Solstice opened in 2021, rebranded from its former incarnation of being ‘Kenny’s cafe’ on the decision of Kenny Atkinson to make it a continuum and next chapter of House of Tides. By all accounts this was a serious menu and the details of my menu experienced are as follows:  

SMOKED EEL – this was a brandade, with crème fraiche, smoked eel, compressed granny apple and N25 hybrid caviar, served chicken skin crackers. This had a beautiful balance of the salt from the eel and caviar combined with the softening creme fraiche and acidity of the gel.   

BEETROOT – a crusade with chewy beetroot cooked in salt crust for 4-5 hours and seasoned with diced, dehydrated beetroot (having cooked in beef fat), cumin, elderberry pickled from last year, horseradish creme fraiche, carroway, and lightly pickled beetroot. This was good, with a chewy, salty texture and lovely crunch of the crustade. 

DUCK – chicken liver parfait with Pedro Ximanez sherry, pain d’epiese, fermented plum, dill and fresh flowers served in a spring roll pastry, parcel.  This was frankly outstanding – the perfect texture of the parfait also had real liver depth and was balanced with the supporting plum and dill gave the sweet and lightness it needed, all combined in the beautifully brittle pastry for texture – wonderfully enjoyable.

PORK – this course consisted of two elements, a dumpling and a broth.  The dumpling, pork shoulder, was made with dashi, cooked in pork fat, black bean paste, ginger,  pickled daicon, yuzu ponzu and trout roe – a lot of elements and a nice result with a very light batter and softened pork flavour.  The broth of pork collar was made with shiitake mushrooms, ceps, ginger seasoned with ponzu and miso oil. This was a very dark broth and quite salty.

LOBSTER – cooked in its own oil and served with sancho pepper, fresh red currents, yuzu gel, yuzu caramel, yuzu butter cream sauce and lobster head oil on top. Although the lobster piece was only just warm, the small piece had good sweetness and texture and overall lovely combinations of cream and citrus combined.

SASHIMI – a ‘palate cleanser’ which came with sea bass, cured in sake brine, rolled in black radish, blanched, finger lime, dill and ponzu, aged mirin, infused with shiitake and kombu, seasoned with bergamot, zest and toasted sesame oil.  This was aromatic to the last, complex and light. All the aramats worked well together and was good to have some vegetables in the mix for the meal.  

PARMESAN – a cheese mousse from 35 day macadamia nuts, glazed with Lea & Perrin sauce, gold dust, truffle, Parmesan sauce and South of France truffles from truffle company Wiltshire truffles.  This was absolutely delightful. I was grinning as a genuine dopamine moment from the first moment of this course.  Overall it had the perfect seasoning in amongst the aerated cheese with the truffle and  – beautifully done, showing real skill.

CATCH OF THE DAY – Monkfish from Hodgson Fish of Cornwall was dry-aged for texture, served with melody blossom, apple marigold and a smoked creamed sauce using Craster kippers. This was probably one of the best Monkfish I have ever had (they can so often be too chewy, but this was perfectly supple and smokey in flavour with amazing sauces, all washed down with a wonderful Riesling whilst listening to Simply Red For your Babies playing as the restaurant music in the background – I was utterly happy in this moment with everything.

SQUAB PIGEON – from Anjou, near Lyon.  The pigeon breast was served with a cherry glaze, cherry juice, miso, sake, sugar, seasoned with pink peppercorn, salt baked celeriac, topped with puree of celeriac, yeast, black garlic, cherry gel, butterfly sorrel and parsley.  The sauce was made using the carcasses of the pigeon wings and chicken with Madeira wine, chopped truffle, Parker house brioche brushed with chicken fat.  The pigeon was absolutely spot on with a lovely, deep sauce that had a delightful hint of aniseed touch in the sauce.  Beautifully made milk bread was provided to soak up all of the sauce possible and this was used to the maximum level possible. 

PEAR – a picturesque pre-dessert of goats yoghurt and goats milk crémeux came with horseradish jam, mashed pears, pear sorbet and a tuille (from pear pulp) with a final drizzle of pear and sage juice with sage oil. This was refreshing and lovely. Done. 

