What: Described as a ‘warm, friendly neighbourhood restaurant with its feet planted firmly in the West Country’, Briar has taken over the space that was formerly home to Merlin Labron-Johnson’s Osip restaurant. The restaurant is part of 12-bedroom boutique hotel Number One Bruton, which opened in 2020 and which is made up of a Georgian townhouse, medieval forge and row of converted cottages.
Who: Briar is a partnership between Sam Lomas and husband-and-wife team Claudia and Aled Rees, owners of Number One Bruton. Lomas is a former River Cottage ‘Rising Star’ and Roux Scholarship finalist who has also previously been head chef at Glebe House, an agritourism-inspired guest house and restaurant in Devon.
The food: Drawing inspiration from its namesake (briar is a wild bramble or shrub native to England), the menu celebrates hyper-local produce, foraged ingredients and is dictated by the growing seasons of the kitchen garden. It serves a daily changing blackboard menu of small plates, snacks, sharing dishes and ‘proper puddings’ using fruit and vegetable grown in Number One’s kitchen gardens and the hotel owners’ garden up the road in Batcombe. Dishes on the launch menu include small plates and snacks such as Sam’s Porridge loaf with cultured butter; Westcombe cheddar gougeres, wild garlic capers; pickled cucumbers, wild herbs, chilli and olive oil; and homemade smoked pork sausage, cider mustard; and larger plates such as Batcombe Ratte potatoes, wild mushrooms, dulse butter and egg yolk; and braised should of lamb, butter beans, tomatoes and late summer herbs. Dessert options include Westcombe ricotta ice cream, damsons; and Somerset apple cake, butterscotch and clotted cream. Overall, Lomas’ focus is on craft cooking and unfussy dishes.
The vibe: Briar rocks the stripped back countryside chic look that fits so well with the building’s history. The walls comprise bare weathered brickwork and a bricked up fireplace as well as a flatter plastered finish on which art hangs. The room features warm mustard tones and a long pale blue striped banquette, wooden floors and dressed that give off an upmarket bistro vibe.
And another thing: Briar is technically Lomas’ second restaurant and comes 20 years after he set up The Diced Carrot, his first restaurant, in his bedroom at the age of nine.
1 High Street, Bruton, Somerset, BA10 0AB
