Judgement day

10:02am Tuesday 11th March 2008

The column visits Judges Country House Hotel, formerly Kirklevington Hall, near Yarm

IF we are to judge not lest we be judged, as St Luke's gospel supposes, what - short of eternal damnation - is the Good Book going to make of food critics, forever passing a few appropriate sentences of their own?

What, more specifically, if the venue is itself called Judges, once the country retreat - "secure and sumptuous" says the brochure - of beaks on the North-East circuit.

Today's column may thus be considered a judicial review though not, very likely, a judicious one. As they taught us at O-level English, that's something else entirely.

Judges Country House Hotel is the former Kirklevington Hall, just south of Yarm, and must on no account be confused with Kirklevington Grange, which is one of HM prisons just along the road.

Apart from anything else, the food is very much better than it is likely to be at Her Majesty's pleasure and it's by no means every commercial eating place on Teesside about which that may confidently be said.

The hall was built in 1881 for the entrepreneurial Richardsons of Hartlepool, is now a listed building and became a hotel - owned by the Downs family - in 1994.

To sum up at the beginning - a practice which could save a great deal of legal time, expense and hot air, and is thus to be recommended to Mr Jack Straw and friends - it is smart, relaxing, civilised, efficiently and affably run and, save for lunchtime, very, very expensive.

Forever pleading poverty, we went at lunchtime. It's £14.95 for two courses, £17.95 for three - "prices are per person,"

advises the menu, lest anyone suppose it to be for a family of four and with a doggy bag thrown in for grandma.

We considered it good value, and a highly enjoyable experience, nonetheless.

Things got off to a bad start, however.

Though the brochure boasts 250 bins, 30 armagnacs dating back to 1933, 70 malts, 50 vodkas and 30 cognacs, there was not only not so much as a single bottle of caskconditioned beer but a head waiter who'd no idea what it was.

A pint of Tetley's Smooth was £3.60, which in the circumstances may be considered criminal. Tim Howard, the hotel manager, promised subsequently to review the situation.

Warmly greeted, we were shown to a book-lined lounge with a portrait of a robed judge above the fireplace. No one knew who it was, but probably it was Judge Jeffrys. He was a hanging judge.

Lunch was taken in the conservatory, with pleasant views of some of the hotel's 31 acres, the word out that the owner was expected to arrive at any moment.

"If you're going to shout at me, shout at me now," said the cheery waitress whose name, it transpired, was Joy. "Name and nature," she said.

For me it was a first visit, for The Boss a familiar haunt. It's one of the favoured locations for those who have become known as ladies who lunch - lunch, in this case, a thinly-veiled euphemism for blether.

Another dozen or so were present, two of them male. "Men like having a fuss made of them," said Joy.

The four starters on a frequently changing lunch menu were white onion soup with deep-fried frogs' legs - honest - smoked salmon salad with citrus dressing, terrine of pressed duck leg and foie gras with celeriac remoulade and spiced pear and, fourthly, garlic ceps with white beans and garlic ciabatta.

The soup was intense, fragrant, wonderfully flavoured. Three frogs' legs - you forget how fleshy they are - came in a little cup and were fun. The garlic onion bread which preceded the starter was fresh, firm and very enjoyable, too.

The Boss had the ceps - there may have been 39 - and thought the experiment successful.

Already, it seemed, there was a bright and confident talent in the kitchen.

The owner, unnoticed, had crept in without so much as a Purcell trumpet fanfare with which to acknowledge her. Happily, come to think, there was no music at all.

We'd followed with roast veal with pomme puree, root vegetables and Madeira jus - more strong, vibrant, imaginative flavours but perhaps not for the ravenous. The root vegetables, for example, comprised four little cubes about the size of a quartet of sugar lumps.

The Boss had the pan-fried bream fillet with young vegetables, clams and a foaming, tangy, mussel broth. It looked terrific, tasted (she said) just as good.

Service was by the head waiter, by the ebullient Joy and by a young lady whose principal role appeared to hold the tray while others took things off it. We were reminded of the classic Barker/Corbett/ Cleese sketch. I know my place.

We finished with a "tonka bean creme brulee" - something to toy with? - with "rhubarb flavours" and a parfait of banana, coffee meringue and butterscotch sauce. They took so long to arrive that it could have been supposed that the chef had decided that the first one wasn't good enough and tried again - you know what they say about practice makes parfait. The Boss thought there should be nine months for gags like that, presumably in the punitentiary.

Coffee and inventive petits fours - an extra £4 each - were taken back in the lounge, colliding by that time with a couple of ladies tackling afternoon tea. That cost £12.50 - per person - but appeared to be of classic description.

The early bird dinner menu is £30 for three courses, the carte £44. While the temptation may be to rob a bank, it's probably best just to try it out at lunchtime.

Take her down.

■ Judges Country House Hotel, Kirklevington Hall, Yarm, 01642-789000.

THOUGH she hasn't yet been - "There's a good one in Canterbury" - Maureen Stephenson reports the opening of branch of Cafe Rouge on Framwellgate Bridge in Durham. What's particularly interesting is that the manager is Salvatore Savino, whose father - the incomparable Andrea - died last year. Andrea's restaurant in Shildon, famed throughout the North- East, has remained closed since his passing and only rumours with which to feed the passing. An awfully hard act to follow, anyway.

ONCE excellent, latterly not visited, the Abbey Inn at Byland Abbey, near Helmsley, is now operated by English Heritage and reopens tomorrow - "local, fresh and seasonal are our priorities" - with a lunch party to which the column has even been invited. No chance of attending, of course.

DARLINGTON CAMRA's "Spring Thing"

beer festival runs from this Thursday to Saturday at the Arts Centre, live music in the evenings and with 50 ales including Locomotion No 1, Darlington SS and Leyburn Shawl. All beer will be served in halfpint glasses with a third-pint mark, too.

"For those who wish to try a lot of beers without feeling the effects the following morning," they say.

and finally, the bairns wondered if we knew what sits in a fruit bowl crying for help. A damson in distress, of course.

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