224. Forelles.

 

  I rounded off four days passed in Ludlow by dining on the Tasting menu in Forelles restaurant at the lovely Fishmore Hall which the dog and I visit quite often. Set just outside the town the attractively refurbished Georgian building provides us with a little peaceful haven in beautiful Shropshire away from Birmingham’s busier pace and more crowded living space and the only entity overlooking us is Titterstone Clee Hill, sometimes clothed in cloud, sometimes basking in sun, sometimes dripping with rain and in winter sometimes dotted with snow.

  Forelles, named after some little pear trees in the garden next to the spacious conservatory in which the restaurant is situated, is a lovely place to pass an evening (or an early morning for breakfast, for that matter). The meal started with three little amuses gueules, a tiny cornet filled with a delightful cheesy foam, an unusual and very tasty lamb appetiser with yogurt and an equally delicious soupçon of salmon tartare with perfectly hot wasabi on a tasty crisp.

 

  Next an espresso cup filled with onion soup to which an emmental and truffle foam was added. This was full of flavour and highly memorable. Then a vegetable starter made up, unusually, of roast artichoke with an artichoke purée with nigella seeds. The presence of tamarind gave a real lift to the dish giving scattered little bursts of sweetness.

  The fish course was an interesting dish of well-cooked monkfish, seaweed, samphire, miso and a squid ink-dyed cracker with a roe purée and finished off prettily with roe, samphire and pansy flower. Apart from the seaweed, which it seems, under all circumstances, is a flavour that does not suit me, this was an excellent and quite complex dish.

  Not surprisingly, the meal’s highlight was the main course of Herefordshire beef, obtained from local Ludlow butcher DW Wall,  cooked perfectly - admirably tender, beautifully seasoned - and well set off by the truffled pomme purée on which it sat along with sweet onion and spinach, hazelnut and mushroom. What a relief to be served beef rather than the presently overfeatured venison which crops up time and time again in restaurants around the region.

   After the gem of the main course, a clever predessert which successfully combined the elements of sweet and savoury. Along with poached slices of peach, the colour of the sun, was served a wonderful, well balanced, mildly bitter pink peppercorn panna cotta with an equally mildly bitter zingy pink champagne sorbet. A very pretty dish. A perfect transition between the first and second parts of the menu. For dessert proper I was served a lovely chocolate delice with hazelnuts and milk ice cream.

  This was an excellent meal and showed that Forelles, apart from its unique atmosphere and location, continues to help Ludlow to hold on to its established name in the Shropshire part of the West Midlands dining scene.

Fishmore’s forelles at dawn.