Few buildings in Manchester can match the majestic grandeur of The Midland Hotel, in fact, I can't think of any which really compare. It's Manchester's most iconic building for good reason. Modern grey glass simply can't even come close to rivalling the history and presence that comes from a 120 year old establishment such as this.

Once you've crossed the foyer and climbed the small flight of steps up to palatial doors of The French itself, you already sense that a treat is to follow. There's a new doorbell outside which is a nice touch as it heightens anticipation, and also allows the doors to be closed to protect guests from the often-noisy foyer outside.

When inside there's nothing quite like it in the city. Grand, yet still small and intimate, setup with a clear focus on the dining experience. You can just feel the history behind those walls. It's a truly special place and one which I've adored for decades and always will.

The Chef in occupancy way back before the room's 2013 refurb once said to us, 'I could serve Pot Noodles in here and they'd still taste good'. I generally agree and see what he was getting at, but fortunately we had our sights focused a bit higher up on this occasion.

Not much really.  It's a lovely spot.  And no Pot Noodles anywhere to be seen.

2 tasting menus and 2 tipsy flights came to £460.    Bear in mind that this includes water, coffee and petit fours, which usually add about £20 per head in top end places.  Here, there's no unexpected additions and service charge is truly at the discretion of the diner so not automatically added, which in 2024 is how it should be and how many London operators now do it.  Remember back in the day when everywhere started adopting the London practice of adding a 'discretionary' 12.5%, and we all moaned about it?  People need to follow The French's northern lead

All in all it's good value and perfectly in line with what you'll pay at any such accoladed venue, and still considerably cheaper than the other  2 'Big 3' venues in the city centre by a solid £100+ per person.

Nothing out of the ordinary. It's pretty pricy, sure, but then so's a Porsche. And there's a valid reason for that.

So onto the bit which really matters, as much as some may be adamant that it's an evenly weighted package deal.  I agree with that to an extent, but then the contents are the best part of any good package, and we came here to eat rather than look at the nice embellishments.

The first course is Adam's now trademark sourdough and beef butter course.   It just can't come off the menu and has evolved into a tin loaf, rather than from a banneton.  First class bread with a whipped butter that's so light that it comes to the table piled high like a Mr Whippy.  The bread itself is served warm, as it should be.  Over the years the running order of this course has changed, but I prefer it bang at the start as per on this visit.

Snacks are always a highlight at The French, and they didn’t let us down this time either.  The cheese and onion pie/croustade is as substantial as you could hope for, loaded with masses of cheese flavour. It's the familiar yet elevated flavours which Adam Reid has made his trademark.  The second snack was a superlative chicken skin cracker, topped with dressed lobster and some shredded greenery as garnish.  Lobster and chicken skin in the same bite can only equate to happiness. 

Finally in the snack department was a tranche of fried bread which acted as a platform for some Cumbrian beef tartare, topped with some superb quality caviar.  Outstanding. We also loved the Kintsugi repair on the plate which this snack came plated on.  More places need to do this rather than lazily discarding cracked/chipped crockery.

Cold Cuts came in the form of the always superb ham.  Iberian pigs, reared in the UK and marinated for 7 days, and then smoked in honey and muscovado.  On the night it was served with a tableside-quenelled spoon of wholegrain mustard.  More bread was served with this course, only this time it was Hokkaido style milk bread, of course glazed with honey butter.  A simple but uber flavourful course.

Onto the mains and things started with a bang via some Lobster tail.  Perfectly cooked protein, plated in an 'American' sauce, which IMO is the best sauce to ever cross the pass at The French.  Add to that some ramson oil and a cash of cayenne, and this dish started the proper menu at a sprint.

Hen of the Woods is a love or hate ingredient, but fortunately any kind of 'shoom is on my top shelf of most beloved foodstuffs.  On serving, Head Chef Blaise advised that it's his current fave.  Toasted yeast mousse and a generous Microplane of hugely scented Hungarian truffle finished the menagerie.  Earth, deep, delicious, rich.  Autumn in a bowl.

Turbot was the fish course, and more evidence of top quality, luxury produce being showcased here.  The flatfish came to the table, plated alone, but was soon joined with a superb brown butter sauce, some punchy chive oil and more caviar; made to Adam's spec by Exmoor Caviar, carrying a light smoke.  A lesson in restraint and flavour delivery.

