Arundel House Restaurant & Rooms

The historic town of Arundel has many delights to offer, the latest of which is the Arundel House Restaurant and Rooms, providing luxury accommodation and seasonal relaxed dining in the heart of West Sussex, surrounded by some of the finest countryside that England has to show. Combining chic with comfort, the restaurant makes enlightened use of the fine local ingredients to produce dishes that celebrate the good things of life given by nature and refined by man.

In 2004 Arundel House was given a major refurbishment, money that has since proved to be exceptionally well spent, resulting in the kind of facilities that are normally only encountered in a large luxury hotel, rather than a restaurant with rooms. With Goodwood just down the road Arundel House is a much sought after port of call, and the nearby Castle, ancestral home of the Dukes of Norfolk, and the magnificent Cathedral combine to surround the hotel with the cloak of history.

It has often been said of a top flight restaurant that to eat there was an experience rather than a meal. I can think of few places of which this could be better said than the restaurant at Arundel House. An aperitif, the Royale, is offered to assist contemplation of the menu, and as you absorb the flavours of raspberries and champagne, surely two of the most luxurious tastes unimaginable, the day retreats and a panorama of indulgence takes its place. Lest you should quail before such pleasure, Billy Lewis-Bowker and Luke Hackman, the proprietors, offer a little advice. But who in their right mind wishes to pass up even a brisk trot through such a menu?

Poached salmon arrives at table clad in a herb blanket set on a gaspacho coulis, with dill crème fraiche. Local crustaceans provide the main body of the tiane of crab and crayfish tail, carefully layered with tomato and spicy guacamole, served with melba toast. Or there may be a charlotte of local courgette stuffed with a red pepper mousse and served with a piquant beetroot carpaccio.

The local woods are alive with roe deer which have provided tasty dishes for Castle and Town alike over the centuries. A saddle of roebuck, served pink on sweet potato mash with wilted spinach and pine nuts, is well set off with a port wine reduction. The roasted breast of duck, carved over a duck confit rosti with savoy cabbage and pancetta, is finished with a delightful nutmeg cream.

Since indulgence is the keynote at Arundel House a dessert of chocolate mocha tart with chocolate brownie ice cream would not seem out of place, but just in case the diet police have been assaulting your conscience see of they will settle for chilled lemon and fresh elderflower soufflé with lemon sorbet. If, however, you plead hard of hearing, just consider the Arundel House assiette, where all five of Luke's labours of love are assembled in miniature. And then there's cheese...but that is a matter between you and what's left of your conscience. Just let me warn you that the choice of port is a temptation beyond fair play, never mind the French alternative with which they seek to intrigue you.

The Wine list here is the work of the Four Walls Wine Company, at Chilgrove. To describe it as a fine list is to finish on a note of understatement, which in all the circumstances would be unforgivable - it is a masterpiece, but then this is nothing less than one would expect to find at somewhere with so much going for it as Arundel House.