Restaurants in the UK worth travelling for

Chef Ben Wilkinson in the kitchen at The Pass at South Lodge — Ben Wilkinson in the open kitchen at his Michelin-starred restaurant

(Image credit: South Lodge)

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Ben Wilkinson at The Pass, West Sussex
Maria, Sheffield
Cuubo, Birmingham
Bybrook at The Manor House, Wiltshire
Catch at the Old Fish Market, Dorset
Maré, East Sussex
The General Tarleton, North Yorkshire
Ragù, Bristol
Noto, Edinburgh

Whatever the clichés about British food, there are some cracking places to eat all around the UK. Ranging from the sensory intensity of a chef’s table to the social bustle of a neighbourhood bistro, all of these stunning restaurants dish up some of the most palate-wowing dishes in the country.

Ben Wilkinson at The Pass, West Sussex

There are two things to know about The Pass, writes The Week’s Irenie Forshaw. The first: this is the type of fine dining that’s actually tasty. And the second? You’ll feel lucky to secure a table here. Hidden behind the reception at South Lodge – a luxury hotel that overlooks the South Downs – The Pass reopened earlier this year following a refurb with a brand-new menu. Thankfully, head chef Ben Wilkinson is still at the helm, alongside his talented wife Monika Zurawska, who is in charge of the warm and welcoming front-of-house team. They run a tight ship. The restaurant is beautifully decorated with unique little touches like the fabric pendant lamps and pretty murals of radishes that adorn the curving walls. It’s an intimate setting with space for just 28 diners, which only adds to the fun, electric atmosphere. In the open kitchen, the chefs work quietly and methodically, armed with tweezers to add the finishing touches to meticulously crafted plates of food. During our seven-course tasting menu we were treated to a Louët-Feisser oyster poached in its own shell and served in a light, creamy sauce with beluga caviar and tiny chunks of turnip. This was followed by an intensely rich braised beef cheek garnished with crispy straw-like celeriac and served with a disc of fried sourdough bread topped with beef tartare. But my favourite dish was the dessert Wilkinson himself brought to the table: fromage blanc perfectly balanced with little cubes of peach, a citrussy sorbet and grains of paradise, which the chef told us is a peppercorn from west Africa that has a “warmth like ginger”. With food like this, I have a feeling it won’t be long until the Michelin inspectors come knocking with a second star.

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Sheffield is home to a number of “idiosyncratic restaurants”, from the “ultra-modernist Jöro” to the “South African-inspired Orange Bird”, says Tony Naylor in The Observer. The latest to join their ranks is the Sicilian-inspired Maria, housed in a “sharply designed space” in the city centre. The cooking here could not be further from that of your average “high-street trat”. Italian, but not “as you know it”, it offers a riot of “full-bore flavours”. Typical are the handmade pasta dishes: cavatelli with an “almost funkily savoury pesto trapanese”; pappardelle with mutton, artichokes and ricotta salata, which “delivers layered umami oomph”. But while a meal here can feel “like an artillery barrage”, the chef, Tom Aronica, is “also capable of deft lightness”. Cuttlefish-filled arancini are “subtlety themselves”, while sea bream crudo is a dish of “intelligent poise”, the fresh pomelo and fried rosemary providing an “unusual acidic-herbaceous counter to the bream’s luxuriously smooth flesh”. On a Thursday night a month or so after it opened, Maria was “busily abuzz with hip young things”. Let’s hope it continues to thrive.

When this place in Birmingham opened during lockdown, it was a very different beast to what it is now, says Tom Parker Bowles in The Mail on Sunday. Named Qbox, it “sold salads, fried chicken, and mac and cheese”. Then, about two years ago, chef-proprietor Dan Sweet turned the “takeaway into a restaurant proper” – and it has been packed ever since. Cuubo has space for only 22 diners, and the menu is similarly compact, with just five choices per course. But there’s no lack of ambition in Sweet’s “assured cooking”. A “fat” raviolo stuffed with spicy sausage is “enveloped in a rich ragù” and topped with an “ethereally light parmesan espuma”. At once “gutsily hearty and quietly refined”, it’s “one of the best things I’ve eaten all year”. A lozenge of pork belly sits in a “swirl of bacon cream”, and is a “paean to the beauty of a well brought-up pig”. Sweet is assisted by only one other chef, which makes the quality of his food remarkable. And with a three-course lunch costing £45 (and dinner £55), the place offers “exceptional value too”.

Named after the river that winds through the hotel grounds, this elegant restaurant offers Michelin-starred dining in a picture-perfect setting, writes The Week’s Irenie Forshaw. Bybrook is tucked inside a 14th-century manor house in Castle Combe – a quaint (if touristy) Cotswold village that’s often hailed as the prettiest in England. Executive chef Robert Potter has crafted an intricate tasting menu packed with ingredients from the on-site vegetable garden. We kicked things off with a delightful trout tartlet in a squid ink parcel topped with dots of wasabi, and sweet, juicy Isle of Wight tomatoes served with a dashi broth and freshly picked edible flowers. Next came the bread course: flaky brioche and croissant rolls, and a rustic farmer’s loaf with a salty crust, infused with local ale and drizzled with olive oil. The top-quality produce really shines here; Cornish turbot in a silky seaweed butter sauce is served with fresh wild garlic leaves. A zingy bowl of lime, mango and passionfruit salad topped with coconut sorbet and foam is the perfect palate cleanser before dessert. We were even given a mini box of raspberry macarons to take away for a midnight snack. Guests can choose to stay in the main building or – like us – in one of the honey-coloured cottages within the hotel grounds.