Chicken, from Rhug Estate in Wales, was exemplary quality poultry and it's great to see the humbly perceived chicken on a premium tasting menu alongside more spenny items of produce.  Brined breast, slow cooked with crispy skin, finished with tarragon oil and a classic butter sauce.  Because you can't have too much butter.  And speaking of indulgent, some shaved truffle completed the plate.

Rhug Estate Lamb, was a nice off menu surprise course which again wasn’t included on the bill, but should be on the menu by the time you read this.  Lamb short rib, smoked over lavender served with preserved ramson berries and a simply stunning sauce.  You're in for a treat with this one, as the seasons change and red meat becomes more apt.

The relatively recent trend of a meal's cheese course coming as a dish, rather than via some wedges with chutney and crackers, is one which I approve of.   In this instance it was a slice of Baron Bigod, blowtorched at tableside until bubbly and then topped with some apple reduction, a prune and Armagnac chutney, then topped with a shard of walnut biscuit.  A cheeseboard, interpreted as a dish. Clever and delicious.

With the last of the salt-based courses down, I was time for a sweeter course which was baked Fig Leaf Custard with a multitude of raspberry preparations from a sorbet, a sauce and a tuile.  A super fresh and well textured dish which always pleases.

Last up was the tipsy cake, another Adam Reid signature.  For those who've yet to try it, you can expect a rum baba type dish.  Soft sponge, laced with Salford Spiced Rum along with a light Microplane of lime yest to deliver a massively perfumed hit, and some whipped cream.  Simple, delicious, and this can't ever come off the menu either, as much as it's changed and evolved over the years.

However; the milk bread lacked colour/crust so the glaze had started to mar the texture.  The lobster snack's lettuce garnish was impossible to eat in two bites, and messily dragged off in one, leaving the rest of the snack sans garnish.

And watch the amount of dishes which involve herb oil.  Sure, there was a few different flavoured oils and they were all delicious and worked, but be careful to not let things get repetitive.

That’s it, which across so many courses is a solid showing.

The French's service has always been top notch, striking that all important/Manchester friendly balance of being precise, yet still relaxed and approachable.  We just don’t like it any other way in Mcr.

The always fantastic Dima heads up things in FoH, and also pulls the strings with the French's wine offering.  We mentioned to him in passing a few weeks ago that we were dying to try the wonderful Gusbourne 51 Degrees North which isn't available by the glass anywhere else that I can think of, but The French duly oblige.  We arrived and were greeted with 2 glasses of it, which is wonderful detail and a superb wine to boot.  For transparency, we were not charged for this glass of wine.

All evening the team were fun, friendly, chatty and measured the chattiness barometer of all the tables around them, returning the same level of interaction.

And whilst service charge is included in the bill, be a saint and add a bit more.

A few new faces were on duty, and a couple of nerves seemed apparent.  We are all human, plus they'd possibly been versed that this piece was incoming.  No pressure eh?  But to those concerned I say; never feel nervous around food writers or supposed 'critics'. Most of us couldn't ever do your job, many don’t even directly pay for their dinners, and without you our job wouldn't exist.  So you have nothing at all to fear as you're the A-side.  Be yourself and relax.

I was fuming when after years of senseless denial, Michelin had the absolute cheek to host their '24 awards at The Midland, with Adam's team prepping the snacks under the nose of all involved, only to then overlook The French for a Star yet again whilst also seeing fit to handout premature stars to a couple of newly launched places in London, as ever.  In many ways I don't care as I stopped going to restaurants simply because they have Stars, Bibs or Assiettes about 15 years ago. 

I generally have no issue with anyone getting an award even if I personally don’t think that it's warranted, as the whole subject is just massively opinion based and is way too subjective to be truly consistent anyway.  It is what it is.  But it just irks me when people have worked their backside off for years and have easily done enough to get one, yet then miss out for whatever reason other than standards, whether it be politics, who owns the host venue, bias, or just plain ignorance.  In this case, it has nothing to do with service, ambiance, value, or what's on the plate.  Those are the only things which should be considered in any guide's assessment metrics, as per our own scorecard.  It should never be about opinions as much as they are good for the ego to broadcast; it should be about measured facts and nothing else.  Anyway, rant over.

So, we ended our last visit to The French feeling that generally, it had moved on via a few tweaks and was broadly serving the best food that it's ever done. The same can be said again on this visit. Dishes have become more stripped back with a laser-like focus on the key ingredient, in this case super premium ones. Lobster, caviar, turbot, truffles. It's as top shelf as it gets really. The focal-point proteins are garnished and sauced with more quality to deliver something truly delicious. And that's the real skill here; delivering something which seems simple and yet is far from that, in reality. 

