The Michelin Guide Great Britain And Ireland 2024 awards ceremony was held at the Midland Hotel in Manchester on 5 February 2024. This led to a large amount of speculation that at least one Manchester dining establishment would be awarded a Michelin star. In true Michelin fashion, by a process known only to the coterie of people who call themselves Michelin Restaurant inspectors (except they can’t do that since they are, in theory at least, supposed to keep their identities secret) those who decide these matters chose to hold their ceremony in Manchester to tell the city that it was not receiving any additional starry recognition.
In fact, as is always the case, most new stars were awarded to London restaurants where the inspectors clearly feel at home or, to restaurants in Ireland which doubtless is a destination which must always be a nice trip for the inspectors. Therefore, of the 15 new single Michelin Star awardees in the United Kingdom 11 were located in London and across the Irish Sea, there were 3. None of the four other UK awardees were located anywhere in the West Midlands (or the East Midlands or, for that matter, East Anglia).
Meanwhile 18 United Kingdom restaurants have been deleted from the Guide - 6 in London (2 because of closure including of course Le Gavroche) and 3 in the West Midlands (Carter’s of Moseley in Birmingham and Pensons in Tenbury Wells, both because of closure though of course Carter’s is operating as a pop-up in Colmore Row for 3 months) and Salt in Stratford upon Avon which I visited several times last year and, if anything, found it to be delivering better food than it has ever done.
Hence the West Midlands region now only has, incredibly, just nine single star dining establishments - Purnell’s, Adam’s, Simpsons (Birmingham), Le Champignon Sauvage and Lumière (Cheltenham), Grace And Savour (Hampton In Arden), The Cross (Kenilworth), The Royal Oak (Whatcote) and Upstairs By Tom Shepherd (Lichfield).
Not all is gloom of course. For at the ceremony, with a certain amount of drama, it was announced that Aktar Islam’s Opheem on Summer Row in Birmingham, as I predicted in Blog 378, is now the holder of two star status which sets all sorts of records including, importantly, that of it being Birmingham’s first two star restaurant and Aktar Islam becoming the first United Kingdom-born chef of south Asian heritage to be awarded two stars. A glittering and exciting achievement. As I implied in Blog 378, the moment for the award to Opheem had come and I was pleasingly unsurprised to see Aktar up on the stage in Manchester donning his white jacket and making a short impressive speech. Great stuff!
The Michelin-listed restaurants in the West Midlands are now:-
Birmingham -
Opheem **
Simpsons*
Purnell’s*
Adam’s*
The Wilderness
Folium
670 Grams
Harborne Kitchen
Asha’s
Land
The Oyster Club by Adam Stokes
Plate by Purnell’s
Chakana
Tropea,
The rest of West Midlands county -
Grace and Savour* Hampton in Arden
Smoke Hampton in Arden
Toffs by Rob Palmer Solihull
Cheal’s Knowle
Purnell’s Cafe and Bistro Coventry
Worcestershire -
Broadway (wrongly listed as being in Gloucestershire by Michelin)-
MO
The Back Garden
The Inn at Welland (Bib) Welland
The Butcher’s Arms Eldersfield
Eckington Manor Eckington
Black and Green Barnt Green
Herefordshire -
The Bull’s Head Craswell
Kilpeck Inn Kilpeck
The Baiting House Upper Sapey
33 The Homend Ledbury
Shropshire -
Ludlow -
Forelles
Mortimers
The Charlton Arms (Bib)
Whitchurch -
Docket No 33
Wild Shropshire
The Walrus Shrewsbury
The Bear Inn Hodnet
Staffordshire
Lichfield -
Upstairs by Tom Shepherd *
The Boat
Larder
Duncombe Arms (Bib) Ellastone
Lunar Stoke on Trent
Little Seeds Stone
The Flintlock Cheddleton
Warwickshire -
The Royal Oak* Whatcote
The Cross* Kenilworth
Stratford upon Avon -
Salt
Woodsman
The Howard Arms Ilmington
The Bower House Shipston on Stour
Fuzzy Duck Armscote
The Mount Henley in Arden
Gloucestershire -
Halfway at Kineton Kineton (wrongly listed under Warwickshire by Michelin)
henne Moreton in Marsh (wrongly listed under Warwickshire by Michelin)
Cheltenham -
Le Champignon Sauvage*
Lumière*
Purslane
Memsahib’s Lounge
Prithvi
Bhoomi Kitchen
JOURNEY
Cowley Manor Cowley
Buckland Manor Buckland
Atrium Upper Slaughter
Daylesford Organic Farm Daylesford
The Fox Lower Oddington
Old Butchers Stow on the Wold
Ox Barn Southrop
Wilder Nailsworth
5 North Street Winchcombe
This makes a total of 69 Michelin-listed restaurants including just one with 2 stars, nine with 1 star and three Bib Gourmands.
Michelin itself does not get any stars for placing four of the restaurants in the wrong counties! Regardless, Aktar Islam is this year’s star of the show and well-deserved it is too.
No comments:
Post a Comment