The Good Food Guide has announced its award winners for 2024, including one new ‘World Class’ restaurant and six new ‘Exceptional’ restaurants. #Blog

Victoria Hayes
31st January 2024

Prestigious publication The Good Food Guide, unveiled its award winning restaurants on 30 January in their inaugural ceremony at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane in London.

 

The Good Food Guide Awards, in partnership with Resy, was a celebration of the wide diversity of the country’s restaurants culminating in  The Sportsman in Kent receiving the Restaurant of the Year award and becoming only the fourth restaurant in Britain to be rated World Class by the Guide. Mountain in London won Best New Restaurant, and Helmsley and The Howardian Hills in North Yorkshire was named Most Exciting Food Destination.

LONDON, ENGLAND – JANUARY 30: (L to R) Elizabeth Carter, Adam Hyman, Tommy Banks, Ellie Hook and Chloe Hamilton attend the Good Food Guide Awards 2024 at Theatre Royal Drury Lane on January 30, 2024 in London, England.
Photo Credit: Dave Benett.

Three restaurants maintained the Guide’s elusive ‘World Class’ rating: L’Enclume in Cumbria, Ynyshir in Mid-Wales, and Moor Hall in Lancashire with a further six new restaurants added to the ranks of  ‘Exceptional’, including Mýse in North Yorkshire, The Cedar Tree in North Cumbria, and CORE by Clare Smyth in London’s Notting Hill.

 

Editor Elizabeth Carter said of awards: “It’s a new era for The Good Food Guide with a new look and a revamped rating system, but the Guide’s deep-rooted values remain exactly the same. There’s always been a lot of excitement surrounding our awards, and this year we’ve overhauled them to better reflect the fast-paced changes in Britain’s dining out scene. I’m incredibly proud of the entire awards list as every restaurant on it, not just the winners, sets the standard by which all others should be measured.”

 

In place of the usual ranked list, The Good Food Guide has moved to recognising Britain’s top restaurants by their rating as Exceptional and World Class, with individual awards (including Best Front Row Seat and Best New Restaurant)  marking out the leaders in their field. Every restaurant is comprehensively inspected by co-editors Elizabeth Carter and Chloë Hamilton and their team of 30 anonymous inspectors, with Good Food Guide readers sending tip offs when promising cooking and hospitality emerges from the most remote or unlikely places.

 

This year’s Restaurant of the Year was awarded to The Sportsman in Seasalter, Kent, which also moved into the highly selective group of World Class-rated restaurants. The Guide highlighted its assured originality and impressive longevity: not only has it been in business for 25 years, head chef Dan Flavell has been working alongside Stephen Harris for the past 23 of them. “It’s still hard to book, it’s astoundingly good value, and it’s as relevant today as when it was the new hot ticket,” said Elizabeth Carter. “This restaurant is rock solid. They’ve never been out of touch with the local food movement. They’re in touch with their customers. They’ve got a take-us-or-leave-us attitude, which is not irreverent, it’s just ‘this is what we do’.”

LONDON, ENGLAND – JANUARY 30: (L to R) Elizabeth Carter, Adam Hyman, Leandro Carreira, Renato Santos and Chloe Hamilton attend the Good Food Guide Awards 2024 at Theatre Royal Drury Lane on January 30, 2024 in London, England.
Photo Credit: Dave Benett.

The Good Food Guide prides itself on in-depth inspections and detailed, longform reviews. In an age of recycled content, it’s an invaluable and trusted resource to help readers seek out the perfect restaurant for their taste and budget. With the current economic climate, the need for confidence in dining choices has never been greater and with over 70 years of experience, The Good Food Guide has invested heavily in new ways to access their content –  via an app, website and social media – without compromising the quality of output.

 

The Good Food Guide was acquired in 2021 by Knife & Fork Media, owners of hospitality perks platform CODE, who have made a series of changes to the respected publication. Adam Hyman, founder of Knife & Fork said, “It’s no secret that the hospitality industry has been through a torrid time over the past few years with the impacts of Brexit and the pandemic. Yet our awards not only prove the resilience of hospitality as an industry, but show just how much dining out across Britain has evolved for the better in the past 70 years. The range and diversity of Britain’s restaurants has never been greater and so The Good Food Guide is more valuable than ever in providing trusted, authoritative recommendations.”

