: can such modest pricing be sustainable? I really hope so, because it's "one of the good places", and it "needs to survive". 17 Starbeck Avenue, Newcastle upon Tyne.

Claridge's Restaurant

Over the years, the main dining room at Claridge's has played host to some of the biggest names in cooking, says Grace Dent in The Guardian: Gordon Ramsay, Simon Rogan and New York chef Daniel Humm have all had restaurants here. But its latest iteration breaks the mould – for it is now a "straightforward restaurant", with a "low-key" head chef in Coalin Finn. Don't come here expecting a 16-course tasting menu, or dishes listed only by their component ingredients. Instead, you'll find a short menu divided into clear sections, which is full of "unchallenging yet pleasing terms" such as steak au poivre and roasted Norfolk chicken. Everything is well-judged and delicious – from the "beautifully dressed" seafood in the plateau de fruits de mer to the stunning baked alaska for two, which the staff set ablaze at your table. This isn't cooking to "ooh and ah over". But in a London restaurant landscape "teeming with groundbreaking, puzzling, horizon-expanding dining experiences", it is wonderful to be reminded of the virtues of old-fashioned simplicity. From about £80 a head à la carte, plus drinks and service. Brook Street, London W1. 

Kopitiam Unit 19

You could walk past this "unassuming Malaysian café" in Oxford "without giving it a second glance", says Tom Parker Bowles in the Daily Mail. But that would be a big mistake. For the food it serves is "magnificent" – and eating here costs barely more than it does at Pret. There are two menus – one Chinese-leaning, the other made up of "Malaysian classics" – and my advice is to stick to the latter. An establishment's roti canai "always set the tone of the lunch ahead": here, they're "charred, just chewy and delicate as silk handkerchiefs". Everything else is "as it should be", including "mellifluous chicken curry, cooked on the bone", and Nanyang prawn noodle soup, made with a "rich and brooding" stock that has a "deep crustacean grunt". That you can dine at Kopitiam and lunch on "serious Malaysian food, for just over £15 a head, makes me very happy indeed".  Suffolk House, Summertown, Oxford 

The Star Inn

Lodged in the mind of every Englishman is the ideal of a perfect country pub, says Charlotte Ivers in The Sunday Times. What a pity, then, that so many forays into the English countryside in search of this ideal end in disappointment. "Well, joyous day": the perfect pub does exist, in the tiny North Yorkshire village of Harome. The acclaimed Star Inn has "twinkling lights and thatched roof"; inside, it's all dark and cosy, with "wood panels and antique furniture". Andrew Pern – a chef from a family of local farmers – bought the inn in 1996 and has since turned it into a place that serves Michelin-starred food, while never taking itself too seriously. A starter named simply "Ploughman's" proves to be a "chunky raviolo of pulled ham hock with a truffled cheesy sauce" – sitting on a heap of cubed sweet apple. Yorkshire pudding royale is "like a vision of all the most decadent meals you've eaten": the pudding comes piled with onions, veal juices, black truffle and pan-fried foie gras. Charming and a "bit absurd", the Star Inn is like something dreamed up by Richard Curtis: how wonderful that it actually exists. Total for two, including drinks and service: £234. High Street, Harome, North Yorkshire.

Woven by Adam Smith

I'll admit that the mantra of this fine-dining restaurant in Berkshire – "Storytelling on a plate" – initially made me rather sceptical, says William Sitwell in The Daily Telegraph. "Storytelling" is a concept long abused in the corporate world; and here, it seemed to promise an afternoon "groaning with explanations". But my advice is to ignore the "guff" – and simply concentrate on Adam Smith's "wonderful" cooking. In his hands, jellied eels and coronation chicken are transformed from retro classics into sublime canapés. A "perfect mini pie of grouse" is served with a gravy of "outrageously fun largesse", while a "fabulous rectangle of turbot", topped with lobster and caviar, has its richness "tempered by oysterish salsify and salty sea purslane". I even find space for a "vast plate of English cheeses", washed down by a "game-changing" English pinot noir, recommended by the "excellent sommelier". In a room of Japanese minimalism, Smith has – through his cooking – "woven a fine fairy tale". Lunch, £85pp with cheese supplement (excluding drinks and service). Coworth Park, Blacknest Road, Ascot.

