Fine Dining in the UK - 2026

It's always fun looking back at previous years of fine dining. Especially at what was planned vs what actually happened. When I wrote the intro for Fine Dining in England 2025 I didn't see us having as much time to discover food without Lewis as we did, but he definitely got his fair share of treats too! For our 'Fine Dining in the UK - 2026' page this year I'm not making any predictions... that way I can't be wrong!

670 Grams

A head chef who likes trying food as much as we do

Each dish at 670 Grams was accomplished. The flavours paired perfectly with the wine... or cocktails... or both at the same time - really!! This may well have been lead by Kray's own love of fine dining. There's something very refreshing about a chef (or anyone actually) who is not afraid to compliment other people's work.

I've made no secret of my admiration for a person whose name is not just 'above the door'; and this was definitely the case at 670 Grams. Kray is the restaurant and the restaurant is him. I'm speaking on his behalf, but I don't think either would function as well without each other. It was great to have the personal touch and be able to compare food stories with him, as well as hear some of his personal recommendations.

The food itself was banging... the selection of snacks including KrayFC set the tone for a varied and adventurous menu. There wasn't a bad course, and I'm glad we added all of the extras (sorry belly, I'll work it off at some point). The chocolate and prune dessert was the best sweet dish I’ve had so far in our food journey - a perfect mix of flavours and textures... I'm not sure this will be beaten anywhere!

We opted for one mixed pairing and one wine pairing and this worked brilliantly – really complimenting the dishes. One of the wines that we tried was a 2024 Outer City Limits from Midland Press; a local light red wine from Worcestershire which went down very well.

670 Grams punches well above its weight. What a way to start 2026... and well worth the nearly 300 mile drive back from New Years in Cornwall to get to it.

Grace and Savour

As good as we remembered, plus some extras

Grace and Savour is the only place where we've eaten the same style of menu twice during the last 3 years of fine dining. We absolutely loved it the first time in 2025, so when we had the same weekend commitments in 2026, it made perfect sense to visit again.

This time Gill managed to book a half day off work so we arrived earlier than before and enjoyed a welcome drink and snack, a chat with Executive Chef David about the sustainability ethos behind his restaurant, and a wine tasting session in the main house. We should have had a garden tour too, but the garden was covered in snow. David explained the details of the garden through windows from the warmth and comfort of indoors.

These little touches set us up perfectly for what we already knew was going to be a special meal. They are included in the price of the dinner, bed and breakfast package and are definitely worth attending if time allows. It was great to hear first hand from David about the ways that he and his team preserve, and even make, ingredients in order to ensure that they use British only ingredients. This is more of a challenge than one might think - for example, lemons are notoriously difficult to grow over here so in order to replace the citric acid they use lacto-fermented rhubarb.

Dinner was 14 courses and we both went for the standard wine pairing. Like many places there are options for mixed and non alcoholic pairings, as well as a prestige (AKA expensive) wine pairing... the standard one worked perfectly for our uneducated paletes. We opted to sit at the chef's counter (again) in order to be up close to the action, and it was great to see how hard (and consistently) the young team were working. The attention to detail when assembling the dishes was incredible.

The food was as good as it looked - each course was full of flavour, and we'd already had an insight into the effort that went into the ingredients. Many dishes used a variety of parts of the same animal or vegetable in order to minimise waste.

All of the dishes were super. The amount of sauce with each dish was generous (this is something that Gill and I had both remembered from our previous visit - amazing sauce, and plenty of it!) In terms of favourites I'd say the scallop course and the venison course were definitely up there, and the 'prawn cracker stuffed with prawn' (which is 100% my name for it) from the snacks too.

We thoroughly enjoyed our second visit to Grace and Savour - it was really nice that some of the staff recognised us from when we visited last year too.

The Loch and The Tyne

My second visit here, Gill’s first…plus the chicken parfait!

I visited The Loch & The Tyne last year without Gill… it was good to be able to go back together in 2026. The Loch & The Tyne is Adam Handling’s gastropub. While on one of our many trips to Cornwall we visited (and enjoyed, twice!) Ugly Butterfly in 2025, which is another of Adam’s restaurants, once for a taster menu, and again for afternoon tea.

The Loch & The Tyne is very different to Ugly Butterfly (intentionally) but the food is similarly good, and the service was friendly and relaxed too. It feels like popping to your local (but with better food, and a better wine list), and it was nice that some of the team remembered me from my previous visit with my friend Nick, and Gill’s dad.