The area around Weymouth Harbour’s Old Fish Market is “horribly pretty, even in the dark”, said William Sitwell in The Telegraph. And it’s home to this fabulous restaurant, specialising in local fish. After walking up some winding stairs, you enter a charming, dimly lit space with low beams and an open kitchen. At first, the nine-course menu looks “rather daunting”, but such is the brilliance of the cooking that everything slips down effortlessly. Hash brown topped with raw tuna and smoked egg yolk is a “one-bite glory”. There’s “blissful” shellfish broth with sliced squid and onion, and fine seabass with hollandaise and green sauce. But one dish towers above the rest – and indeed is one of the finest I’ve ever eaten. It consists of “scallops, raw and soft and sweet”, nestling with raw local prawns and baby tomatoes “dried just a touch”. On top is a squirt of roe, and it all sits in a “soft bath of smoked olive oil”. A lesson in “simplicity and great sense”, it’s so “delectable” that “happy tears” gather in my eyes.

Maré is wonderfully unstuffy, writes The Week’s Irenie Forshaw. Located on Hove’s bustling Church Road, the latest culinary venture from Rafael Cagali (the celebrated chef behind two Michelin-starred Da Terra in Bethnal Green, London) and his partner Charlie Lee, is fine dining – but with a warm, buzzy atmosphere. Staff are attentive and knowledgeable, brimming with obvious passion for the new restaurant, and eager to advise on perfect wine pairings. Cagali’s protégé, Ewan Waller, heads the tiny kitchen downstairs, working closely with his mentor to craft flavour-packed dishes that draw on Cagali’s Brazilian-Italian roots, while showcasing local ingredients. There is a refreshing lack of jellies, foams and gels on the menu; these are tasty dishes that will have you polishing off every last morsel. We kicked things off with a glass of chilled English fizz and a selection of moreish bites including crispy tempura oysters drizzled with a hot sauce emulsion and topped with slivers of pickled onion; and pillowy toasted brioche coated with liver parfait, tangy preserved cherries and lashings of truffle. From here, we dived into an assortment of delicious small plates spanning everything from “Build Your Own Tacos” (mini cassava taco shells, tender, slow-cooked lamb shoulder, black bean mole and a fiery fermented-chilli sauce) to picanha steak smothered with chimichurri. Be sure to order a side of the addictive cassava chips – and save space for dessert: the fragrant olive oil sponge, topped with a rich Mayan chocolate ganache and scoop of coffee ice cream, was the perfect end to the meal.

The chef Tommy Banks owns a number of establishments in Yorkshire, as well as a brand of tinned wines, said William Sitwell in The Telegraph. Now, with his business partners, he has renovated The General Tarleton, an eight-bedroomed pub not far from Harrogate, which first opened in 1762. It’s clear right away that he “knows what he is doing”: the refit is “sympathetic”, and “there’s a distinct feel of professionalism among the staff”. And when I start “gleefully” raiding the menu, my delight only grows. Ham and chopped carrots prove an “appetising joy” – a dish of Yorkshire coppa and delicious brined vegetables. It’s followed by a “well-orchestrated” cheddar-cheese soufflé and “unimprovable” slow-cooked lamb shoulder, which sits on a circle of soft polenta “emboldened by gravy at the base” and tenderstem broccoli on top. For pudding, there’s “magnificent” treacle tart, its filling a “sublime and rich mix of citrus, ginger and syrup”. Banks and co. have worked wonders, turning an old boozer into a “gastronomic pleasuredome”.

Bristol’s Wapping Wharf, with its many shops and restaurants, has become a “true independent food destination”, said Grace Dent in The Guardian. Ragù is a “cool, minimal, romantic ode to Italian cooking” housed in a converted shipping container. Owned by Mark and Karen Chapman (who also run nearby Cor), it offers what could be “some of the most skilful cooking anywhere in Britain right now”. Our meal began with crisp, lightly battered artichoke fritters, served with “punchy aïoli”. Of the mains, the “star of the show” was Ashton Court venison, “cooked rare but as soft as butter”, accompanied by “pungent gorgonzola with bone marrow butter”. Diners “wanting something lighter” could go for the tagliolini with Devon crab. The puds here are excellent too – like the chocolate budino with sour cherries: an “almost-too-much truffle-type cake” – and service is “fantastically prompt”.

“We make delicious food”, reads the blurb on Noto’s website. It’s “not wrong”, says Tom Parker Bowles in The Mail on Sunday. Stuart Ralston’s restaurant in Edinburgh’s New Town – one of a “small but critically lauded group” – is an unassuming “gem”. The short menu has a “strong Japanese accent”, and the dishes display an “innate” understanding of “Japanese technique”. Scottish mackerel is sliced sashimi-thin and served with ponzu and a “mere whisper of wasabi”, with pickled squash adding “subtle bite”. Trout arrives in the “crisp embrace” of a deep-fried nori shell, with a “generous spoonful” of salmon caviar providing a “bracing, piscine- scented blast”. Ralston’s cooking “isn’t in thrall to the cult of authenticity”, however. Udon soup isn’t quite what you’d expect: the noodles are made of potato, and with wild mushrooms in the dashi broth, it’s a dish that “melds the Scottish and the Japanese”. The fried chicken is also “very much its own bird”: its “crisp and dark” crust is produced by the “inspired addition” of a coffee and cabernet sauvignon glaze. With lovely service, decent prices and a good wine list, Noto is not to be missed.