The Good Food Guide 2018 announces its top restaurants for the UK with Restaurant Nathan Outlaw ending L’Enclume’s four year reign at the top.

As Nathan Outlaw’s, Restaurant Nathan Outlaw claims the top spot, Simon Rogan’s Cumbria restaurant, L’Enclume gets knocked down to second place while Jason Atherton’s Pollen Street Social rounds off the top three.

Nathan Outlaw recipes

On the newly crowned restaurant, Waitrose Good Food Guide Editor, Elizabeth Carter said: “Nathan Outlaw’s food is characterised by the absolute freshness of ingredients and a clear sense of purpose. He has done an enormous amount to educate and encourage the public appetite for fish, driven by his supply of impeccably fine ingredients, and a special talent for creating unique and thrilling fish dishes. Moreover, nobody seems to leave Nathan Outlaw’s staff – they just go and work in another one of his restaurants. They obviously think he’s a pretty good boss as well as a fine chef.”

New additions to The Good Food Guide 2018 Top 50

New to this year’s top 50 include Claude Bosi at Bibendum (London); The Three Chimneys (Isle of Skye); Moor Hall (Lancashire); The Sportsman (Kent) and The Man Behind the Curtain (Leeds).

As well as celebrating the pinnacle of the country’s best fine dining establishments, the guide, owned by Waitrose, also acknowledges restaurants situated in more unusual places. This year’s guide features four restaurants housed under railway arches including Umezushi in Manchester; Hart’s Bakery in Bristol; and Bala Baya and El Pastor, both in London. While Leeds restaurant, Vice and Virtue can be found in a former strip club and Ode & Co is based at a holiday park above the sea on the Teign Estuary.

Good Food Guide 2018 top 5

1 Restaurant Nathan Outlaw, Cornwall (10)

2 L’Enclume, Cumbria (10)

3 Pollen Street Social, London (9)

4 Restaurant Sat Bains, Nottinghamshire (9)

5 The Fat Duck, Berkshire (9)

The very first Good Food Guide was published in 1951

Published over 65 years ago, The Good Food Guide still uses reader feedback and anonymous inspections to compile its reviews of the UK’s best eating spots. First published in hardback in 1951 the guide originally cost five shillings and listed ‘600 places throughout Britain where you can rely on a good meal at a reasonable price’ within its 224 pages. It was a Good Food Guide inspector who suggested that a café in an unexpected location was worth further investigation.