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Welsh chef Tom Simmons found fame on ‘MasterChef: The Professionals’, where he reached the quarter-finals. In this, his first restaurant, he’s created classic, meticulous dishes using ingredients from across the British Isles (including his native Pembrokeshire).
He has a way with fruit. The star dish was a chilled rice pudding with poached rhubarb – both cooked to perfection, with a bit of bite and not too sweet. On top: a silky apple sorbet and crunchy nuggets of dark golden crumble. It was restrained, thoughtful and, frankly, magical. Equally good was a starter of Orkney scallops, their edges caramelised, with a smooth pomme purée, juicy, mildly curried golden raisins and apple in two ways (crunchy slivers, a compote).
But every other dish had the same issue: too much salt. Which was a great pity, as it was otherwise all technically accomplished.
Over-seasoning is easy to correct. Less simple to fix is the fact that this restaurant is a glass-sided goldfish bowl looking on to a windswept corporate development. They’ve done their best to jazz it up: open kitchen, parquet flooring, ‘seaside holiday home’ ornaments. But really it needs a big fat curtain.