Foraged flavours accompany vegetables from the kitchen garden in this country house menu. Caroline Baldwin reports
It was a Hilton hospitality careers fair that tempted chef Paul Nicholson into the trade. That day, aged only 15, he was a moth drawn to the flame… quite literally, he saw a chef dramatically flambéeing and never looked back.
He "worked his socks off" to improve his skills and applied to work at the nearby one-Michelin-starred Bath Priory. "I applied three times until eventually I knocked on the door and asked for the chef to give me an opportunity, and it went on from there," he says.
Nicholson worked his way from commis pastry chef at the Bath Priory to senior positions at the Yorke Arms in the Yorkshire Dales, Storrs Hall in the Lake District and Lords of the Manor and the Dial House, both in the Cotswolds. His latest position was at the Clock House restaurant in Ripley, Surrey, where he retained a Michelin star and three AA rosettes since joining the team in 2020.
But he and his partner had fallen in love with the north, so when the head chef position at the Orangery at Rockliffe Hall came up late last year, it was too good an opportunity to turn down.
Nicholson's pastry background has stayed with him and can be seen in Rockliffe's afternoon tea, created with his partner, who also works at the hotel as pastry chef.
The tasting menu begins with his signature dish of a Lincolnshire Poacher scone, served with a chilled tomato consommé with celery, fennel, shallots and an aromatic basil oil. The tomatoes and basil are from Rockliffe's greenhouse in the walled kitchen garden, and it's this garden that directs menu planning, with Nicholson working with the head gardener and taking trips in the hotel's golf buggy to forage in the countryside. He's currently picking cecily and rowan berries as well as elderflower, which he plans to turn into a syrup for a strawberry and elderflower sorbet.
"Foraging is a natural progression from being a chef," he believes.
A new dish for summer that encapsulates the hotel's walled garden is vegetables cooked in various ways, including baby carrots, mini leeks and beetroot either pickled, roasted or barbecued, served with a broccoli and lemon purée, with herbs and flowers to garnish.
The garden is bountiful with lovage, which appears in a dish of wild trout served with leeks – the green tops blended with oil to create a mayonnaise, while the whites are salted for 20 minutes before being gently braised. A byproduct of buttermilk is used to create a whey sauce, which foams up to encase the trout, served with puff potato for texture as well as a micro lovage and a lovage emulsion.
Fresh British flavours weave their way through classical cooking on Nicholson's six-dish tasting menu, all of which are also available on the à la carte, allowing the team to reduce wastage. "Part of my ethos about food is that I try not to make it too cheffy," says Nicholson. "I think the simplicity and the flavours of the dishes make guests want to come back and eat every week."
One bite that would happily be repeated weekly would be the lamb fat-glazed crumpet, which accompanies locally-reared, salt-aged Northallerton lamb, served with turnip and mustard.
"We take the belly and salt it for four hours before slow-cooking sous vide overnight," he explains. "It's then pan-roasted to render the fat until it's nice and crispy. Next to this is the loin, which we sear lightly and then almost confit in a bain marie of lamb fat at 58ºC for about an hour. We then carve it and serve with a sprinkle of salt and a brush of lamb fat."
Turnip is grated and salted before being cooked down gently in butter and a little cream before a spoonful of crème fraîche is added, turning the humble vegetable into something similar to a hot rémoulade.
The plate also features turnip that is salted and compressed in oil, then steamed before being sliced and blow-torched, as well as pickled raw turnip and a purèe made from roasting the trimmings. The dish is served with a lamb sauce with sherry vinegar and Pommery mustard.
It's been only eight months since Nicholson's arrival at Rockliffe, but the chef believes his brigade of 11 are getting into a rhythm, having changed the menu, made contacts with suppliers and tested new skills in the kitchen.
"These things take a lot of time," he admits. "There's been lots of progress and a lot more to go. But the most important thing for me is consistency. If I make sure the team are happy and the guests are enjoying the food, everything else will come."
From the menu
- Lincolnshire Poacher cheese scone
- Chilled estate tomato broth, basil
- Risotto, mushroom, fine herbs, 36-month aged Parmesan
- Confit trout, leek, lovage, potato, whey
- Salt-aged Northallerton lamb, turnip, mustard, lamb fat crumpet
- Granny Smith apple, yogurt, lemon verbena, feuilletine
- 64% Valrhona manjari, mint, cocoa nib, crème fraîche
Ttasting menu, £95. Wine pairings, £50
Rockliffe Hall Hotel, Golf & Spa, Hurworth on Tees, Darlington, County Durham DL2 2DU
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