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This is the second of three guest posts from, Phil, a good friend of mine – all restaurants visited while on holiday in Norfolk, England.
The Grove is attached to The Grove Hotel (review to follow separately) but operates as a restaurant in the evenings.
We were based at the hotel during our Norfolk foodie trip so decided to eat in the restaurant on our first night.
NB – Even though we had booked a room for three nights we still had to book a table in the restaurant.
On arrival, we were shown to the bar area and given our menus to peruse whilst partaking in a postprandial gin and tonic. We tried the local brand of gin, Black Shuck with Fever-tree tonic £7.50 a pop. Nice but not the most flavoursome gin and we both prefer Norfolk Gin (although it’s not widely available so we always buy a bottle or two when we visit).
Anyway, it was something to sip while we looked at the wooden menus. Yes, wooden. Quite a nice touch but you wouldn’t want to drop one on your foot.
The Grove’s menu is British through and through, well mostly British as I’m pretty sure that “Muntjac faggot open lasagne” (which was a starter) is half Chinese deer half Italian carbohydrate.
We quite like the idea of having a good old peruse and booze before being shown to your table as it avoids having to keep telling the waiter you need another 5 minutes to choose and then waiting 15 minutes for them to come back and take your order from your table.
As we finished our drinks, a waiter appeared took our food and wine order then showed us through to our table.
The restaurant is nicely laid out although, oddly, there were two separate dining rooms.
We were seated at the leftmost table in the picture directly above.
The other half won the battle for best PWP (People Watching Position).
We ordered some handmade sourdough bread which came with olive oil and balsamic glaze £3.95 and olives again £3.95. Not sure I like paying for bread (in restaurants, I don’t mind paying for it at Simmons!) but it was tasty as were the olives.
I also went for a chicken satay starter. There were three to choose from. Here’s the one with the coriander. A bit pricey at £8.95 but the chicken was tender and very well-seasoned.
We ordered two glasses of Malbec (£4.75 a glass) to have with our meals.
The PW (People Watcher) ordered Mrs Beeton’s lamb shoulder (£19.95) while I went for the pan-fried halibut (£19.95).
Most of the menu was gluten free.
The lamb shoulder got the thumbs up from PW. I didn’t enjoy the halibut. There was something I couldn’t quite put my finger on taste-wise (perhaps the lemongrass) the accompanying smoked paprika risotto was very good although it overpowered the fish. Overall, it just didn’t work for me, so much so, I forgot to take a photo but here’s the lamb.
Desserts were delicious. Salted Caramel Tart with Chocolate Ice Cream and Grove Cheesecake which came with passion fruit, sweet cicely (yep, we had to ask too) and garden elderflower sorbet. £7.25 each (as were all desserts, cheeseboard was £9.95.
As an aside, the hotel has extensive grounds (there’s even glamping) and a lot of the produce used comes straight from the kitchen garden and large vegetable patch (not the fish obviously) and it really does taste better for it.
We’ll be back but not for the halibut.
The Grove
95 Overstrand Road,
Cromer,
Norfolk,
NR27 0DJ.
http://thegrovecromer.co.uk/restaurant/
01263 512412
