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Situated in Almondbury’s main street in a row of traditional Yorkshire cottages which, in a former life, contained, among other things, a posh grocer’s and a haberdasher’s, Nosh is one of three restaurants owned and run by Ben Franco, the others being Cibo and Gringo’s in Huddersfield town centre.
Parking in the evening proved to be no problem with on-street spaces or in the car park behind the premises.
Descending down steep steps, which, unfortunately make access impossible for wheelchair users, one enters a warm and welcoming bar area with colourful decor complementing the heavily oak beamed interior. Tall people should beware as the ceiling is low although the owner has thoughtfully padded many of them to avoid serious cranial damage. A young and efficient staff soon attended to our drinks requirements before we mounted the stairs to the busy upstairs restaurant where the chefs could be seen busy creating their magic in the open plan kitchen.
The particularly innovative menu provided several vegetarian choices and, when informed of my son’s gluten allergy, staff were most helpful in advising what were suitable dishes. In fact, the restaurant manager suggested that, if we were to telephone in advance, special diet menus would be printed and available on arrival!
To start, my wife and son opted for Leek and Potato soup which was pronounced excellent and was supplemented by a choice of warm bread rolls and gluten-free crackers for David. I was a little more adventurous and had a Crab and Prawn Salad with Chilli Oil. The crab tasted of Whitby and was not at all subdued by the heat of the chilli. A varied selection of well-dressed baby leaves made this a most colourful dish.
For my main course I went for a Wild Mushroom and Dolcelatte Wellington, a sort of vegetarian version of Boeuf Wellington, which was served on a bed of French Beans and Mange Tout with a Tarragon cream sauce. I would have preferred to see the cheese exert a little more character but it was a most satisfying dish nevertheless. My wife chose Grilled Sea Bass fillets with a Saffron cream sauce which earned full marks. In both cases the creamy yet light sauces were a real credit to he chef. My son’s Honey Roasted Pork disappeared in a trice and earned the compliment, “nice” which is about as good as you will ever get from him! All main courses were beautifully presented - the expression “art on a plate” would not have been out of place.
None of the above dishes was so large that we could not manage a pudding so justice was done to two Hazelnut Parfaits and a Chocolate Mousse, all of which matched up well to everything that had gone before. The Parfaits were an agreeable concoction of ice cream and hazelnuts and the mousse was a classic set in an unctuous chocolate sauce.
Our bill, which took ages to arrive as seems par for the course these days, came to £56.75 which included a bottle of house wine, a cider and mineral water.
One important point. A licensee friend of mine once said, “whatever you do, you must get the toilets right”. No criticism of Nosh on this score!
Would we eat at Nosh again? Yes. Again and again as the food was quite outstanding and the atmosphere friendly and informal but we do wish that the restaurant had a section for non-smokers.
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