Scotland Restaurant Guide

This “Headingley institution” has provided good-quality pasta, pizza and Sicilian specialities for almost 50 years. John & Gip Dammone were both awarded MBEs last summer, having spent their entire working lives at the restaurant their father Salvatore founded in 1976. They sold up in 2023, and the new owners are not making big changes.

This “relentlessly excellent” family-run spot on “an anonymous corner in Meanwood” is “starting to get the attention it deserves” as “a place where a kind of magic can be experienced in plates of delightful Italian food”. “Russell Norman lives on in north Leeds!” – a reference to the late founder of Brutto and before that Polpo in London, where Rosario Leggiero worked before opening Zucco with his chef brother Michael over a decade ago. Michael’s wife Clare is also part of the team, and their sons Matteo & Joe are being groomed to take the reins.

Launched in February 2024, this welcoming, unpretentious bistro in Horsforth is the work of Yorkshire-born chef Sandy Jarvis, returning after a successful decade at kitchens in London. Low-intervention wines are also a major focus, as his partner and co-founder Clement Cousin grew up on a biodynamic vineyard in the Loire Valley, and his family’s wines are on the list. Early feedback in our annual diners’ poll suggests it’s doing an excellent all-round job as a superior local bistro (but its early PR coup of being declared the best local restaurant in the UK by The Good Food Guide may be over-egging matters a bit).

Just like its much-loved Epsom elder sibling (est. 2016), this spin-off from chefs Nand Kishor & Sanjay Gour has quickly raced to the top of the Trip Advisor ranks, with an offering that includes a five-course tasting menu, alongside weekend thali brunches. It hasn’t yet elicited the same reams of feedback as the original in our annual diners’ poll however, but reports are encouraging, if well below the full-on raves of its cousin ‘darn sarf’.