We started with cocktails (of course), and then had the sourdough bread with chicken butter as a nibble. My only (very minor) disappointment on my last visit, was that they didn’t have the chicken parfait that I had loved so much at Ugly Butterfly… but this time they did! I’ve raved about this parfait to anyone that I have spoken to about food since we tried it down in Cornwall, so it was very exciting to get it again – and it didn’t disappoint! Alongside the parfait and chicken butter was a serving of gravy for dipping bread into too… a great way to start the meal.

Gill enjoyed the scotch egg for her starter. I didn’t even get to try any (partly because I had it when I visited before to be fair!) I had a tasty combination of yellowfin tuna, green chilli and ponzu… it was tangy and delicious – and built the anticipation for the main course.

I was relatively boring with the main and went for a ribeye steak, complete with potato gratin and pigs in blankets as sides… it was all very full of flavour and cooked perfectly. Gill was more adventurous and had squash raviolo with rocket and smoked almond which she couldn't get enough of. I then rounded off the meal with a sticky date pudding which I just about had room for after the very generous portions that made up the dinner so far.

We both enjoyed the food at The Loch & The Tyne and I’m glad that I managed to visit with Gill… and equally glad that they now have the chicken parfait on the menu.

The Kitchin

A good food experience isn’t all about taste – sometimes it’s the attention to detail that makes it

The Kitchin is one of the most disappointing ‘fine dining’ restaurants that we have eaten in. Nothing to do with the quality or flavour of the food – but the total lack of consistency and attention to detail.

Whilst the food was good, we weren't blown away. It lacked consistency in the plating - for example, I had one piece of eel in a dish and Gill had 4, for another course Gill had a big bit of fish on her plate and I had a small one. Nothing was the same, or precise like we have experienced in other Michelin Star/Guide restaurants. It felt thrown together, like no one really cared. We’ve been lucky enough to be invited into the kitchens of other restaurants and have marvelled at the attention to detail used to make sure each plate looks the same – that seems a million miles off what these guys do.

We ate from the Prestige Surprise Tasting Menu – a 6 course menu that is described as showcasing the best of Scottish produce. Due to it being a surprise menu, we didn’t know what to expect and had to trust that our dish was complete when it was served. Seeing a neighbouring table have a jus served over their main that we had just been served without the jus was definitely a surprise!

It felt like we had been forgotten about, despite being sat in an area of the restaurant where the staff were literally brushing past us. These are small things, but not what you expect when being charged over £200 per person for food – our napkins weren’t folded when we returned from going to the toilet (but this was done for all our neighbouring tables), and we ended up topping up our own water a couple of times because none of the staff did. Again, no consistency when they were seemingly fine to do this for the neighbouring tables.

In total we were at the restaurant for just under 4 hours…for six courses plus (eventually) petit fours and coffee. We had 2 stints of 45 minutes wait between 2 courses. And another stint of 30 mins. At one point a waitress asked if we'd like anything else (implying that she would get the bill for us) and we said we just would like the petit fours and a hot drink to finish the menu, and then had to separately ask for the hot drink menu which seemed like an awful lot of effort for her.

It amazes me how many good reviews there are of The Kitchin. I find it hard to believe that it was just an "off night". For a restaurant with a Michelin star, there should be consistency in the food, the plating, the level of customer experience across the restaurant whether it’s quiet or full.

When we have visited other fine dining / star venues there has been an explanation that it’s a new menu, something to manage expectations - but here there was nothing to suggest this. It seemed that this was just a normal night.

Leith seems to be recognised as a bit of a foodie paradise – this is what brought us to the area. It seems that maybe The Kitchin are too busy trying to ride this wave with their multiple menus and too-big-to-manage venue. There's no consistency, and the whole experience felt uncomfortable and out of control, and I wouldn’t go back if it was free.

Chakana, Moseley, Birmingham

Another great night out around Birmingham

I’ve been intrigued by what Chakana offer for a while, but hadn't managed to get a date in the diary to try it – I’m pleased we finally did! Chakana serve Peruvian food, with a Japanese twist, which tastes as interesting as it sounds.

It’s a nice relaxed restaurant in what used to be an old bank. On arrival you are greeted by a llama in the entrance hallway (and they are dotted around the restaurant itself too). There are displays of all the different colour corns too (which I didn’t even know was a thing). The service was friendly and down to earth, from the moment we walked in and continued throughout the meal. The two main servers that we had made plenty of time to chit chat to us, whilst at the same time being knowledgeable about the food and wine that they were presenting.

We started with a pisco sour each (our first ever), and selected to eat the Peruvian Experience Tasting Menu complete with wine pairing. Chakana do offer an À La Carte menu but I’ll always go with a tasting menu if available to get the best of a new cuisine.

