Bristol Restaurant Guide

“WOW!” – “every mouthful is wonderful and foodgasmic” at the Sanchez-Iglesias family’s “sensational” HQ: a “flawless experience” that has regularly won a place at the top of our list of the UK’s top 100 restaurants. It marries a “stunning, stone-walled venue” on the ground floor of the city-centre’s former General Hospital with “sublime” dishes from a twelve-course tasting menu, with the option of “perfectly matched wine flights”. Getting a reservation is no mean feat though: availability is released on the first Tuesday of each month at noon (UK time) for the period four months in advance! And even fans “dislike being required to pay (non-refundable) in advance at the time of booking”.

Near the docks, Peter Sanchez-Iglesias’s aim is to ‘transport you to Andalusia’ (well that’s what the website says) at his casual tapas haunt (named after his dad). As a concept, it’s “absolutely spot on” and “tapas of the highest quality, with every dish a delight”, alongside a decent list of wines and sherries. “Try to get a seat at the counter for top banter with the chefs and great views as they toss stuff into the open fire”.

Chef-owner George Livesey’s “very adventurous tasting menus” – full of “unusual ingredients and foraged items” – have made this modest-looking, former greengrocers a top star of the Bristol dining scene. Some reporters reckon it’s “a bit of a Marmite restaurant – love it or hate it”, but all are converted by the time they leave, and if some dishes “don’t look appealing on the menu or on the black plates, they certainly taste good”. Service is “friendly and well-informed”, and there’s an “interesting, mainly organic wine list”.

“The most innovative, original and seasonal food in Bristol at the moment” is the claim made by fans of Jan Ostle and Mary Wilson’s Redlands bistro – “a very small place” offering a “reassuringly limited choice of very well-sourced dishes (magnolia blossom and mackerel a surprise and a success) with service that’s charming, enthusiastic and helpful”. At the end of October 2019, the couple announced a further step towards hyper-locality, with new menus incorporating ever-more produce from their own expanding farm.

“Still the best fish/seafood in Bristol”, say fans of this long running operation (fka Rockfish Grill) from Mitch Tonks of The Seahorse in Dartmouth. “If we were confined to one restaurant forever, this would be it” – “excellent, very fresh fish”, “reliable cooking, good service and comfortable”.

A “quirky”, even “crazy place for a meal” – a “Victorian lido where you sit and watch Bristolians swim lengths in the open air” while you eat behind glass in the former viewing gallery. This “unexpected venue has even more unexpected culinary standards”, serving “rather interesting food with distinctive Mediterranean elements” – a legacy of former Moro chef Freddy Bird, who ran the kitchen here for 10 years – “and service that is friendly rather than professional. The pool and the building are the real stars, though”.

Fans “love this place” – a softly-lit tapas joint, in Cotham Hill, which has made a name for its “small plates and Spanish sandwiches done right”; if there’s a caveat it’s that “too many covers squashed into a tiny space” can spell noise and a “rapid turnover”. Owners Kieran & Imogen Waite – also behind Bakers & Co (Gloucester Road) and Cargo Cantina/Gambas (Wapping Wharf) – launched new Mexican eatery, Masa + Mescal, in Stokes Croft, in March 2019.

“Really great pizza and small plates” ensure that this Neapolitan-style outfit (also with a Clifton Village sibling) is “always buzzing”; it’s “particularly great in the summer when the windows are open to the pavement on a sunny evening”.