HONEY – the main dessert was a celebration of honey from the Northumberland Honey Company made from heather honey, parfait bergamot, fresh bee pollen, ice cream from grain.  The honey parfait was delicious with good texture and the ice cream with a pleasantly contrasting (nutty) toasted cereal flavour.  It was in effect an absolute showcase of honey as a dessert and one of the best honey desserts I’ve ever had. 

An array of petit fours was presented with coffee.  A cranberry tart crémeux with cinnamon, orange, cranberry gel, mascarpone; Granny Smith Apple financier creme patissiere  (lovely apple crumble feel to it); Manjeri chocolate with 64% cacao (not overly bitter, and nicely smoked sea salt complement); blood orange pate de fruit (fruit paste), infused blood orange, cardamon, Madagascan pepper (very good mix of spice and sweetness) and finally a tonca bean petit four of single origin Manjari 70% Valrhona chocolate, filled with tamarind gel and chilli ganache with chilli coconut – once again, very good handling of spice, heat and sweetness.

This was a very impressive menu and the consistency I enjoyed that pretty much every single course had a degree of freshness in amongst the sometimes complex mix of elements without confusing the overall result.  The atmosphere of the restaurant was charming with the lovely touch of the kitchen team bringing out and explaining the dishes themselves.  There is real care and pride in the work here and rightly so.  I thought this was Kenny Atkinson at his absolute best and certainly the most intricate and impressive menu I have enjoyed of his yet. I will wager that Solstice is very much the flagship beacon of the brand now, even if it is a more recent addition.

I have yet to have a bad meal in any way on any of my visits to Kenny Atkinson’s venues – they have strong consistency and based on this meal, Solstice is highly recommended as a result.

Food Grade: 87%

A series of well-prepared canapés began the meal.  ‘Uncle Juan’s rosti’ came with  sour cream & pickled onions and was a superb start. Next, for the meat eaters, ham, egg & Berkswell crumpet (just the egg for the vegetarian version) which was appealing, followed by an Oxtail & Thyme custard, bone marrow cordyceps and tarragon bite (minus the beef elements for the vegetarian option) – all fine.

The amuse bouche was Umbellifers (flowers) cooked in allium broth with ricotta, thyme and ramson (a form of wild garlic flower); this was deep and beautifully done.  Home made bread and whipped, salted butter were very well done.  Onion, onion, onion, mint was the name of the next course that comprised of onions cooked in dashi and celery, served with ricotta, onion crisp, thyme leaves and oxalis petals.

The first of the mains were corn fed roasted crown of chicken served with a herb rosti, honey glazed alliums, smoked aubergine and a white onion puree.  This included thyme, tarragon, pickled carrot, sour cream and ramson oil for the chicken and the seabass pescatarian version.  The sauces for these had good depth and worked with both dishes with another superb rosti to go with the mains.

The dessert was a delight and reminded me of Norwegian Rødgrød – a sweet composite of plum and damson served with goat’s milk, marigold oil, brown butter/sugar crunch on top.  Some at the table felt this was too sweet, but I thought fine when balanced with the goats milk and loved the texture of the butter and sugar crunch.  There will have one or two calories in this dish for sure, but I thought very good.

Redbank coffee was served with petit fours of buttermilk custard madeleines, sea buckthorn pastiles and chocolate grenache, all of which were good.  It completed a meal that was satisfying, clean cut and well presented.  The next time I am passing I will be delighted to come back in and try a freshly made sausage roll from Kevin Tickle’s team with a beer in their pub area – for around £10, I predict that will be one of the best purchases available.

Food Grade: 81%

St Barts is under the helmsmanship of head chef Johnnie Crowe who is formerly of The Harwood Arms (when under Alex Harper) and Nest in East London.  Our meal started with House made soda bread with slices of pancetta from the loin of Mangalaci, a breed of pig specific to Hungry and widely thought of as the ‘Kobe beef’ of pig.  This was indeed very good and a simple and quality start.

Next up came Jersey beef Denver carpaccio (known for its marbling) which had 100 days aging and was swerved with horseradish perilla flower (within the shiso family).  This had a lovely coating of oil and bite from the perilla which were pitched very nicely.  Next came buttered mushrooms on set custard with mushroom stock, cep, shitake, caramelised yeast butter sourdough croutons and pickled foam – I thought this was cracking with punchy mushroom and indulgent textures and accompanying flavours.

