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First look at Native: a terrific celebration of English food
Published 19 June 2024

Native’s farm to table restaurant with rooms within the Netherwood Estate located on the Herefordshire-Worcestershire border

The Native narrative advocated by Ivan Tisdall-Downes – which is basically eat the view – has been promoted by other chefs, but few restaurants can match food and setting more harmoniously than this out-of-the-way restaurant (with a couple of rooms), on the Hereford-Worcestershire border. As a whole it breathes ‘nature’ and after almost a decade at various sites in London, feels like a homecoming for Tisdall-Downes and his business partner Imogen Davis.

It may be deeply rural but there’s a resolutely 21st-century feel to the ancient, voluminous former cowshed it occupies, an airy barn-like affair with a magnificent beamed triangular roof, a wide-open kitchen and simply set, well-spaced wood tables; what would have been the farmyard is now a charming, sheltered courtyard. The interior has changed little since it was Pensons, but the sustainability focus is more intense: culinary adventure and conscientious husbandry, hand-in-hand with an almost messianic commitment to seasonality. The team really do use all the wild herbs and foraged ingredients growing around them on the estate.

First look at Native: a terrific celebration of English food
The interior has changed little since it was Pensons, but the sustainability focus is more intense: culinary adventure and conscientious husbandry, hand-in-hand with an almost messianic commitment to seasonality.

Open just a few weeks, it’s still a work in progress. But an early dinner (the longer seven-course taster) gave notice that Tisdall-Downes has seriously upped his game. In a terrific celebration of English food imaginatively reinvented, dishes are airy, delicate and even playful in their design. Angelica, woodruff, chamomile may sound like ingredients from old country recipes but these are components used in dishes that are very now: combinations are modern and delicious.

First look at Native: a terrific celebration of English food
Of particular note was a grassy green ‘regeneration risotto’ made with heritage grains and cover crops, which came with a shatteringly light pastry tartlet made with Lincolnshire Poacher cheese and filled with herbs, tiny flowers and early broad beans, while cured chalk stream trout in a tangle of rhubarb, woodruff, wild garlic and angelica yogurt, delivered wonderful freshness and balance.

Of particular note was a grassy green ‘regeneration risotto’ made with heritage grains and cover crops, which came with a shatteringly light pastry tartlet made with Lincolnshire Poacher cheese and filled with herbs, tiny flowers and early broad beans, while cured chalk stream trout in a tangle of rhubarb, woodruff, wild garlic and angelica yogurt, delivered wonderful freshness and balance. A highlight was Ryland mutton, served first as a lamb broth flavoured with fermented turnip and wild garlic, quickly followed by a wonderful, pink, fatty slice of loin (with a slow-cooked nugget, Wye Valley asparagus, black garlic and aliums).

First look at Native: a terrific celebration of English food
As a whole it breathes ‘nature’ and after almost a decade at various sites in London, feels like a homecoming for Tisdall-Downes and his business partner Imogen Davis.

A parade of desserts layer texture and delicate flavour, culminating in a signature daredevil balancing act – caramelised white chocolate and bone marrow caramel (served in a split bone). It was rich, perhaps too rich, but an impressive finale.

WHEN 22nd May
WHERE Native, Pensons Farm, Tenbury Wells, WR15 8RT
FOLLOW @eatnative
BOOK nativerestaurant.co.uk

The Good Food Guide allows three to six months before anonymously inspecting a new restaurant. Look out for a full review coming soon.