Cabbage Hall, Cheshire

Quite average food. I would not go out of my way to go to this restaurant.

The Cabbage Hall
cabbagehallrestaurant.com
Forest Road
Little Budworth, Tarporley CW6 9ES
01829 760 292

Stirkhouse Hotel and Restaurant, Lancashire

Stirk House Hotel & Restaurant, Gisburn, Clitheroe, Lancashire
Tel: 01200 445581 Fax: 01200 445744

http://www.stirkhouse.co.uk/

Absolutely wonderful food. Stayed in the hotel during a conference and had the dinner, bed and breakfast deal. The 3 course dinner was absolutely lovely. The fish was very fresh and meat succulent. This restaurant deserves 2 AA rosette and is nearly a Michelin star standard. The service was friendly and warm but not quite formal enough for a star. If it beefed up its formality, I won't be surprised if it gets a star next year. If you are staying there, ask to stay in the main hotel. I was in the barn conversion section, which was nice but is showing some age and the bathroom just a hint grubby.

The 1 michellin star dim sum restaurant

Tim Ho Wan restaurant in Mongkok.

We queued for almost 2 hours before we got a seat. In hindsight, due to the ticketing system, we could have collected a ticket, and returned 2 hours later as not being present only bumped you to the next available table rather than losing it completely.

The food was served very quickly as you had to preorder before you got to your table. The dim sum was fresh and everything felt freshly made. I really love the baked char siew bun, which had a lovely light crust but the honey roast pork filling felt just a little too sweet. The stewed spare ribs in rice was also quite tasty. However, the other dim sum felt only average for hong kong standards. We had the truffle milk pudding, which just felt completely wrong. The strong flavour of the black truffle used overwhelmed the delicate light milk pudding, so the creation of this pudding was completely lost on me.

The service was  friendly, and good for the limited waiting staff. Due to the small size of the restaurant, seating was very cramped and I was literally clashing chopsticks with the person next to me. Most dim sum plates cost a very reasonable HKD$10-15.

Overall, it was a lovely meal but with the excellent quality of dim sum restaurants in hong kong, I struggle to see why this restaurant was awarded a michellin star when there are many more dim sum places serving excellent fare in relative obscurity.

Blackhouse: The Grill on the Alley, Manchester

The restaurant is just down the road from Gaucho, Manchester. We were there on a Saturday night and the place was packed. I had battered squid for starters, and the squid was covered with a south fried chicken style batter and I found it overly salty. The squid tasted pretty fresh though. We went there for the steaks and they certainly didn't disappoint!

I had the 11 ounce rib-eye and Karen had the fillet. The steaks was Lovely! It was very nicely grilled and had a lovely juicy, full flavour. The fillet steak was just as nice. The steaks here definitely beat Gaucho, Manchester but still not quite the same standard as Gaucho, Picadilly London, but its probably the top 10 of the steak restaurants I have been to in England.

I will definitely go again!