Squash ‘risotto’, was next and was diced squash, puree pumpkin seed, praline and foam from pickled squash juice.  This was indeed carefully prepared and executed but my mind could not help reflect on simpler and more powerful versions of pumpkin or butternut squash as experienced at 2 Michelin starred Kichisen in Kyoto.  Peking duck from Yorkshire was aged two weeks in house to get rid of moisture in skin and served with pickled lingonberries, duck fat and berry compote dressing.  Home made milk bread (very good) was on the side along with a mashed potato side as well.

An additional cheese course was opted for which included Yarlington, Baron Bigod, Beauvale, Sinodun Hill and Lincolnshire poacher, served with Buchanons Oatcakes, spelt sour dough crackers and fruit bread.  All of these were hugely enjoyable and it was also very good to have such good condiments as well which included Medlar and onion chutney and quince.

The dessert was black apple with puffed wheat, black barley cake apple compote, black apple tuile and sour dough ice cream which was a good dessert however I probably enjoyed the flavour of the excellent sour dough ice cream the most – a lovely balance of sweet and slightly savoury, expertly done to accompany the rather bitter apple remainder, which did not perhaps feel like the main component.  Tea came from the Rare Tea Company and Nespresso for the coffee and the petit fours were a skilful couple of chocolate tarlets made with koji, miso and caramel – whilst these were pleasant with well-executed pastry tartlets, normal ganache would have been more enjoyable in a tartlet as my preference if there was a choice. 

In summary, there were some fine aspects to the produce sourcing here, with a very hospitable team and engaging and articulate chef on meeting and speaking with him.  The restaurant is a beautiful place and I was pleased to have experienced it.

Food Grade: 72%

Scott Paton moved to Boringdon Hall in 2016 having moved from the Horn of Plenty in Tavistock.  He oversaw the transition in 2018 of Àclèaf taking over the former Gallery restaurant and has thankfully managed to survive the significant turmoil since 2020.  The meal started with three intricate canapes with well crafted home made breads and butters.  The Iberian charcuterie had a deep, smokey flavour with good salt content; the mini celeriac pickle tart held superb pastry and pleasing Japanese pear, hazelnut pickled celeriac and truffle oil and the mini black pudding beignet was warming.  Home made  baguette and brown breads came with salted butter from Normandy and a wonderfully judged goats milk butter with truffle honey on top, proving a very good combination.  Goat’s milk is not to everyone’s palette, but when balanced like this (i.e. made less potent but still with inherent flavour), it shows a high, quality skill level.

Whilst we’re on this, I actually enjoy the canapes and breads probably the most in all my meals as it can very often serve as a very good indicator for the quality line and calibre of the restaurant – if the effort is there to make the ‘smaller’ things wonderful, it shows a very good advertisement to how much care goes in to the main elements and therefore the meal as a whole. As an aside, it was also gratifying to see Gusbourne served by the glass on the wine list as well (one of the more punchy of English Sparkling wines I have enjoyed visiting in Kent).

My starter choice was the chicken liver parfait.  This was gorgeously smooth and had a wonderful touch with the Pedro Ximénez and equally well-done brioche to accompany.  Next was the very pretty crab dish from a large, 2kg Red King crab served with a curry emulsion.  This was fabulous – excellent, sweet white crab with garden herbs,  absolutely fresh, a lovely combination with just the right amount of curry.  I upgraded my main to the Highland wagyu which was another, very good dish.  The Highland beef rump was braised with hen of woods mushroom beef jus, served with celeriac fondant and puree with ox tongue bone marrow.  There was rich intensity here without being too much and was a strong main. 

Pre-dessert was creative.  At the beginning of the meal I was asked to simply nominate my preferences on a cryptic piece of paper showing different shapes and colours – I felt like I was about to enter the eating phase of Squid Game.  What it was actually used for was to decide which type of pre-dessert I had a subconscious bias towards; turns out my opted colours and shapes were aligned most to the sharper based lemon-based optiont.  This was good news for me as the whole point of a pre-dessert is to serve as a palette cleanse from savoury to sweet and lemon handled correctly, does this probably better than anything.  A lemon mousse, lemon posset and lemon curd pre-dessert was nicely balanced (not too sharp), visually pleasing and just the right portion size.