LONDON, ENGLAND – JANUARY 30: (L to R) Elizabeth Carter, Adam Hyman, Rosie Green, Ross Trueman, Dave Mothersill, guest and Chloe Hamilton attend the Good Food Guide Awards 2024 at Theatre Royal Drury Lane on January 30, 2024 in London, England.
Photo Credit: Dave Benett.

The event at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane was supported by Lord Lloyd Webber who, via a video appearance from the Caribbean, paid tribute to the founder of the Guide, Raymond Postgate, joking that he initially intended to call it ‘The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Food’. Lord Lloyd Webber referenced his personal Good Food Guide collection, being one of the few owners of every single edition published since 1951 (69 in total). He also mentioned that the Guide has returned better than ever, enjoying a new  accessibility of information and inspiration.

 

The full list of World Class and Exceptional restaurants, along with the individual award winner is  as follows:

 

World Class

L’Enclume,  Cumbria

Moor Hall, Lancashire

The Sportsman, Kent – NEW

Ynyshir, Mid Wales

 

New Exceptional-rated restaurants for 2024:

Behind, London

CORE by Clare Smyth, London

Mýse, North Yorkshire

The Cedar Tree at Farlam Hall, Cumbria

The Ritz, London

The Sea, The Sea Chef’s Table, London

Exceptional

Aulis London, London

Annwn, Mid-Wales

Cail Bruich, Glasgow

Claude Bosi at Bibendum,  London

Da Terra,  London

Edinbane Lodge, Isle of Skye

Grace & Savour, West Midlands

Hélène Darroze at The Connaught, London

Hide and Fox, Kent

Hjem, Northumberland

Harborne Kitchen, Birmingham

Home at Penarth, Wales

La Dame de Pic,  London

Lake Road Kitchen, Cumbria

Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons, Oxfordshire

Meadowsweet, Norfolk

Old Stamp House, Cumbria

Osip, Somerset

Outlaw’s New Road, Cornwall

Pine, Northumbria

Pollen Street Social, London

Restaurant 22, Cambridge

Restaurant Gordon Ramsay, London

Solstice by Kenny Atkinson, Newcastle

Sosban & The Old Butcher’s, Isle of Anglesey

Spring, London

The Glenturret Lalique Restaurant, Scotland

The White Swan, Lancashire

Woven by Adam Smith, Berkshire

 

BEST FRONT ROW SEAT

WINNER – The Sea, The Sea Chef’s Table, London

Behind, London

Aulis London,  London

Barrafina, Dean Street, London

Harrods Dining Hall, London

DRINKS LIST OF THE YEAR

WINNER – Furna, Brighton

Noble Rot (all locations), London

Allium at Askham Hall, Cumbria

The Kitchin, Edinburgh

BEST FARM TO TABLE RESTAURANT   

WINNER – Our Farm, Cumbria
Crocadon, Cornwall

Coombeshead, Cornwall

Osip, Somerset

The Goods Shed, Kent

The Small Holding, Kent

MOST EXCITING FOOD DESTINATION

Helmsley & the Howardian Hills, North Yorkshire

CHEF TO WATCH

WINNER – James Carn, Lark, Suffolk

Max Coen, Dorian, London

Kasia Piatkowska, Tropea, Birmingham

Rob Sachdev, Upstairs at Landrace, Bath

Wesley Smalley, Seasonality, Maidenhead

Jamie Smart, Cadet, London

BEST NEW RESTAURANT

WINNER – Mountain, London

Myse, North Yorkshire

Lark, Suffolk

Dorian, London

Higher Ground, Manchester

The Abbey Inn, North Yorkshire

Noble Rot Mayfair, London

 

RESTAURANT OF THE YEAR

WINNER – The Sportsman, Kent

Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons, Oxfordshire

Ynyshir, Mid-Wales

L’Enclume, Cumbria

Pine, Northumberland