W
L
MR SMITHS
by Carl Housbey
This month I bring you news of some exciting developments that have
taken place at one of the UK’s most popular venues, and the best bit is
you don’t have to travel halfway across the country to get there, as it’s
only in Lancashire, in a small village called Wiswell. with brown butter ice cream, radish, and passion fruit, this time the crab
had been cooked to order rather than being prepared in advance and it is
amazing how much difference this makes, and is one of the many benefits
of the new kitchen.
Our story begins 10 years ago when Chef Patron Steven Smith first opened
the doors of Freemasons at Wiswell and put this village pub firmly in the
centre of the culinary map. In no time at all customers were travelling from
far and wide to experience this modern and innovative interpretation of
traditional pub grub, and the awards and accolades soon followed. Over
the years they have been awarded AA Restaurant of the Year, Best Food
Pub and Chef of the Year in the 2018 Great British Pub Awards, 18th in
the Top 100 UK Restaurants 2018 to name but a few, and in 2019 they
currently stand at Number 3 in the Top 50 Gastropubs, and Steven Smith
is Gastropub Chef of the Year. Next up were two fish courses, firstly the “Homage” which is a beautifully
firm fleshed Turbot cooked on the bone before being filleted and served
with a sauce of oxidized Montrachet and Caviar – wow, this was fantastic.
The other was a superb scallop dish that was apparently Steven Smiths first
ever dish and it left me in no doubt as to why he has won all of those awards
over the last 10 years.
After all of these accolades, something special was required to mark the
10th Anniversary, and that has taken the form of a large extension to the
rear which houses a brand-new state of the art kitchen together with Chefs
table and kitchen bench. The nearby cottages have also been turned into
four luxurious en-suite rooms, with yet more planned in the future which
means you can now stay over after your superb meal.
The Chefs table is a magnificent hand-crafted oak table in the middle of
the new kitchen which can easily seat twelve people, but on normal service
will be set out for six to ten. This is complimented by a four-seater kitchen
bench on the end of the pass from where you can watch the Chefs skilfully
preparing each dish. In order to differentiate this area from the main pub
it has been branded as Mr Smith’s, and will be offering different food and
wine to the main restaurant.
I was very lucky to be invited to a sneak preview of the “Taste of Mr
Smith’s” and it was amazing. We started with a glass of Inedit and a few
snacks, Truffled Cheese Hot Dogs, Tuna and Ponzu Pizza, and Smoked
Salmon Nuggets with Douglas Fir sauce, all of which were absolutely
delicious. Then we had a new variation of a much loved favourite, Crab
50 wirrallife.com
The much bigger kitchen means there is space for a meat aging cupboard,
and this had been used to great effect in our main course which was beef
that had been aged for 100 days in its own dripping giving it real depth of
flavour and melt in the mouth tenderness, of course we had this with duck
fat chips, but it would be wrong not to as they are so good.
Throughout the meal we were able to watch the Chefs preparing not
only our dishes, but all of the food for the main restaurant as well and
any fans of cookery shows on TV will find this absolutely fascinating. You
can even go one step further and attend one of the monthly Masterclasses
at Mr Smith’s where you can watch Steve and the team demonstrate the
techniques involved in creating one of the new dishes before sitting down
to eat it for lunch, or for any budding Chefs out there why not join the
team in the kitchen to see first hand what it takes to be a professional chef.
Details of everything I’ve mentioned is available by clicking on the website
www.freemasonsatwiswell.com where you can also find out about the new
luxurious en-suite rooms each with a Super King bed, Nespresso Coffee
machine, 50-inch smart TV, and Sonos sound system. There are so many
other options that I haven’t had space to tell you about, so give the team a
call straight away on 01254 822218 for more details.
To see what else I get up to, why not follow me on Twitter @carlhousbey