The restaurant has an old-school dessert trolley
Emberwood is on the ground floor of the Francis Hotel
Well, I didn’t expect a weekday dinner in a posh hotel restaurant to be this much fun.
Despite it being a warm mid-June evening when most diners were going alfresco, Emberwood on the ground floor of Bath’s rebooted Francis Hotel overlooking Queen Square, was doing surprisingly brisk business.
And, according to the waitress, most of our fellow diners weren’t simply tourists staying in the hotel itself – many were locals who had chosen this newly opened restaurant above the city’s many other great places to eat.
The restaurant is part of the Georgian hotel’s multi-million-pound restoration and one of the reasons why it is already attracting interest is the arrival on new executive head chef David Hazell.
Hazell will be familiar to many Bristol restaurant-goers as he previously worked at the recently closed Michelin-star restaurant Paco Tapas and also Clifton Lido.
The elegant dining room at Emberwood on the ground floor of the Francis Hotel(Image: Emberwood/Francis Hotel)
Named after the hotel’s architect, John Wood the Elder, creator of many of Bath’s prestigious buildings, the restaurant is spacious, stylish and has an open kitchen at one end, complete with a hearth where the meat and seafood is cooked over fire.
Hazel’s ingredient-led menu showcases local ingredients from Somerset and the South West, which means fish and seafood arriving daily from St Mawes in Cornwall, meat from local farms and cheese from Somerset makers such as White Lake near Shepton Mallet.
I started with the coal-roasted Cornish scallops, at £18 the most expensive starter from a choice that starts at £10 for spring soup, burnt leek, spinach, courgette, peas and creme fraiche.
The scallops at Emberwood are cooked over the hot coals of the hearth(Image: Emberwood/Francis Hotel)
The three plump, sweet scallops were served in their shells and cooked over the hot coals so there was a slight smokiness to them although the garlic butter and zesty gremolata were the main flavours.
Main courses range from £18 to £25, but there are also larger sharing dishes including whole monkfish tail, cured lardo, paprika and parsley for £90.
The West Country bavette steak (£25) is already becoming something of a bestseller and with good reason.
Smoky from the grill, the tender slices of steak were served with crisp and salty ‘Koffman fries’, a punchy green chilli salsa that was a successful cross between a salsa verde and chimichurri, and a rich and tarragon-flecked béarnaise sauce.
Bavette steak and Koffman fries at Emberwood(Image: Bristol Live)
A side dish of rainbow chard, confit garlic and chilli (£6.50) was generous and packed with flavour and pleasing heat from the chilli.
To finish, rum baba, vanilla Chantilly and chargrilled pineapple (£9) was a proper old-school rib-sticker of a pudding.
It was also nice to see a small choice on a retro dessert trolley including baked vanilla cheesecake with citrus crumb and summer fruit compote – whether it’s Sunday roast meats, stinky cheeses or desserts, it’s always nice to see a creaking trolley being pushed around a restaurant as it provides additional theatre to a meal.
Emberwood is being overseen by Five Graces Hospitality, the team behind celebrated London destinations such as Julie’s in Holland Park and Dorian in Notting Hill.
With their expertise and respected Bristol chef David Hazell running the kitchen, this new real fire cookery restaurant really is the hottest ticket in Bath this summer and worth the short trip from Bristol.
Emberwood at Francis Hotel, Queen Square, Bath, BA1 2HH. Tel: 01225 424105.