The opening of the North Hill Hotel in the centre of Colchester has ensured that the town now benefits from a classier place to accommodate its visitors in a comfortable fashion. The venue offers convenient and friendly surroundings in which to stay at the heart of this old Roman capital city. The interior is full of character and retains a lot of its original features and charm behind a modern clean exterior.

Their Green Room Restaurant sources local produce for its regularly evolving menu. It should not surprise you to find that the food majors on classic British fare with a good range of dishes, from slow roasted tomato, fig or feta cheese tart, crab and prawn spring rolls through to roasted rump of salt marsh lamb with purple sprouting broccoli, ratte potatoes and salsa verde.

For puddings the ultimate must surely be the lemon and amaretto cheesecake with raspberry coulis, closely followed by dark chocolate cardamom tarte and vanilla ice cream.