My actual dessert was the duck egg brûlée, the eggs coming from the local Newlands farm.  Duck egg is underused in my opinion and wonderfully rich so careful treatment is required – thankfully this was done yet again. Cinnamon cream, dusted puff pastry, French financiers, cranberry compote with cranberry ice cream all came together beautifully, the cranberry cutting through the rich egg perfectly and this was frankly a stunning dessert. Handmade petit fours were served in the hidden bar for a change of scene to finish and included tonka bean with cherry glaze, Mirabelle plum and single origin chocolate which were all good.

There was virtually nothing I didn’t enjoy about this meal and it is amazing what happens sometimes when one moves further out of London, you can find some lovely gems.  I would definitely say this is one of them.

Food Grade: 85%

Once things were ordered, the espuma amuse bouche arrived with bread and butter offerings to keep busy whilst waiting for the first, selected course of l’oeuf – egg “en cocotte” with cream corn and iberico ham which was wonderfully light and rich at the same time from the perfectly confit egg.  This was the upgraded version however with white truffle shavings which, although small in quantity was actually pitched perfectly as the aroma was one of the strongest I have ever experienced and I didn’t even have to lean forward much at all to be hit in the face with the power of the truffle.  I recall having to put my nose right up against a truffle in a three Michelin starred restaurant in London and still struggling to gain any form of distinct truffle smell.

I couldn’t resist the signature le foie gras dish which is seared Duck Liver, with a quince gel, shaved stick of apple and almond crumbs on top.  I have had seared foie gras with an almond foam as one of the best I have ever had elsewhere and this was a lovely reminder of that and there is no doubt how sumptuous this dish is – the quince giving just enough acidity to balance the inherent fat, along with the apple and almond crumb for texture.  The mash on the side needs no further introduction and I genuinely wanted to have another bowl, but I am also trying to regulate my intake these days – wish me luck!

I was sat next to some charming US guests who kindly let me take some snaps of their dishes as they were just so pretty.  The mini burgers with foie gras are just superb, which I have had several times in London’s former L’Atelier location and it was also lovely to see the six choices of mini ice creams (€19 for the six) which again, the guests to my left seem to enjoy very much when having a very pleasant chat with them.  That is also one of the lovely things that can happen when counter dining – I wasn’t expecting to chat with others or wishing to invade anyone’s discussion, but was a lovely bonus to happen naturally at the bar which, I was all too happy with.

I was also very happy with my signature chocolate dessert entitled le chcolat tentation made with smooth araguani chocolate, cocoa nibs and oréo biscuit.  This was as smooth as they come and thankfully not in a huge portion size to tempt overeating.  Coffee was served but sadly I had been excluded the petit fours for some reason, which I had to effectively ask permission for and that combined with a couple of poor service episodes meant that the only negative of this meal was not being made to feel truly welcome by the staff – a first for me being a fan of Joel Robuchons, having been to their 3 Michelin starred branches in Hong Kong, Macau and Las Vegas as well as other Ateliers.  For clarity, specifics of the poor service included being told at the beginning of the meal that the waiter’s English was not so good, so he ignored the water request instead of trying to find help and interactions of one staff member who seemed utterly frustrated at having to take orders when busy.  C’est la vie.

Nevermind, as usual it does not detract the food grade being where I think it deserves to be and these were wonderfully enjoyable dishes; the only lesson from this visit to this Atelier is possibly avoid when very busy and make sure that you can either speak French, spend a lot of money or be very well known to the staff – if you have any of those, I doubt you will have any staffing issues at all.  In summary, wonderful and seductive dishes via a winning formula and was superb to be open on a Sunday on a lucky extra day in Paris.

Food Grade: 83%

The meal started at the bar downstairs where the amuse bouche was offered: Gambret (thigh) from Aquitaine pigs was served as Charcuterie (from SW France), fed on acorns, similar to Belota pigs from East Spain (Iberia).  Mixed vegetable and herb bouquet was offered to be brushed in an asparagus vinaigrette with koji which had a very gentle and aromatic aroma and taste. The butters were wonderful – burnt leak, cultured and chicken butter served with spelt rye sour dough.  Serious effort had gone in to these small, introductions which is always a very good sign and sets the tone frankly for the whole establishment.