Then there's the non-food related changes to little things which we moaned about last time.  There's now nice front of house Microplanes for during the tableside theatrics.  And we now have hooks under the perimeter tables for the ladies' bags, rather than us putting them on the floor.  Such details are essential at premium venues.  90% of customers wouldn’t notice or even care about such things even if they did notice, but for us it's all about details and that’s how it should be at this elevated operating environment.

Small changes, every year, year on year, constantly getting better and questioning absolutely everything from the booking process, the welcome, the physical menu, the cutlery, main event, to the bill presentation, to the coat collecting, to the goodbye.  Every single facet of the experience from the second you consider booking should be evolved and shook up, constantly.  That mindset has been clearly evident over the last 2 years at The French.

Too many courses sport green herb oil.  And I still miss Henry's cracker… but then as I say, it's about facts not opinions, plus things have to move on and all that.

The Midland Hotel needs no introduction. If it does then Google can elaborate better than I ever could.  Under those grand arches at the hotel’s entrance is a newly placed vintage Rolls Royce, in keeping with its surroundings and the general history of said hotel; as much as that’s not directly related to the restaurant itself.  It does however set the mood for the opulence that’s about to follow.

So, you walk through the foyer and reach the doors to The French, and are instantly transported into a place where you can’t fail to feel special.  Modern blue booths accenting the historic 120-year-old ceilings, embellished with the now iconic chandelier, all sat within a legendary dining space that has more history than any other in the North.  It's just a magical place to spend a few hours.

The side tables are perhaps a bit small, not that we were sat at one because we were gratefully sat in our ‘usual’ booth.

The music was a touch loud at times/on certain tracks during the evening, which led to some guests also being loud .

We gladly handed over £145 a head for the tasting menu, plus £95 for matched wines.  It’s just what you pay these days but generally, such occasions are not supposed to be a regular thing though right?

No service charge is added though as much as we tipped 10%, and the menu is all-inclusive of coffee and water, etc. too, so there are no worries about the bill stacking up once upsold extras are bolted on, as is usually the case at such high-end places.

Wine markups run high in places.  I’ve said it 100 times so don’t need to over-elaborate but will.  Would you really expect to pay the same cash for the exact same product if one was purchased in Harrods and the other in Asda?  It just is what it is, in all honesty.  Something has to cover the bills for that grand hotel.

Expectations are always high when visiting such esteemed places, and after sitting at the #1 spot in our Top 10 best restaurants for the last 10 years, as in The French’s case, those expectations are amplified further.

It was great to see some proven and now expected staples still on the menu, starting with the bespoke Pollen Bakery bread and house-made beef butter, served with the claw-like spoon that used to accompany the now-retired tater 'ash dish.  Always pleasing, and the bread is now lightly toasted to bring some added texture.

Snack wise, the croustade/pie has also been elevated.  It’s bigger, much bigger, and evolved into a cheese and onion pie in terms of taste profile.  Croustades appearing on every single tasting menu snack course across the land are getting a bit tiresome, but this was outstanding.  Substantial in both physical weight and mouth feel, with a superlative cheese and onion taste burst.

The new raw beef and horse radish on fried bread snack took us back to The French of 2013 when the menu showcased a certain raw beef dish, which Mark Birchall can probably take as much credit for as Simon Rogan did back then.  Still delicious.

The cold cuts section is still on the menu, only it’s now served as separate episodes and plated with some added tableside theatre.  The salmon was fabulous quality on top of being ideally smoked, and the pork was similarly high quality but is now glazed before your eyes for yet more server interaction.

The Scallop was cooked as little as possible, carrying some char on top, to retain all that sweetness and freshness, balanced with fermented tomato, nicely finished with some herb oil.  A confident, minimalistic, and ultimately flavour-packed plate.

Next over the pass was Grilled Cornish Cod, with BBQ brassica and mussel topped with a mini quenelle of top quality N25 caviar, again sauced at the tableside.  This dish was right up my street. Fresh yet buttery and decadent.

Welsh Rhug Estate Deer with salt-baked beets was sauced at the table by Adam himself and was a main course fitting of the occasion.  Autumnal to a tee, focused around that top quality protein, robed with a stunningly acid-balanced sauce.

Now we love a good cheese course, especially when it’s plated above and beyond a few slices of cheese and garnishes on a plate.  Here said course was compiled with Stichelton cheese, walnut, prune, and apple.  A cheese course, made into a proper dish.  Punchy and full on, but a great way to end the salt-based courses.