We started with some delicious sushi style snacks then moved on to a purple corn sandwichito. The sandwichito was one of the nicest things I’ve eaten (again!) – it was absolutely packed with flavour, and had a variety of different textures. It was so good that I would have asked for another, but we’d already been told that it was a decent size tasting menu so I thought better of it!

One of the courses was a hot crab causa. Causa is a traditional Peruvian dish that is usually served cold – not this time though. This one was served warm, and it was super tasty…my (maybe slightly simplistic) description of it would be like the nicest, most elevated, potato salad that you’ve ever eaten, complete with crab, and the perfect amount of spice.

Dessert was a mousse made with condensed milk and custard apple which (as well as being a lovely flavour) almost served as a palette cleanser to set us up for the petit fours, one of which included my South American favourite – dulce de leche!

Overall Chakana was great, I’m glad that we visited and tried some new food and drink.

Skof, Manchester

It's a shame Gill missed out on this one

I've wanted to eat at Skof for a while so decided to book a table for lunch with my brother. It's crazy popular, I booked it 3 months in advance when the bookings opened so we had plenty of time to build anticipation.

Everything about the experience met our sky high expectations - Skof was awarded a Michelin star at the latest awards and it was definitely deserved!

We had the 15 course taster menu. It was incredible! Every dish was better than the (already amazing) last one - the food just got better and better. 'We' has chosen the 15 course menu as I was really keen on the idea of the seared Cornish tuna and the langoustine... both were well worth talking Simon into the bigger menu for!

We were served one dish up at the counter looking into the kitchen and were talked through the dish by Tom Barnes (the main man at Skof). As you know from previous food blogs, I've always loved having the main person in the restaurant rather than just a name above the door, and this was a lovely touch here too. The miso custard that he served us was delicious, one of many highlights from the menu.

Another highlight, and probably my favourite of the 15 courses was the steamed West Coast cod. The fish itself was perfectly cooked, as you'd expect, and the accompanying onions added an incredible sweetness, the asparagus a delightful crunch, and the shrimp foam was remarkable - it was perfection in a bowl!

The personality of the team at Skof really shone through. I always enjoy a bit of chatter with the people serving us and this seemed easy, friendly, and authentic.

Skof was so good. I'm really pleased to have eaten there, and definitely wouldn't mind visiting again to introduce Gill to the place.

L'Enclume, Cartmel

The service made this meal special

I've wanted to eat at L'Enclume for years, and thought the best way to twist Gill's arm into a trip to the Lake District was to buy a time limited voucher!

Overall the food was good, sometimes even great... and the snacks were incredible – the depth of flavour in the pork and eel fritter was out of this world, and the Corra Linn (cheddar style cheese) snack was remarkable too. I was over the moon to get a sweetbread dish after enjoying them so much in Argentina and this one was (quite predictably) my favourite course of the night, and one of the best things I’ve ever eaten.

We both didn't feel that everything worked as well as these highlights though - the scallop dish was underwhelming, and the pork 'main' wasn't to either of our tastes. Now this is a subjective one so I'm going to stick to ‘not to our taste’ but the pork was relatively fatty, and wasn't really rendered down to make it the flavour or texture that either of us would have expected at this price point or reputation. I'm 100% aware that tastes vary, but I'm also aware that mine and Gill's often do, but we both agreed that this wasn't the best.

There were other small gripes, like Gill not liking the texture of the seaweed custard, or me accidentally trying a turnip by itself (not good at all, but much better with the other accompaniments that they should have been eaten with) - but these were absolutely personal preference.

The desserts, which can sometimes be a bit disappointing at fine dining restaurants, were very impressive. We enjoyed the petit fours too - including one that was disguised as a pebble, hidden amongst actual pebbles on the plate, this was a real throwback to the fun of 'guess what is edible' when we were in Bangkok a few years ago.

What really did make the experience special were the friendly, knowledgeable and attentive staff. Everyone that we spoke to seemed like they had so much time for us, despite being a fully booked service. There were loads of staff, each working in their own way to make sure diners had the most amazing experience, and their efforts didn't go unnoticed.

Would I go back? Unlikely.

Do I still want to eat at Simon Rogan's Ion Harbour restaurant in Malta? Definitely.

Would I recommend that you try L'Enclume for the experience? Maybe, I’d be more tempted to recommend Skof (which is also part of the Simon Rogan empire) that I enjoyed so much in Manchester with my brother.

We both love the ethos of L'Enclume - the farm to table idea is super, and the idea of minimising waste by using as much as possible really is something we all should get behind. I'm pleased that we finally got to eat here. The following morning Gill summed up the experience really well – ‘within the 15 courses there was something for everyone, but not everything for everyone’. Should you settle for that when paying £275 per person for a meal?