Moving upstairs, to the kitchen, I was introduced to the head chef, Theo Clench who introduced me to the first bite of aged blue fin tuna Otoro (deliberately 9 days of ageing as opposed the longer times of 40 days) from Spain on heated Himalayan salt with a ponzu sauce.  The fresh wasabi was from Japan, giving a lovely and more gentle spice, with umami from the aged foie gras from Londe and melted for extra fat with shiso flower and a cherry blossom vinegar juice to finish. All very delicate and a very nice presentation to be given in the kitchen.

Once sat in the illustrious, private dining area I was able to look at the wine list which is strongly influenced from the biodynamic and organic echolocation of wine making.  What was also very pleasant to see was 171st edition cuvee of Krug (based on the 2016 vintage) served by the glass at £49 which was a no brainer.  Not many places will serve Krug or Dom Perignon by the glass because of the risk of losing the remaining content obviously, but it is lovely to see when this is done and especially when I believe exactly the same stratosphere of Krug is served by the glass for £90 in Raffles, London for example.  The premium Rosi Schuster, Grüner Veltliner from Burgenland, Austria at £25 for the glass was a fairly pleasing option, but in retrospect, I should have bought a bottle of more normal champagne and offer what I wouldn’t be able to  finish / other half of that to the staff.  My sommelier kindly arranged a number of tastings however, to try and gain the best match without any frustration, which is another sign of a quality restaurant. 

Back on to the parade of canapés: a 36 month Comte and pickled walnut canapé was lovely, with just the right hint of vinegar to balance the fatty and slightly chewy, warm Comte. Raw hamachi (yellowtail tuna) came with sweet and sour pear and sesame which had an umami, fatty and lovely sesame finish.  Duck liver and red pepper was an absolute knock out moment with superb, brittle crispy outer shell and deep flavour – beautifully done. 

BBQ eel from Devon came with a warm cucumber sauce, herb oil and N25 caviar – this was a variation from oyster and had a wonderful amount of umami, salty creaminess and sweet from the buerre blanc with very well sourced caviar (one of the best suppliers).  Beremeal, sourdough was a take on soba noodles made with a rare wheat only grown on the Orkney Islands for thousands of years. The broth from all sour dough, chive, hazelnut and roe was not my favourite initially in its graininess, but enjoyable as something different nonetheless less.

Confit scallop (from the Isle of Skye) came with tomato, Myoga (type of Japanese ginger),  confit in wagyu, fermented tomatoes, shellfish sauce, roe of scallop powder on top.  A lovely, foam sauce decorated this scallop. Turbot from an 8Kg Brixham fish came with lettuce, sake lettuce sauce, fish bone and caramel sauce.  This was one of the prettiest and clean-cut dishes I have seen for turbot and the sauces went superbly together without drowning the magnificent piece of turbot that it was, all able to be mopped up with a beautifully light, mini white loaf on the side.

Hereford beef was 70 day aged and served with a sea buckthorn, preserved winter truffle (from Australia), BBQ Maitake mushroom was frankly a masterclass of umami beef dish in every way.  There was nothing to not love here and the surrounding elements complimented the beef superbly.

A pre-dessert of apple, olive oil and shiso pre-dessert was an extremely good palette cleanser – fresh, vibrant and the way it should be done.  The actual dessert was a 70% Chocolate tart with raspberry sorbet in the form of an aerated and mousse like chocolate on pastry with an intense and smooth raspberry sorbet.  I thought these worked very well together.  Petit fours were likewise very well presented with a lovely canelé with brown butter mousse (superb), a fermented raspberry fudge sandwich (fine) and an agreeable 30% Dark chocolate Bon Bon.  All came with Difference coffee, again, one of the best suppliers in their field.

The bill with premium drinks by the glass came to £315 which can be toned down from the wine selection. Be prepared to pay upfront to gain your seat here and you will have a very good return on skill, ingredient sourcing and flavours.  The price tag perhaps prohibits going for date night here each week for most (including me!), as each outing would probably be £600 for the host of two, but I think is worth it for pushing the boat out if you desire well-executed dishes of quality that in the main create some serious moments.

Food Grade: 87%