Shropshire Magazine

Pan-seared breast of Gressingham duck on a thyme-and-potato rosti, wilted savoy cabbage, caramelised baby onions, roast cherry vine tomato, fine green beans and a juniper jus.

It’s an inauspicious start to our Saturday evening dinner. My wife and I take to the sumptuous dining room at Dinham Hall during what is traditionally the busiest evening of the week. There are, however, few other diners. One couple sit in a window seat, overlooking verdant lawns, while a solitary hotel guest is eating alone, thumbing through the pages of a book between courses. All told, there are only five people in the dining room. We’re baffled as to why.

The hotel sits by the Castle in the medieval town of Ludlow.

The diners of Ludlow are a discerning pack. They took to Shaun Hill’s Merchant House with such enthusiasm that it became almost impossible to book a table. They showed similar favour to such high-end restaurants as Hibiscus and the town’s perennial favourite, Mr Underhill’s. Middle-market eateries with great head chefs have also proved a hit. The Roebuck Inn, under the expert tutelage of Olivier Bossut, is ever-popular, while Parkway, run by the excellent Dean Banner, has been a runaway success.

Dinham Hall’s head chef Caitlin Procter took over from Banner as head chef at Dinham Hall some years ago. During her time at the helm, she has developed a reputation for serving excellent local produce. Her skills, however, are not as advanced as some of the town’s better-known chefs.

Rillette of smoked and poached salmon with spring onion, served with sweet mustard sauce, dressed mixed leaves.

Accordingly, our dinner was enjoyable, rather than memorable. Dinham Hall is an archetype of late-18th century grandeur. Tall, square and stylish, it sits in a picturesque corner of Ludlow, that also includes the town’s formidably solid castle, the pristine Dinham, the magical River Teme and the mesmerically beautiful Whitcliffe Common.

Dinham Hall offers guests the opportunity to dine in style. An impressive lounge is filled with comfortable leather armchairs, plump sofas, a roaring fire and copies of books devoted to country pursuits. An arch leads through into a light and airy dining room, which has wooden floors and delightful views of close-clipped lawns and flower-filled beds.

Charming

When my wife and I visited, we were shown quickly through to the lounge by a confident maitre d’. A charming waitress appeared soon after to offer menus and take our order for drinks; her attentive service was one of the highlights of the evening and her skills compared favourably with those at some of the region’s best restaurants, such as Mr Underhill’s. The menu was impressive, indeed. There were four starters, four main courses and four desserts, all featuring carefully-selected local produce.

Though the kitchen didn’t serve an amuse bouche or olives – a surprising omission given the £38.50 per person charge – we were presently shown to our table and greeted by a warm bread roll and a small cup of pea-and-ham soup. My wife started with the sardine, served with a mustard dressing, while I choose yellow-fin tuna, served on a bed of salad dressed in lemon oil.

Both starters and the soup were lacking in punch. The ingredients were good but they’d lost something in translation and should have been better seasoned.

The selection of main courses featured local lamb, lemon sole and similar principal ingredients. My wife and I, however, were swayed by the merits of the guinea fowl. The game bird came poached with crushed potatoes, fine beans and a beetroot reduction. The wisdom of the dish, however, escaped us. The skin of the guinea fowl was still fat and elastic, having been cooked with water rather than rendered in a hot oven. The kitchen’s concession to flavour was to stuff it with a woody stem of thyme. It added a little, but not enough. The red liquid from the beetroot, meanwhile, turned our potato an unappealing puce colour. Diners eat with their eyes, as well as their mouths and noses, and subsequently we were underwhelmed.

Caramelised orange tart, port reduction, wild strawberry sorbet.

Thankfully, Caitlin came into her own when the desserts arrived.

A pre-dessert of coffee panna cotta was impressive and had great texture. It was the gastronomic highlight of the evening. My wife’s parfait, meanwhile, was served with a crunchy homemade honeycomb and swish of fruit coulis. I opted for the cheese board, which featured six varieties served with a pleasantly piquant relish, grapes, sliced apple and deliciously herby oat biscuits. The cheese, however, had clearly been taken straight from the fridge, so softer varieties were unripe. Their flavours would have been far more gratifying had they been allowed to develop at room temperature.

Though we skipped coffee and petits fours, we still found we were the last guests to leave the dining room. When we made our exit, Dinham Hall’s dining room was empty at 9.30 on a Saturday evening.

There is much to commend at Dinham. The venue is a treat, the service knocks the spots off its competitors and the choice of ingredients is impressive. It’s a salubrious eaterie with stunning gardens filled with fine blooms and fragrant perfumes.

However, the critical flaw is in the lack of flavour in each dish. The former Ludlow chef Shaun Hill was a master at getting the most from ingredients. A typical chicken dish at The Merchant House would be so full of juicy, moist flavour that it would rank as the chickeniest chicken ever.

Hill was expert at ramping up flavour, seasoning to perfection and balancing different tastes. His presentation, similarly, was easy on the eye. Such skills would bring much-needed oomph to Dinham Hall’s kitchen, helping turn otherwise bland dishes, like the pea-and-ham soup, into winners.

When Olivier Bossut and Dean Banner ran the kitchens at Dinham Hall, it was rightly regarded as one of the county’s finest eateries. It wouldn’t take much – a little more salt and pepper, better taste combinations and more flair for presentation – for Caitlin to restore that hard-earned reputation.

The dining room at Dinham Hall.

• Dinner for two at Dinham Hall was around £100, including drinks. A three-course à la carte selection is £38.50. To book, call 01584 876464, email info@dinhamhall.co.uk or visit the website.

REVIEW: ANDY RICHARDSON

PICTURES: JAMES WATKINS