Three Tuns
58 Middlebridge Street
Romsey
Hampshire
England
Tel: +44 (0)1794 512639
Serves lunch and dinner Monday to Sunday lunch; bookings advised; children welcome; patio garden.
This is the kind of eatery you might have lunch in after a morning’s shopping – the classic, unfussy food; simple but elegant surroundings; service that makes you feel good and a bill that won’t break the bank.
The manager, who used to do front of house at St Martin’s Lane Hotel in London, brings you the short, daily-changing menu. It warms your soul: pork rillettes with crudités and cornichons, braised shoulder of lamb with onion gravy and potato purée, and seared scallops with black pudding and red wine jus. It’s mostly French, though risotto appears sometimes, as do British classics. The cooking is careful, exact and full of flavour.
Chef Billy Reid, who had Michelin stars at both The Vineyard in Stockcross and L’Escargot in London, set the style and Damien Brown executes it. They both moved to Hampshire for a better life – houses in the country, shorter working hours, and a clientele that would appreciate simple food. ‘When you’re cooking in a Michelin-starred restaurant you are striving to keep everything as swish as the luxury décor,’ explains Billy. ‘It is hard to wow people with your cooking in that kind of environment, so I decided I wanted to work in a simple, neighbourhood place.’ He is definitely wowing them in Romsey, and you’d be wowed by the Three Tuns even if you had to drive 40 miles to get there.