Edwinns Restaurant

Dine Online Restaurant Review

Edwinns Restaurant, Englefield Green, Surrey

Update: The review below is a little out of date now, but we had a email (September 1997) from a reader. It is appended to the end of the review.

Originally a pub, it achieved some fame in the 1970s as The Bailiwick, a Spanish Restaurant, more recently it became rather more infamous as The Chicane, a so-called "theme" restaurant, where the motoring racing theme outshone the cuisine. Under totally new management it has reopened as Edwinns Restaurant, its pubby antecedents are still visible inspite of every vertical surface being covered in an amazing variety of prints. There are even Klimts in the men's room. The polished wooden tables are arranged on a variety of different levels, and the place was packed out on a mid-January Saturday evening. The staff seemed more than able to cope with the demand, and the service was timely and committed. Three of us started with a warm duck salad with nice leaves, well put together and tasty but rather low on duck. A bottle of Grenache Blanc at Stg 11.25 went down very rapidly with our starters.

Rowan had Bream covered in a crunchy casing, it looked good and I'm told it tasted good. One of our friends had Edwinn's steak and kidney pudding, a veritable Mont-St-Michel in a sea of rich gravy. Large chunks of very tender steak tumbled out when its walls were broached. His wife had a thin escalope of salmon with a fan of avocado. She seemed to think the salmon wasn't quite generous enough. For my main course I had Escalope of Pork with a grain crusted glaze served on a bed of leeks and spinach. It tasted fine but the pork was rather chewy. The vegetables were excellent and generous: gorgeous dauphinoise potatoes all creamy and garlicky, and a big covered dish of red cabbage, broccoli and carrots. By now we were onto the house red, a perfectly decent Vin de Pays de l'Herault.

The puddings at Edwinns are really superb. Rowan had crême brulée for the second time in three days, this one was also light with a crisp top; Debs had Banoffi Pie (invented by Nigel Mackenzie at the Hungry Monk in Jevington, Sussex), it came surrounded by the yummiest warm butterscotch sauce. Michael had the Chocolate Roulade with hazelnut cream and coffee Anglais. It didn't quite make his absolute tops, but then we don't fling rosettes around willy-nilly! I had the lemon meringue pie. Now there's a test of pudding cookery. This one had the lot: a crisp top to a leviathan depth of moussy white meringue covering the lushest lemon filling without a hint of the gelatine, and resting on the shortest pastry: 10/10!

The bill for four came to Stg 103.55 - including two bottles of wine but didn't have coffee, thereby missing out on the homemade chocolates.

Reader's Comment

Went to Edwinn's, Englefied Green, last Wednesday, 24 September 1997. It was full and pretty busy. The style seemed very much the same as described in your article, wooden chairs and tables, yellowy gold walls covered in prints - nice atmosphere, very friendly staff. The menu was reasonably priced: for 2 courses, Stg15.50, for 3 courses, Stg19.50. Again, the wine was good too, from Stg11 to Stg20 for a good bottle of wine. Two of us for a full meal (one person had 3 courses, the other had 2) with aperitifs, bottle of wine, coffee and one brandy came to Stg60 which for the quality of the food we both thought was excellent. They also called for a taxi for us as we were paying the bill.

There are two other Edwinns restaurants too, in Surrey and Middlesex. Brgds Rebecca Ostrowska Date: 23 September 1997 05:53

Editor: The latest to open is in Bramley, Surrey. Edwinns is part of the Bluebecker chain of restaurants.