Chadwicks Inn Maltby Review

Whilst on a trip to the North East of England to visit relatives, I checked this very website for a family friendly, award winning restaurant to have lunch at on the way. Step forward the Chadwicks Inn Maltby, a renowned gastropub which has been under its current ownership since 2009, and which holds a Michelin guide listing as well as two AA rosettes. With credentials like that (as well as hundreds of positive reviews from regular punters) I was pretty confident of receiving some quality cooking as I rocked up for lunch with my wife and two young children, on a cold March Saturday.

After parking in the sizeable car park at the back of the restaurant (always handy) we made our way around to the front. The exterior was looking a little bit tired if I'm being super pernickety, but inside has a nice modern pub feel and I really liked the space. We had a short wait at the bar before anyone seemed to notice us (not really a problem, we were a couple of minutes early) and we were then promptly shown to our table in one of the main dining areas.

The table was spacious and even though we were close to the toilets, we were sat on a sort of very high back settle (over 6ft I'd say) which provided a more than adequate screening from passing foot traffic; it's clear the owners here had given that some thought. The only thing I didn't like in the dining room was the bellowing music; we were quite close to a speaker and it was unnecessarily loud for me for a lunch time visit.

On offer at lunch is a decent three course carte menu with a good amount of choice, a set three course market menu, sandwich options and a children's menu also, although slightly unusually this had options for only one course. Drinks wise there's a solid wine list and a good range of other offerings such as cocktails, including a better than average non-alcoholic selection - we enjoyed some well made 'Blackberry Nojitos' during our meal.

Lunch began with some complimentary made-in-house bread (it's actually quite a rarity nowadays for this to be complimentary) including a slice each for the kids. The bread was delicious; rather than try and do something 'clever' flavour wise, they've clearly just made the decision to focus on delivering great quality bread, and that's exactly what it was, baked well and texturally perfect.

First course proper for me was the Whitby crab, served with picked cucumber, a cucumber ketchup, creme fraiche and a brown crab puff pasty tuille. It was, put simply, a stunning dish. The main crab element was delicious and all the accompanying elements were executed without fault; the only minor exception being the tuille which although an understandable addition, didn't pack a great deal of flavour. That aside though, it was an excellent dish that looked great on the plate and tasted even better than it looked.

My wife was equally enthused with a beautifully plated and very tasty goats cheese dish, whilst my daughter (in the absence of any starters on the children's menu) had another portion of the very tasty bread. My young son (as always, we're trying) was very happy with just a side of skinny fries.

After being blown away by my starter, I was very much looking forward to the main course. The mains were delivered in good time but I have to be honest and say I was slightly disappointed with what I was served. That's not to say my Spring lamb, served with a confit lamb belly fritter and wild garlic mash wasn't tasty (it was) but the presentation was a lot more agricultural, the lamb could have done with some more resting time, and the fritter lacked seasoning for me.

My wife I have to say did enjoy her main a lot more; a well cooked chunk of stone bass sat atop a very flavourful Cullen Skink, the only minor complaint here being she wasn't given a spoon to finish off the rest of that delicious sauce. My daughter too was perfectly happy with her cheeseburger and fries from the children's menu.

After some impressive cooking for the savoury courses, there was absolutely no chance of us leaving without dessert, and this proved to be a wise choice. My cheesecake again was plated with clear skill and was an interesting take, with a pistachio praline disk sat on top of the whipped vanilla cheesecake. It was very tasty, the only element here I didn't enjoy was the rhubarb and grenadine sorbet which didn't carry any of the zing I'd been expecting.

My wife also devoured a very well executed slice of salted caramel custard tart, with banana sorbet and a pecan praline. For the kids, this is where it got a little bit complicated as there are no desserts listed on the children's menu. There was fortunately no problem in delivering a couple of scoops of tasty vanilla ice cream for my young son when we asked; if I could offer just one suggestion to the restaurant, it would be to list that on the kids menu to avoid any confusion. In the end my daughter decided to pass on dessert.

And so, after collecting the bill (complete with an automatically included 10% service charge), a very enjoyable lunch came to an end. Overall I was very impressed by our first visit here; the food on the whole was excellent and the menu pacing was solid too (albeit the restaurant was fairly quiet for the duration of our visit). The service too was pretty faultless; professional and perfectly attentive with all the essential things (glasses being cleared, our empty water being replaced and so on) being done properly.

I didn't realise until after the meal, but we were served primarily by the owners for our visit which is very unusual to see nowadays for a well established restaurant, but there was no hint of pretence at all, and I actually found it quite refreshing to see that. On the downside, yes the place is fairly pricy and if I'd only had my lamb main course and nothing else (coming in at £34) I'd probably have left disappointed, but that's one of the reasons I always try and sample as much of the menu as possible (well, that and the fact I'm a glutton).

But look, I have absolutely no problem declaring this is an excellent restaurant with some great (better than I'd been expecting in all honesty) cooking on show and very good service too; I wish the team all the best moving forwards and I would have no issue at all returning in future.