Baked custard with Cheshire raspberries and nutmeg was presented a few tiers above how the menu description led us to envisage it.  A multi-layered scarlet-laden delight, with endless variations of textures and temperatures, garnished with a pretty berry tuile.

Tipsy Cake is another course that’s now expected to appear.  Fortunately, it was, and is now served as a slice of loaf, doused with Salford spiced run and some grated lemon, which again added a new dimension to the plate via its wonderful scent.

But; the chickpea cracker snack was a bit flat, lacked texture, and was well overshadowed by the other two snacks. And do you need two cracker dishes in the snacks anyway? That said I did pine for the now retired Henry’s Cracker.

As delicious as it was, the ham cold cut didn’t eat very well due to the size of the tranches and needed a knife, not just the mini serving fork that it came with, to break up without creating mucky fingers. Thinner slices perhaps?

And the grater used to zest the tipsy cake’s lime garnish looked a bit naff at tableside. A nice wooden-handled front-of-house Microplane would fit the bill and look a lot slicker.

The French has continually served up not just the best service in the city for 12 straight years but has also delivered the best hospitality to boot.  And there’s a difference between the two things.  Service is what you do, but hospitality is how you make a guest feel, and ultimately, a barometer of dining on this level is all about how the whole experience makes you feel, not just about what’s on the fork.

Being honest; we were a touch nervous ahead of our visit on this occasion as there’s been a huge wave of staff changes at The French over the last 12 months, and it’s the staff who make that experience happen, elevating things from doing everything correctly on a tick-boxy service point list, to making the guest feel like a million dollars every single time they visit.

But soon after arrival, our anxieties were put to rest via a warm smile and an impromptu glass of quality Polish fizz.  Service was broadly handled by the Chefs, which has always been a touch that we’ve loved since its inception a couple of years ago when finding staff was nigh on impossible.

Bring back the handbag table hooks for the people who don’t have a booth seat to sit their bags on.

We’ve visited The French at least twice a year for the last decade due to a mix of personal and professional visits.

During that timescale we’ve seen it grow, fall back during transitional periods, then then elevate itself again once settled. Through all of that as previously mentioned, it’s been a constant at the #1 spot on our prestigious Top 10 restaurants in Manchester list and has continually delivered the best all-around guest experience in the city.

But the food on this visit was hand on heart, the best that it's ever been during any of our approximate 25 visits since 2013. The new menu is an ideal balance of proven and familiar dishes, albeit elevated in most areas with some new additions to keep things fresh and progressive enough to warrant those repeat visits.

Things have improved drastically in Manchester’s dining scene over the last decade or so, with a couple of real stars emerging over the last 12 months. But still, we honestly can’t see any true contenders to knock The French off its perch as the best all-round experience in town.

Watch the repeat ingredients. Bring back the bag hooks and Henry’s Cracker.

Menu Box By AR Preview

I don’t know about you, but in our house it's been a solid 12 months of DIY food boxes, Netflix, online wine tastings, along with some daydreaming on Trivago.  The main social event of the week; getting dolled up to eat at a place that you've wanted to go for ages, has been superseded by waiting for a courier to knock after you've tracked their location on the app all morning, to be handed a cardboard box full of produce that you’ll cook and then eat whilst adorned in a set of PJs.  Possibly speaking for myself there? 

Now since spring 2020, everybody's been posting photos of said cook at home boxes on social media, and there's been a clear improvement in the nation's home crockery standards and plating skills.  A cheesy polka dotted affair with excessive herb oil garnish, has progressed to modern stonecast plates, hosting food that’s been presented with a bit more care and light-handedness.

One of the first decent level food boxes back in the day was from Manchester's very own Adam Reid, who started doing his Great British Menu, to finish cooking at home.  We loved it, and were over the moon to see him carrying on the DIY boxes after that, launching as Menu Box by AR.

Now we have a perhaps silly policy to not repeat Chefs' boxes, as to cram in as many different ones as possible in between now and us actually eating in dining rooms again.  So until now we've not returned for more of Adam's wares, although each week we excitedly wait for the menu to be released so we can at least enjoy it vicariously.  Sure, when this palaver is all over many places will carry on with their food boxes, but the places who do it properly will intrinsically stop and focus more on serving customers in person, not virtually. 

