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| Posted by: Cecilia |
Wednesday, February 29, 2012 11:40 AM |
Some time around 2006 or 2007 we went for dinner at the Castle Dairy in Kendal, because it had been voted Restaurant of the Year (or something similar) by the readers of The Westmorland Gazette, and we were emailed by one of them about the excellence of the place...well, that taught me. We brought Matt and Josh along, spent over 90 pounds, and had the worst dining experience in a long time. The food was stodgy, bland and pretentious, the chef kept walking between the kitchen and the bar carrying bottles of wine, the owner/waiter stood by the wall staring at us eating throughout the meal (we were the only customers), and afterwards, as we read some sign or other outside about the history of the place, Matt (who is now a chef with Michelin experience) said: "The most historic thing about that place was the duck." We later found out that the person who had emailed us was the owner....
Needed to get that off my chest, as I refrained from writing a review – at the time we had a policy of only including restaurants we felt we could recommend. (That's no longer the case).
Anyway, I'm now very happy that the Castle Dairy has been refurbished and resurrected, with Robert Stacey as head chef, and a kitchen full of eager students from Kendal College's Catering courses (Matt was once one of them). We shall be dining there asap, the set menu sounds very interesting/mouthwatering.
From their website:
"The
Castle Dairy is a Grade I listed building which has undergone a major
refurbishment as a restaurant/patisserie and art gallery run by Kendal College.
£120,000 has been spent on improvements by the building's owners South Lakeland
District Council, with further financial support from English Heritage, Savoy
Educational Trust, Lakeland Vintners and Kendal College amounting to an overall
project cost of £200,000.
Car
parking is available at Kendal Museum (postcode LA9 6BT) and the new Wildman
Street car park (postcode LA9 6EN) entrance opposite the reception of the
Riverside Hotel."
Good luck to the Castle Dairy team!
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