Restaurant Review: Hampton Manor, Hampton-In-Arden (Oct 2018)

This article is the fifth in a series designed not to provide ‘A N Other’ opinion about a chef’s output, to be lost in the now sea of increasing ‘noise’ about top end dining.  This is something slightly different.  In this article the chef will analyse each of their dishes sampled against the five criteria used by Michelin for awarding a Michelin star. How so? Discerning foodies will recall that at The Michelin Guide GB&I launch event for the 2018 Guides, a slide was briefly discussed by Michael Ellis (at the time WW Director of Michelin Guides), which for the first time highlighted the five criteria followed by inspectors in the awarding of Michelin Stars.  Michael Ellis confirmed these under interview on that day, as a reminder he explained:-

“The first and most important criteria is the ingredients, all great cuisine starts with great product – the actual product itself is considered for freshness, quality, flavour and texture and so on. The second criteria is mastery of cooking technique. The third criteria is equilibrium and harmony in flavours; the plate must be in balance, so the sauce is not, for example, overpowering the flavour of the fish or that the seasoning of the dish is found to be exactly as it should be. The fourth criteria is regularity (or consistency) and this means starter, main and dessert are all of the appropriate standard and that each are also consistent over time. Finally, value for money is the fifth criteria.”

Rob Palmer honed his craft at Peel’s, so named after the former prime minister Sir Robert Peel, whose onetime estate in the picturesque village of Hampton-in-Arden now houses the luxury hotel Hampton Manor in which Peel’s restaurant resides. Today the infrastructure for guests is abundant with road and rail a short distance awaty. A short drive frpom the M42, west of Birmingham, finds this unlikely idyll.

Rob was originially sous chef to Martyn Pearn. After 4 years under Michel Bourdin and twelve years of Michelin stardom across La Reserve (Bordeaux) and Buckland Manor (Cotswolds) Martyn proved a great mentor in the grounding of classical technique. From September 2014, at the tender age of 27, the opportunity arose for Rob Palmer to take the reins and stamp his own personality and creativity on the developing kitchen at Hampton Manor.

Ably and astutely developed by stages in Michelin 2 star kitchens such as Andrew Fairlee and Nathan Outlaw, by the 2017 ‘guide season’ Rob had led Peel’s restaurant to a first Michelin star in the GB&I Guide, along with the award of 4 AA Rosettes and a Michelin Welcome and Service Award which justifiably recognised the wonderful front of house found across Hampton Manor.

Onto the food, the dishes to be analysed by Rob across the five criteria are langoustine, beef, eel and chocolate led plates.

Consistency and value for money will be considered separately before each dish is discussed in terms of the other three criteria. So consistency, each chef is given their own recipe book to include the house dishes and to work on creative input to the team. The rule is that a recipe can be documented only after the chef has twice made that recipe successfully – twice is to ensure the difference between understanding something in theory and delivering it in practice. So typically I will provide my book and taste the dishes to check that each chef can produce the dishes to the correct consistent standard. During service I will taste dishes before they reach the customer or if I am not available the sous chef will taste the dish.

We will train people thoroughly which is a natural insurance of consistency, anyone who comes in shadows a section for a period of time until they are comfortable then they will run a section. We don’t really deal with commis chefs in the kitchen as the nature of the size and make-up of the brigade is such that each chef is effectively running a section.

In terms of creation or evolution of dishes, not everything has to come through Rob, it is a collective effort involving tasting and refining, before agreeing whether changes or new dishes make it to the customer via the menu. Naturally as dishes evolve the taste make-up of the whole dish will change so in addition to taste checks during any given service, over time (Rob believes every couple of weeks) the dishes are collectively re-checked and tasted to ensure that they continue to taste exactly as intended and no deviation has happened (by accident) over the course of say twenty services.

This is very different from a chef unilaterally deciding (typically in a very large kitchen environment) to do something differently during service outside of the house recipe for a dish, the nature of the Peel’s kitchen is close knit and the value add of each chef clearly visible from front to back of the kitchen.

