New Michelin star addition to the 2021 Guide

Osip opened in 2019 with its head chef, Merlin Labron-Johnson who previously worked at Michelin starred Portland, London as well as No 28 Market Place in Summerton and the Soho House group amongst his portfolio. Osip is adjoined to No 1 hotel in Bruton but they are separate businesses. The short version is that this was a genuinely good meal with dishes that were a complete pleasure to eat for their simplicity and good flavour. The menu du jour of 5 courses for £45 was very reasonable and I would be very happy to come back here again. For full details of the lunch experienced, just click the below button.

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A greeting of a ‘bouquet’ of garden flowers with fennel vinegar was brought to each and was a refreshingly healthy way to start the meal with some pleasant produce munched. The clever thing about this starter is that it resembles any cook’s best friend used in a huge collection of dishes, a bouquet garni, so this was nice to have an actual edible one.

Carrot soup came with an egg sabayon which was delightfully aerated, yet well-flavoured and came with bread to mop up the remnants, of which there were utterly none. A carrot canape made with Westcombe red cheese was dissolve in the mouth light, sweet and very good.

The bread was another lovely touch – focaccia with a good olive oil content was also fluffy with a salty crust and with the duck duck charcuterie on top, this made a superb combination not had before. The butter whip made with wild garlic and herbs locally sourced from Dreamers Farm was another absolute hit – so well balanced and the sort that becomes the main reason to order more bread if possible.

Lamb with chargrilled asparagus and yoghurt sauce had a small piece from the leg and another from the loin. The lamb came from Castle Cary butchers, The Thoroughly Wild Meat Company and was handled brilliantly by Osip. The fat was rendered well, the skin crisp and the lamb flavour bang on. What was even more of a complimentary joy was the reduction which had taken 48 hours to prepare and was just fantastic, tempered well by the small addition of yoghurt. It doesn’t need to be much more complicated than this and this was absolutely spot on.

As the meal was going so well the offer of an additional Cheese profiterole course course for additional £10 was an absolute no brainer. The choux pastry had a cheddar cheese ‘custard’ with onion jam and dried mushroom powder and it’s safe to say the hit of umami was as good as that sounds. The pastry itself was a little harder than expected, but presumably this was to keep all creamier contents in place. If it was a fraction softer, I would view it as the perfect creation.

Within the dessert, Ice cream made with potato skins was another combination I hadn’t had in quite a while and the starch-like effect actually worked quite well I thought and was a good compliment to the strawberries, strawberry jus, meringue, white chocolate and crème fraiche. This all worked very well and was over in seconds. Coffee was from Roundhill Coffee and were served with two, delightful chocolate canelés which were super.

Flavour wise, there really wasn’t anything I didn’t like about this meal. If I had one criticism, it is the portion sizes felt a little on the meagre side. It’s not a cost factor as I think I would have been happier paying a bit extra for more of the same to make more complete, but then again, everyone has different appetites. I would be very happy coming back here again.

Food Grade: 82%