Hardens Guide to the Best Restaurants in Birmingham
Hardens guides have spent 31 years compiling reviews of the best Birmingham restaurants. On Hardens.com you'll find details and reviews of 53 restaurants in Birmingham and our unique survey based approach to rating and reviewing Birmingham restaurants gives you the best insight into the top restaurants in every area and of every type of cuisine.
Featured Birmingham Restaurants
1. Divide
British, Modern restaurant in Birmingham City Centre
Unit 9, 8 Centenary Square - B1
Divide is our exclusive restaurant uniquely created with privacy & intimacy for 1 – 4 guests or up to 16 Guests within our exclusive Private Dining Room, aptly named the Kin Table, Divide is uniquely hosted by our Chefs who Create a modern British micro- seasonal p...
2. Sabai Sabai
Thai restaurant in Birmingham
268 High Street - B17
2018 Review: More reports please on Torquil and Juree Chidwick’s stylish modern Harborne Thai: part of a local mini-chain of upmarket Thai restaurants founded in Moseley in 2003.
3. 8
British, Modern restaurant in Birmingham City Centre
Unit 8, 8 Centenary Square - B1
Our Flag Ship Restaurant “8” is one of the UK’s most progressive & pioneering dining experience hosted, delivered & executed in the heart of the 8 kitchen by our critically acclaimed 8 brigade led daily by Andrew Sheridan. Featured by Michelin & reco...
4. The Karczma
Polish restaurant in Birmingham
Bordesley St - B5
Lovers of kitsch should make a beeline to this well-established venue, not far from the Bull Ring, decorated like an old-fashioned Eastern European cottage – “highly recommended to anybody who would like to try Polish cuisine” or looking for a meal with “great character”.
5. Craft
British, Modern restaurant in Birmingham
The Terrace, Unit 10-11 The ICC, Centenary Square - B1
Craft is our unique, cool and chic Garden. Its features our famous Pods, Capsules & Summerhouse available for up to 12 Guests Dining from our Relaxed Family Style 4 Course Menu or For Drinks around the fire whilst listening to our Resident DJ, playing classic about beats to i...
6. Peel's
British, Modern restaurant in Hampton-in-Arden
Hampton Manor, Shadowbrook Lane - B92
This Victorian manor house (with 15 bedrooms) is one of the grand dames of the Midlands hospitality scene, although – under proprietors the Hills, who have owned it since 1986 – it is in the middle of repositioning itself not just as a hotel, but as a provider of ‘immersive staycation experiences’ as ‘a spiritual home for the food lover’. There’s a new sibling to Peel’s (see Smoke), a new trendy bakery in the grounds, and new suites opening in 2022. Peel’s itself occupies a wood panelled chamber and is still the main culinary event, where chef Darren Meacham produces a six-course tasting menu, matched with (sometimes funky natural) wine pairings. On all reports, “celebrating a special occasion at Peel’s is itself a truly special experience”.
7. Divide by 8
Sandwiches, cakes, etc restaurant in Birmingham City Centre
Unit 7, 8 Centenary Square - B1
Salutations, Divide by 8 is our afternoon cakes & cocktails bar exclusively designed to host guests wishing to “Eat The Best Cake & Drink Banging Cocktails” In the evening it opens its doors for pre & after diner drinks, which hosts our resident DJ & m...
8. Sabai Sabai
Thai restaurant in Birmingham
25 Woodbridge Road - B13
The original of this small local Thai chain inspired only limited feedback this year, but all to the effect that it’s a good-value choice.
9. Adam's
British, Modern restaurant in Birmingham
16 Waterloo St - B2
Often cited by fans as “Birmingham’s top gastronomic destination”, Adam & Natasha Stoke’s central restaurant and bar wins ongoing praise for its “sublime food with service to match”, although you don’t have to have the tasting menu to enjoy it, as there is also a more conventional three-course option. After our survey concluded, in Sept 2021, it acquired a new head chef: James Goodyear, who joined from London’s Hide.
10. Rosa's Thai Cafe
Thai restaurant in Birmingham
2b Chamberlain Square - B3
2021 Review: The “lovely Thai food” at these reliable cafés is “impressively authentic given that they are a chain” – “excellent value” and “fast”, if occasionally let down by “iffy service”. Founded in 2008 by Saiphin and Alex Moore, who inherited the name of their first East End site, the group has 18 branches in London and expanded to Liverpool, Manchester, Reading (delivery only) and Leeds following the sale of a majority stake to US investors. The couple also have two spin-offs, Lao Café in Covent Garden and the new Chinese noodle bar Hoh Sek in St Katharine Docks.