When asked if Rob felt he was a scientific or instinctive chef, he felt that instinct was critical to being successful at the top end of the industry in that all ingredients are unique, so simply applying the science of weighing things out and cooking for a set period of time will take a chef so far but it is an art as well as a science and to master the art of being a chef means (in many respects) having instinctive creativity in the kitchen.

We keep up with seasons and pay focus and inspiration to the concept of an English walled garden, the garden at Hampton Manor is in its first year but this is developing into a stunning resource. While we do use a few different techniques and Asian influences in the dishes produced, the vegetables and garnishes have a clear English focus.

In terms of value for money, we do have a kitchen GP, but the hotel as a whole may meet in the middle, between say, large functions and the Peel’s top end restaurant kitchen. We put on a seven course menu for £95 and the customer will get a pre-dessert, snacks, amuses (as traditional ‘extras’ on a top end restaurant menu) but and in addition Wagyu Beef or Langoustine may feature in dishes: How many top end independent restaurants are required to charge a supplement for these sort of luxuries? The nature of the way the hotel works allows us to put on these wonderful premium ingredients for the customer.

Beef comes with a certain masculine comfort and accessibility factor, the kitchen experimented a couple of years ago with taking beef off the menu but brought it back by popular demand. We decided that rather than offer a kind of cliché like ‘fillet of beef’ (which has been done so often), we would instead offer rare and premium breeds such as Longhorn and Wagyu. While these breeds have limited access, they remain the best choices for kind of sheer quality and flavour that turns customers in regulars.

For the last couple of months we have been offering a special Thursday evening menu called ‘blind five.’ Five courses for £45 where two or three will be from the menu and two dishes which be produced specifically as a surprise for this menu. The evening has been fully booked since it was introduced as customers like the idea of trying something different and creative form the kitchen. This is also a premise of giving a dinner price point that brings people into a Michelin dining environment, perhaps for the first time and encouraging them to return for the full seven course experience.

The Scottish Langoustines are from Keltic Seafare, which we get in every week and are beautiful products. Nothing is wasted, the shells help make the sauce with a little ginger for some heat added to the bisque, the dish is served with a garden led leek terrine. The langoustines have a delicate flavour so to cook and season it naturally brings out the best of the product. We consciously don’t over manipulate the ingredients which can lead to overwhelming the natural balance and harmony of a dish. The philosophy is to try and stick to no more than three flavours on a plate. In terms of the langoustine dish we would want no more that the taste of langoustine, ginger and leek cooked properly and properly seasoned.

The three flavours of the Wagyu Beef dish are beef, carrot and black garlic. The carrots are from our own garden, an English black garlic, and via the butcher Aubrey Allen, we take Earl of Stonham farm thoroughbred Wagyu, which offers the best I’ve tried on the market. The beef is cooked sous vide at fifty-six degrees for six minutes and then quickly sear it in a pan to give it a little caramelisation, the glaze soy and sugar which works very well. The black garlic enhances the natural flavour of the beef and complements the dish exceptionally well.

The eel dish, we buy in the sustainable eel from the Devon eel company, already smoked as we don’t have the capacity to smoke them in house and the consistency and quality is superb. We fillet, skin and portion the eel before pan fried for a minute. The Kohlrabi is cooked sous vide and to order is diced and roasted in pan with miso butter. The Kohlrabi we also blitz with a 2% salt solution and ferment for a week in sous vide bags, . When ready we squeeze the juice out and infuse the eel bones into the juice. The result is loads of natural seasoning, smokey eel, salty sea herbs (Samphire or Sea Perslane) and an acidity from the juice that bring together the dish perfectly.

The Chocolate dish, and chocolate and vanilla go together perfectly. Each element of chocolate has different textures and intensity through different percentages of cocoa. There’s biscuit, shard, croustillant and a frozen mousse to go with sherry and vanilla ice cream. I’ve always felt that sherry has these chocolate notes that brings out the best in a chocolate dessert and I love this dish.

from Fine Dining Guide