Food & beverage
garden and what the fishmongers get”, allowing for seasonality and locality to dictate what they serve. “In the summer, we do a native lobster dish
Above: Tartare of aged Dexter beef, hen’s yolk and caviar from the Latymer’s kitchens.
Below: Steve Smith, head chef at the Latymer at Pennyhill Park in Surrey.
Previous page: The Forest Side has moved away from ‘elitist’ attitudes to dining to make it a more accessible experience.
Having worked as a chef for two decades, cooking
under legendary names including Marcus Wareing at the Berkeley and Andrew Farlie at Gleneagles, Leonard celebrates the move away from ‘elitist’ attitudes of the past. “When I started, some people didn’t think they could eat in hotel restaurants or restaurants with the accolades, because they might get looked down on. Whereas, everywhere you go now, it’s a lot more welcoming and dining’s become more accessible.” He joined the Forest Side from the Devonshire
Arms in Bolton Abbey, where he won four AA Rosettes. Set on the outskirts of Grasmere, near to the north and central lakes, the restaurant grows most of its ingredients in a large kitchen garden (which has 160 raised beds and several polytunnels). Leonard’s ethos is to allow these ingredients to shine without over- complicating dishes. “We’re not really following any trends,” he says. “We’re just following the seasons and cooking good food.” His set six-course lunch tasting menus and eight-course dinner menus change on a daily basis “depending on what we can get from the
barbecued on pine, which we get from just behind the hotel, until it’s just cooked – then we serve it with a sauce made from the lobster head and some vegetables from the garden,” he says. “It looks simple, but it has taken us maybe two years to get it absolutely bang on.” Other standout dishes include hand-dived scallops and langoustines or, as Leonard says, “anything people can’t really get hold of at home”. “If you go to Spain, you’re going to try paella; you go to Italy, you’re going to eat pasta and pizza; you come to the Lakes, I want you to try the best of what we’ve got to offer, because we’re really representing the county.” Leonard and his team are constantly developing new dishes, and often ask guests to try them so that they can be involved in the process. With many diners staying for two or three nights, the chefs have to consider what they can offer across these days. “It needs to stay interesting for them, so we’ve really got a think about the balance – using what’s seasonal and local.”
Dining as a journey This is not such a challenge for Steve Smith, head chef at the Latymer at Pennyhill Park in Surrey, because although his team also serves up a set tasting menu, the hotel has a second restaurant on site, where guests tend to eat for at least one night of their stay. “If they want to dine with us a second time at the Latymer,” he says, “then we will make sure that three to four of the courses that they have the next day are different, but also absolutely at the same level of execution as the night before.” The restaurant does see customers returning every few months, though, meaning they are continuously thinking of new ideas for the menu to maintain an element of surprise. Set within 120 acres of verdant Surrey land,
between Ascot, Sunningdale and Wentworth, the Latymer follows a seasonal model too, making good use of local suppliers when sourcing their ingredients. The food is rooted in tradition, but is technically spectacular, featuring popular dishes of Orkney scallop with celeriac, smoked eel and truffle, as well as Aynhoe fallow deer with blackberry and chocolate, winning the restaurant a 2021 Michelin star. “I’ve always worked in starred properties, whether they be restaurants or hotels,” says Smith, who began his career in the kitchen of Jean Christophe Novelli before going on to work with Shaun Hill, Simon Gueller and Paul Heathcote. In that time, he has seen service become more customer-focused. “There’s a much bigger desire to try and give customers a journey, an experience from when they arrive until when they leave,” Smith says.
52 Hotel Management International /
www.hmi-online.com
The Forest Side; Latymer
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