Corsham, British, Modern Restaurant Guide

Since 2006, chef Hywel Jones has been at the helm of the kitchen of this traditional, period dining room which provides a very classical country-house retreat in a rural Palladian mansion: go somewhere else if you want stripped floors and open kitchen, as here you will get swagged curtains, tablecloths, silverware and aperitifs in the lounge. Limited feedback this year, but remaining positive on its high-quality, classically rooted cuisine: there is a tasting menu, but the à la carte offers three courses for £115 per person.

2022 Review: Chef Rob Potter wins solid praise for the consistency of his cuisine at this plush Cotswolds five-star hotel with golf club. The style is “traditional rather than super-inventive” (“we didn’t experience stand-outs but good quality throughout”).

“One of the best in Bath” (that “tourist city largely dominated by chains”), founded in 2016 by Chris Tabbitt, whose CV includes stints at London’s Bibendum and the Old Bridge hotel in Huntingdon, where he met his FOH wife Sarah Olivier. It “seems quite European in the interior” (down to being “fairly cramped”), but that only befits its “excellent French-inspired” bistro cooking, which is offered for a “reasonable” price.

2024 Review: “Outstanding views from the dining area” and “lovely garden” over the surrounding countryside (top walking territory) characterise this well-liked stone gastroboozer; there are plaudits too for its “small menu of good classics” (plus latterly small plates).

2023 Review: A “quirky and interesting” local with a “good atmosphere” serving a “creative menu, with cooking of a consistent high standard”. It makes a “fantastic pub for Sunday lunch”, with “outstanding roasts”.

Harwood Arms co-owner Mike Robinson’s “superior steakhouse” is the fancier of two dining options in the “formal setting of a well-restored Georgian house, now hotel” (from the “modern and quirky” Indigo chain). A visit begins with cocktails in the vault-based speakeasy, before heading upstairs for a seven-course dinner during which “the star is game” – and “oh, the venison! Sourced from the chef’s local estate”, it’s “melt in the mouth” and “just brilliant”. “Good value for money” too – just “go there and enjoy a magnificent meal in this lovely city”.

This decade-old wine merchant and sharing plates restaurant is the flagship of the Beckford Group: a six-strong outfit based in Wiltshire and Somerset (and whose side arm is hit bath and body product brand, Bramley). Perhaps, it’s “more about the wine and ambience than the food” (there are over thirty wines available by the glass, and relatively cheap rates for corkage), and perhaps it’s “a little expensive”, but then again this feel-good place is, according to all reports, “one of those restaurants where you don’t really mind”. Top Tip – the outdoor tables make a “great place to catch the early evening sun come summertime”.

“Top-quality ingredients, expertly cooked, and very warm, attentive service” are much appreciated at this Regency-era townhouse venue from accomplished chef-patron Rob Clayton, who trained under the legendary Nico Ladenis and headed the kitchen brigade at Bath Priory. His “classical style is perhaps a bit old school, but there’s nothing wrong with that…” – “don’t be fooled by the simplicity of the menu, or what could be perceived as high prices: this is worth every penny!”

2022 Review: Taking afternoon tea in this “wonderful Georgian setting with a trio playing during the meal” – and the Roman baths next door – is to wallow in English history, with literary visitors from Jane Austen to Charles Dickens as your guides. The nibbles – “beetroot-cured smoked salmon with homemade blini”, perhaps – are a secondary consideration, “but well worth having!”.

It’s “been around for ever”, but this “quirky” bistro in a fine Georgian house happily “still keeps its standards very high”, with newish owner Matthew Lisanti (who took over from the longtime former landlords in 2021) overseeing the “short, simple and superb” modern European fare. “Great, friendly service” and an interesting list of indie wines also make it “a cut above” in these parts.

Independent wine shop off Queen’s Square whose dining room and heated wood-framed marquee offer a “casual” setting for a rather superior small-plates menu (crab soufflé, beef shin croquettes, pan-roasted pigeon breasts, cod with pork-braised cannellini beans and chorizo, veggie options, cheese boards and desserts) to pair with vintage Burgundies or other discoveries in the fine-wine selection.

Handsome Georgian pub near the Royal Crescent with a relatively ambitious seasonal menu, “excellent wine list” and “stunning Sunday roast”; the courtyard garden is an added attraction in the summer. (“I don’t get to Bath enough but next time I do, this will be on the shortlist for sure!”).

2023 Review: The “food and wine are always interesting” and are “still as good as ever” at engaging Anglo-Scottish chef Gordon Jones’s former sandwich shop on the southern edge of town. There’s “a single tasting menu available” (the only choice is whether to have 7 or 9 courses) and it comes as a complete surprise, with each dish introduced as it arrives at your table (and no vegetarian or other options).

Celebrating three decades as part of the Brownsword Hotels stable in 2024, this lavish getaway in two adjoining Georgian houses has much to love about it, from the four-acre gardens to the UK’s only L’Occitane spa. Dining options are split between the dining room, open for afternoon tea or a £98 per person three-course dinner showcasing “skilful cooking of delightful food”; and the more casual ‘Pantry & Terrace’ which also offers breakfast, brunch and lunch.

“Wonderful... imaginative... loved chatting to the chef” – Ricki Weston and his team maintain the renown of this well-known dining room, where fans applaud “unusual combinations, flavours to savour and the lovely venue”, all in the “beautiful and relaxed location” of this Cotswolds manor house, dating from the early 1800s. All reports are fundamentally very positive, if sometimes with the caveat that “standards can be a bit up and down”. You choose either a six-course meal for £145 per person or a nine-course menu for £175 per person.

2022 Review: The more informal dining option at this luxe Cotswolds country-house hotel, with an elegant grey colour scheme and a garden for summer months – the British-slanted menu offers “tasty food” in “good portions”, drawing on fresh produce from the kitchen garden.

This former private home eight miles from Bath features a “restaurant with a great vibe” and a “really diverse wine list” – making it “perfect for a night away”. The famous ‘25-mile menu’ is a doddle here: the property has its own 30-acre deer park, the largest kitchen garden in the group, an orchard, a smoke house, and even its own mushroom house with a viewing window.

This “wonderful newish restaurant” (a former bakery and sometime student nightclub) is “very popular with a sleek band of locals”, offering a “simple, decent menu”, along with a “wonderful atmosphere… relaxed, upbeat, urban”. Daily Mail critic Tom Parker Bowles enjoyed a “lunch of heartily refined cooking, confidently straightforward, with service to match” in his April 2025 review. Top Menu Tip – “their grilled pork chop is so good, it’s hard to consider anything else, though it’s also one of the rare restaurants in Bath to offer good fresh fish”.