Telephone: 01584 872325
Address: 17 Corve Street, Ludlow, Shropshire
"Oh yikes," I thought, as a frog's leg slid down the gullet. "Oh triple yikes." I had meant, you see, to take the vegetarian option in honour of Vegetarian Week, for which the bells ring out across the land heralding its start next week. Sadly, my own, true, base nature reasserted itself in a moment of absent-minded greed. I paused for a moment, considering whether or not I should send the controversial dish back, and then decided that it was too late. Might as well be hung for a sheep as for a lamb, or however the old saw goes.
The honourable intention had been to test out how true vegetarians fare when it comes to your average restaurant menu: was there life beyond grilled goat's cheese and roast peppers? Not that Hibiscus - a relative newcomer in that gastro theme park, Ludlow, the only town in Britain with more Michelin-starred eateries than pubs - was the ideal place to apply my self-denying ordinance.
Most proper chefs - most, I repeat, not all - regard vegetarians as a damned plague and react to the abstinence from meat with the same horror that most of us reserve for Hunnish practices. I am not sure that the Monsieur Claude Bosi, proprietor and chef of Hibiscus, holds such extreme views or not. However, on the particular Wednesday when Autolycus, a nonpareil among conversationalists and cooks, and I dropped by, it would have been difficult, if not impossible, to eat through the dishes on display on the lunch menu and not succumb to carnivorous heresy. We were faced with a choice of three dishes at each stage, with the main courses packing down solidly with lamb, fish and guinea fowl.
Having said that, Monsieur Bosi conjured up one of the most beautiful vegetable dishes that I have sunk my tooth into in some months, if not years (and worth all the dishes in Alain Passard's hyped vegetable menus put together). This went under the description of ravioli of white onion and lime with broad beans and mint. It had sweetness, delicacy, texture and tone. It went long in the mouth and short on the plate. It lifted the spirits and seduced the tastebuds. In short, it was terrific.
M. Bosi has an unusual way with fruit. It seems to crop up announced and unannounced in a good many dishes, giving lift here, broadening out a flavour there, adding an unexpected note somewhere else. Lemon gave a citric tang to the frog's legs. Apple cropped up in delicate purée form with the fried scallops with smoked butter and watercress. Peach turned up oddly but effectively (along with the even odder but just as effective peanut) in the John Dory with globe artichokes, marjoram and new potatoes. Breast of guinea fowl with a confit of tomato and chilli passed on the fruit effects, but they came back with a bang in a pudding of pineapple roasted in vanilla butter with vanilla ice cream.
All these dishes were handled with wonderful assurance. Clearly this is classic French cooking, fruit or no fruit. The dishes are beautifully balanced, the attention to detail rigorous, the saucing elegant. There is a natural consideration for the dovetailing of ingredients, and an inherent understanding of the pleasure principles when it comes to eating. It isn't showy cooking. It's too well-bred in the best sense of the words for that, entirely in keeping with the place.
Hibiscus is small. The dining room and little bar are girt with old oak panelling, which gives them a gentle warmth and a certain seriousness of purpose. But there is no oppressive sense of occasion, none of the hushed silence of worship or sense of theatre of ego. The service, which is marshalled by the radiant Mme Bosi, is friendly and charming and not in the least stuffy.
There is a Menu Rapide of two courses for £19.50, to complement the Lunch Menu of £25 for three courses. It will not have escaped the notice of the observant among you that we had a course or two more than that, in honour of Autolycus, so technically we had the Menu Degustation, which tots up to £32.50 a head for five courses. What with a glass of With Hills Sauvignon, the same of Planeta Chardonnay and the same of Willi Opitz Beerenauslese, the bill came to £111.50. It was worth every penny.
Hibiscus delights - as long as you're not a vegetarian, that is. But, I suspect, it would do so even if you were: on the showing of the ravioli, and also of a smoothly charming veloute of asparagus with an egg fondue that came by way of an amuse bouche, I'll bet that, if asked to do so, M. Bosi would come up with a vegetarian menu to beat those of most dedicated vegetarian places into a cocked hat. However, I promise to do penance in the near future by going veggie, Vegetarian Week or no Vegetarian Week.
· Open 12 noon - 2pm Tues - Sun, 7pm - 10.30pm Tues - Sat. Menus: Menu Rapide, £19.50 for two courses, £25 for three courses; Menu Degustation, £32.50 for five courses. All major credit cards. Wheelchair access (no wheelchair WC).
