Rick Stein Winchester [Winchester, England]

[medgirl]

Lunch here to use the 50th Anniversary celebration voucher I received as a consolation prize after not being able to book one of the highly coveted places for their 1975 menu at 1975 prices. So we tried the regular 2025 menu at 2025 prices and £19.75 off with the voucher.

Dining room is nice, with an open kitchen and attentive servers.

Starters:

Grilled mackerel with tomato, capers and olive oil. Perfectly cooked. I was very happy with this, which was part of the set menu.

Sashimi of sea bass, salmon and scallop. I didn’t try this as I’m not a fan of raw fish. Husband was super pleased with the quality and prep.

Mains:

Indonesian seafood curry (cod, sea bass and prawns), pilau rice and a salad of green beans and young coconut. This was very tasty despite some reservations on my part of this mishmash of an ‘Indonesian-style’ seafood prep with Indian sides.

Grilled sea bass fillets with a fennel mayonnaise (I think) and steamed new potatoes - my husband said the bass was perfectly cooked.

Overall, the cooking of every bit of fish was perfect.

The bill:

[GretchenS]

That all looks very tasty, especially your starter - but I am a sucker for mackerel.

[medgirl]

Sometimes I find mackerel a bit fishy but this tasted super fresh and the skin was grilled to crispness with a bit of bubbling of the skin but the flesh underneath was really moist. The freshness of the capers, diced tomato and grassy EVOO partnered perfectly with the oily fish.

[GretchenS]

Stop, I am getting too hungry!

[Harters (John Hartley - a culinary patriot, cooking and eating in northwest England)]

Many years back, we went to Stein’s flagship Seafood Restaurant in Padstow. All I can recall is that the menu referred to “scallops” (note plural) and the dish served was half a scallop. Pisses me off that does.

That said, I always like Stein on TV. He’s probably the only celeb chef whose company round the dinner table I’d enjoy.