11. Dishoom
Indian restaurant in Birmingham
Paradise, One Chamberlain Square - B3
“New to Brum, home of the Balti, but proving very popular” – this all-conquering retro-Bombay group opened in a prime central position near the town hall and art gallery in 2020, to their accustomed acclaim. The Birmingham branch pays tribute to Mumbai’s Swadeshi market, and the two cities’ shared legacies of ‘1,000 trades’. Top Tip: “loved their butter paneer and chicken Ruby Murray”.
12. Asha’s Indian Bar and Restaurant
Indian restaurant in Birmingham
12-22 Newhall St - B3
There’s a “great buzz” at this outpost of Bollywood singer Asha Bhosle’s empire – yes, she's the same Asha namechecked in the 1997 Cornershop single, and amazingly the most recorded artist in music history – with “lovely cocktails” serving as a foil to the “rich” North-West Indian cuisine.
13. Lantern Restaurant at 103 Colmore Row (D&D London)
British, Modern restaurant in Birmingham
103 Colmore Row - B3
D&D London are at last to open in Brum with this rooftop restaurant on the 24th floor of the new tower on the site of the old NatWest building near the cathedral. Originally announced in January 2020, an October 2021 update scheduled its debut for spring 2022.
14. Fazenda
Brazilian restaurant in Birmingham
55 Colmore Row, Barwick Street Entrance - B3
2021 Review: “Latino steak restaurant in the heart of Birmingham city centre” – this well-appointed new branch of the expanding Brazilian chain offers its trademark “generous meat and buffet” formula. It’s tipped by one or two reporters as “good for business meals”.
15. San Carlo
Italian restaurant in Birmingham
4 Temple Street - B2
Sicilian-born Carlo Distefano founded his now international chain thirty years ago with this Brum institution, creating a template of classic upscale Italian food served with immaculate professionalism in a smart and “romantic atmosphere”. He now has 22 restaurants in England and branches in the Middle East and Bangkok.
16. Sabai Sabai
Thai restaurant in Birmingham
8 Waterloo Street - B2
2019 Review: Fourth and most ambitious of this Thai mini-chain, established in Moseley in 2003 – it occupies a large Grade II listed, city-centre property that once housed the Legal and General Assurance Society. It opened in late 2018 – limited feedback so far, but all positive.
17. The Ivy Temple Row Birmingham
British, Modern restaurant in Birmingham
67-71 Temple Row - B2
One of the Ivy clones, which achieved a positive press this year. “Nothing like the original Ivy of course”, though the “attractive” design is a “very loosely based pastiche” of that luminary – and, “rather surprisingly, it works”. “The food is fairly simple but well prepared and served with some elegance” – “I didn’t think I would like it but ended up being quite impressed”.
18. Opheem
Indian restaurant in Birmingham
65 Summer Row - B3
“Continuing to excite since it first opened in 2018: we always leave feeling wonderfully fulfilled!” – Aktar Islam’s “sensational” fine-dining Indian a little way out of the city-centre “is another step up from his former restaurant Lasan” and it is nowadays Brum’s most-commented on restaurant. The cuisine is “arguably more modern-European-with-Indian-influences rather than pure ‘Indian’ but perfectly spiced and spectacular!”. Islam did his brand no harm at all with his “superb Aktar At Home service”, which also inspires many adulatory reviews.
19. Tattu
Chinese restaurant in Birmingham
18 Barwick Street - B3
2021 Review: “Arresting” design is a big feature of Adam and Drew Jones’s stunning-looking Chinese-themed yearling: the city’s biggest basement bar and restaurant situated in the recently reopened Grand hotel (built in 1879, and refurbished after over a decade’s closure). Too few reports for a rating as yet: its menu contains a “theatrically presented combination of small bites and larger dishes”. The next stop after this is Edinburgh, opening late 2019.
20. Purnells
British, Modern restaurant in Birmingham
55 Cornwall St - B3
“Superb in every aspect” – Glynn Purnell lives up to his moniker as the ‘yummy Brummie’ at this business quarter restaurant, which edged rival Adam’s this year for Brum’s highest food score. And his “consistently delicious” and creative cooking is backed up by an “excellent wine cellar”. “For a celebration the private dining room is excellent” (“the most expensive meal I’ve ever had by a long way, but I definitely don’t regret it!”).
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