Squisito

The Needlemakers, in the East Sussex town of Lewes, is a "sort of shopping centre for pretty handmade things", says Tom Parker Bowles in the Daily Mail. And hidden inside it is this utterly charming family-run restaurant, which offers unfussy Italian food at "eminently reasonable" prices. Our lunch begins with "plumply fatty home-made Italian sausage, gently spiced", and arancini filled with 'nduja and "oozing mozzarella". There's "pert fresh linguine" slicked in "rich" carbonara, and exquisitely light gnocchi bathed in a "gently ovine" lamb ragù. Squisito is "the sort of neighbourhood restaurant that we all wish we had" – and a place where you'll definitely want to linger. It describes itself as "unauthentically Italian" – "but really, it's just authentically good". About £25 a head, excluding drinks and service. The Needlemakers, Lewes, East Sussex.

The Hunan Man

"Be aware," says Jay Rayner in The Observer: this recently opened Hunanese restaurant in London's Fitzrovia is definitely not a place to go with friends who are easily scared. As they flick through the "pic-splattered menu", and take in the "boiled beef in sizzling chilli oil and the pig intestines offered three ways", they'll be consumed by "ever-rising panic". Finally, they'll reach the "dry-wok duck braised in beer, complete with head and bill" – and succumb to a full-blown panic attack. Best to "leave those people at home". Instead, bring friends who relish a culinary challenge. Chef JianRen Zhou specialises in"thigh-slapping, salt and chilli-boosted" dishes. Lamb ribs with cumin are first slow-cooked, so that the meat falls off the bone, and are then crusted in spice and fried until crispy: it makes for a "completely involving" dish. Diced chicken with chilli peppers – which we order on the recommendation of our waitress – proves to be the "best version of Chongqing chicken" I've ever had. This is a menu with "uncompromising depths", and to explore it properly you really need to come with a group of friends. Starters £3.80-£13.80; large dishes £11.80-£36.80. 45 Grafton Way, London W1. 

Sea Salt + Sole

This award-winning fish and chip shop next to Dyce train station, just outside Aberdeen, is admittedly "not much to look at", says Tom Parker Bowles in The Mail on Sunday. But if you ever have a spare half-hour before catching your train (as my friend and I did recently en route to the Braemar Literary Festival), it's definitely worth a visit. From the "smiling, immaculate staff", we ordered a large haddock supper (the fish is sourced daily from sustainable suppliers), a battered smoked sausage, and a beef pie from a local butcher. The haddock was greaseless and "incandescently fresh". It wore its crisp, golden batter "like a silk slip", and came with lots of chips with exactly the right "ratio of crunch and squelch". The smoked sausage had "snap, smoke and succulence" – it was a "saveloy with a PhD in good taste" – and the pie was equally delicious. Wolfed down on a "hard plastic bench" on the station platform, our meal was, "quite simply, one of the finest things I've eaten for years". About £9 a head. Station Road, Dyce, Aberdeen. 

Llama Inn

The South American dish ceviche – citrus-marinated fish – is something "I've never really taken to", says William Sitwell in The Daily Telegraph. It has always struck me as an unconvincing "halfway between sashimi and cold fish soup". But a visit to this Peruvian restaurant, on the seventh floor of London's Hoxton Hotel, turned me into "a convert". The ceviche I was served here consisted of scallops in a condensed milk sauce with leche de tigre – a spicy, limey marinade – and "seaweedy crisps" scattered on top. In flavour and texture, it was "sensational". Nor was it the only stand-out dish. Crisp squid with potato-like yuca (cassava) was superb, as was a "triumphant" cabbage skewer, scatted with toasted quinoa and a chancaca (sugar cane) sauce. The sister of a "cult" restaurant of the same name in New York, Llama Inn is, in my opinion, the "best thing to come out of Peru since Paddington". Dinner for two: £57, excluding drinks and service. 1 Willow Street, London EC2.

Sign up to The Week's Food and Drink newsletter for destination guides and the latest trends.