When I say 'properly' I mean the restaurants who actually produce the food boxes, in their own kitchen, by their own Chefs.  A large chunk of boxes out there are now produced in massive generic offsite prep kitchens, by staff who have nothing to do with the restaurant which the box is 'from'.  Crucially, they often don’t use the same produce that the named eatery uses, and bang out 1000's of boxes a week on behalf of tons of restaurants, just using that restaurant's recipes and then share the profits.  I'm not a fan of this because more often than not, you can usually tell that the contents of the box have next to nothing to do with the restaurant whose name is slapped on it.  But each to their own I guess.

No such issues here.  Adam's boxes are produced in the kitchen of The French by the man himself.  We were lucky enough to have a socially distanced Zoom chat with Adam and his restaurant manager Eleanor in said kitchen earlier this month, during which he was indeed prepping his own boxes.  So you can be sure that these are the real deal and you'll get a true taste of Adam Reid at The French ahead of the doors reopening one day soon.

Menu Box by AR is delivered on a Friday but don’t need to be consumed on the day of delivery.  Just remember to unpack the box on the day and follow the storage instructions. So the day after our courier drop off we got into our own kitchen to finish things off. 

The menu started as it often does in the restaurant, with some of the signature beef butter and bespoke Pollen Bakery sourdough.  Whack it on a plate.  No skill needed at all, but a nice plate can make you look semi talented.  There's little more you can say about this dish which hasn’t been said already.  It's as good as any sourdough you'll eat, and that butter is always tip top.

Next up was Brown Onion Soup, with 28 hour sourdough and truffled rarebit.  A spin on French Onion Soup, topped with a giant cheesy crouton, laced with super fragrant truffle. 

A fantastic broth with tons of layers and a real depth of flavour.  It was a cinch to prep too.  Heat the soup lightly, toast the back of the bread, top the other side with the rarebit mix, then grill until golden.  You're supposed to pop the toast into the soup to soak it up a bit, but when you're spending 2 minutes taking photos, you don’t want to be getting things too soggy.  Suffice to say, the bread was dunked about 3 seconds after these shots were taken.  Putting the critical head on; was bread needed on two back to back courses?  Possibly not, but when you're lounging about in those PJ's, bring on the carbs I say.  These things have elasticated waists for good reason.

Main course was Aged Cumbrian sirloin, caramelised cabbage with Garlic and Lovage Mayo.  High quality beef with stunningly rich fat, which came pre-seared, garnished with a slice of braised/charred cabbage, which was topped with a garlic/lovage infused mayo and the best finishing ingredient on the planet; crispy onions! 

I dress at least 50% of home cooked food with them, only I buy the big sacks from the supermarket because they are cheap and passable.  Like my cooking in general.  Clearly, Adam's were on a different level. Perfectly sweet and crunchy, with no sign of bitterness as you too often get when they've been fried for even a few seconds too long.

The sauce was stunning and again super flavoursome.  When a sauce turns up to your house as jelly, you know it's going to be riddled with boney goodness.

To finish it was Medjool date pudding, brown sugar and tamarind sauce, with clotted cream.  Basically, a Cheffy sticky toffee pudding, elevated to make it just that little bit more interesting.  The rich dates created an indulgent and moist pudding, with an even richer sauce carrying the perfect balance of sweetness and tartness from the sugar and tamarind.  A dollop of clotted cream gave it all some lightness and kept the sweetness in check, then the whole thing was finished with some citrus butter for that added lift and zing. 

In the cooking notes, Adam suggests eating this course with a brew.  No PX, no Tokaji or a fancy sticky wine pairing here. We ignored this guidance and opted to finish our meal with an Espresso and truffles to perfectly recreate the restaurant experience.

So another great box of DIY action from Manchester's main man.  As touched on earlier in the prefix blurb; you could taste Adam's cooking even though it was finished in a far less capable kitchen following the vac packing and courier trip.  For me, this authenticity is super essential with any high end food box. 

The only downside of me writing these dishes up for you is that they likely won't appear in the menu boxes again since the menu changes weekly.  So, perhaps not repeating menus from the same Chef was a stupid policy after all?  Not to worry, you can be pretty sure that every week your box of choice will be prepared with the same love and true to form quality. Due to some poor planning on our part we forgot to order the specially created Gusbourne wine selection, so on realising our mistake just paired the dishes with bottles from one of our favourite yards.

With the end of lockdown and normality apparently close to hand, do yourself a favour and get yourself one of Adam's DIY boxes. They are genuinely some of the very best out there, and we've had a lot, an awful lot, over the last 12 months.