I am happy to say that I visit Ludlow reasonably often and am always very content to stay at Fishmore Hall where Forelles restaurant is located in its pretty little conservatory with Clee Hill in the distance looking down on it. I have reported on meals eaten at Forelles a number of times and so will not go on again at length save to say, even though former Head Chef Joe Gould left there in May to cross the border and venture into Sturgeon (the politician not the large fish) territory. Nevertheless I had a couple of dishes this time from the à la carte menu which I had not previously tried and a great pleasure they were; Fishmore’s residual kitchen team are clearly in excellent form and spirit even if they have lost the team captain.
As a first course I had the prettiest little starter that I have seen this year - a sophisticated dish of goats cheese with a cider jelly, caramelised red onion, parsley gel on a bed of oat and walnut bread (I think) with a pleasing potato circle and as a garnish the surely the prettiest little viola flower ever - yellow with purple veins - whose beauty should not be lost by eating it but which should be pressed in a book as a souvenir of a very fine starter.
During the same meal I also had an extremely delicious and powerfully flavoured main course centred on Iberico pork. This was a great pleasure - a generous helping of unctuous pork on a bed of nicely acidic gochujang, little chunks of grilled fennel and caraway seeds and soothing consommé with a crisp which mimicked in appearance, but sadly not in flavour, a strip of pork crackling, all topped off by a courgette flower. There was also pak choi which was apt with this dish though for me it is one of those vegetables which it would have better if it had never been introduced in British restaurants, limp looking and limp flavoured - I do not blame Chef for this but instead I blame the person who first thought that mankind should eat the vegetable. However I suppose it’s greenness rounded off the visual impact of the dish, wrapping itself around the bountiful slices of pork as it did.
I have been intending to dine at the Michelin-plated Mortimers in Corve Street for some time and I finally achieved my goal on this visit to the town that may be viewed as the birthplace of the modern West Midlands gastronomic revolution. Housed in the building that was home to Ken Adams’ Bib Gourmand-winning Oaks restaurant and then Claude Bosi’s Hibiscus and then Will Holland’s Le Becasse, Wayne Smith’s Mortimers has a charming courtyard which is a good place to sit on a fine summer evening imbibing a fine Negroni and grazing on complementary olives and tiny sweet, tangy peppers before moving indoors to the gracious wood-panelled rooms where dinner is served. Perhaps the dining room is a little dark and oppressive for a long, bright summer’s evening but it certainly comes into its own as autumn draws in and the days are shorter and dignified cosiness is required (I recall that being the case from when I last visited in the dying days of Le Becasse.
Service, after a pleasing welcome by Tamsin, Wayne Smith’s wife who comes over as an excellent host, was highly laudable throughout the meal and I felt very comfortable as the very enjoyable appetisers appeared, including an amusing mini-fish finger with little dots of tartare sauce on it and a witty little ice cream cornet filled with liver pâté plus a cheeky cheesy little tart. I was rapidly developing a mildly euphoric state of mind and this was only heightened by a fabulous scallop dish - perfectly pan-fried, delicious scallop with lardo, textures of apple and an entirely apt series of crunches provided by the presence of a scattering of fragments of toasted hazelnut. Fine dining indeed.
Was it to be upwards and onwards? Next came another starter, this time of Gressingham duck rillette with a happy little morsel of duck breast, a joyously sweet piece of toasted brioche and various little items which injected orange flavours into the dish. Great stuff! What could go wrong?
It’s hard presently to have a tasting menu without a course of heritage or just in-season tomatoes slotted into it. This is often a refreshing and reviving dish opening the gates to the main course. The menu did indeed include a tomato dish at this stage - “Isle of Wight tomatoes, buratta, basil” The buratta worked well but the tomatoes were sadly disappointing, colourful but not as rich in flavour as I have had at some other restaurants in recent times and they also had a vague mushiness to them which was not altogether pleasant. I felt that this was a course which could easily be removed from the menu with a benefit to the overall meal.
And so to the main event - ‘Lamb, Alsace bacon, baby gem’. This dish started off at a disadvantage because next to loathsome pak choi and utterly unacceptable mange tout, charred baby gem lettuce has to rank, to me at least, as an unpleasant green thing filling but not enhancing a plate. But I rose above my prejudice and concentrated on the lamb which was deliciously and perfectly lamb-flavoured (lamb is not always as tasty as it should be). The accompanying caramelised onion was as sweet as any I have had and provided much joy.
Being immature in my tastes, for me peas are the greenness I crave (pea shoots, green beans cooked to perfect tenderness, cauliflower, green cabbage, Savoy cabbage and Brussels sprouts (yes, I did say sprouts, with their scintillating sulphurousness) may be added to the list) and the peas in this dish were excellent but while it may be totally apt to throw in some little pieces of bacon with the peas or the baby gem (which was as edible as I expected it to be) it is not at all a happy choice to add the bacon to a dish of fine lamb whereby the potent flavour of even the smallest piece completely overwhelms the darling taste of the lamb. A dish that is winning at half time but ends up as a 2-2 draw.
I do not pretend to know why we must now be served two desserts but it is a reality wherever one dines. Perhaps it is to ensure that the pastry chef has something to do though so many desserts seem to have little to do with pastry. The first was a timely, enjoyable strawberry dish, the strawberry elements filled out with a delightful pistachio sponge and a vanilla cream. I forgot to photograph it but it was a pleasure to eat. The second dessert seems to have to be chocolate-based and I understand why but I would not normally go out of my way to chose one. However this dish at Mortimers, a chocolate marquise, was happily light and easy to eat and was properly accompanied by variants on a cherry theme though the cherry ripple ice cream was not exploding with cherry flavour.
I finished with a fine cup of coffee and was presented with three excellent petits fours including a very cheerful fudge.
The tasting menu was excellent value at £65 plus service. I have pinpointed some elements of the meal which did not suit me but it was an extremely pleasurable evening of good food when taken in the round and I will happily revisit Mortimers on my next visit to Ludlow. The inevitable problem with a tasting menu is that it is almost impossible that all elements of it will suit all the diners and it is much more difficult to bring off eight perfect well-conceived courses than it is to achieve three or four optimal ones.
Ludlow may not yet be about to revive its golden gastronomic age but there are some fine places to eat there and Michelin stars are not everything in a gastronomic life. And as we learned recently at Simpsons the possession of a Michelin Star does not guarantee satisfaction.
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