“Hot Sorcery”

Conjuring up a bit of magic in Alderley Edge... and it's certainly no flash in the pan
Writes Neil Sowerby
Printed in Manchester Evening News - Friday May 12 2006

When the sleepy young hero and heroine of the Weirdstone of Brisingamen first arrive on Alderley Edge they are overcome by the hearty immensity of their first meal. In the farmhouse kitchen of Highmost Redmanhey, their temporary guardians Gowther and Bess Mossock, set before them a 'monstrous' Cheshire pie.

They then doze their last undisturbed sleep for many a goblin-plagued day. What follows, of course is a classic tale of wizards, caves, quests and vertically-challenged meanies that, despite being nearly half-a-century old, knocks spots off Harry Potter in its evocation of the ancient ways.

Pity that JK Rowling's creation rules the roost in every bookshop in the land, while Alan Garner's classics languish along the bottom shelf, in short supply

They even take his name in vain in his native Alderley Edge, naming a blingy footballers' wives' wine bar, Brasingamens (sic), recently revamped with silks and exotic timbers to the time of Elm to make the Wayneroone of Dribbling'em and his ilk feel sufficiently cosseted.

The Alderley Edge Hotel, though no stranger to celebs and riches, is a bit aloof from all this flash. Perhaps guarding the hill up to the eternally spooky Edge gives it a certain magus status. For five years, the Alderley restaurant was in thrall to a culinary wizard, Duncan Poyser, who in 2004 decamped to city centre Obsidian to set up their menu and established his fabulous baking operation in Gatley.

The chef now waving his wand in the 90-cover conservatory is Christopher Holland. To test his powers, I invited along my friend Freyja, Icelandic sorceress taking advantage of the new direct Icelandair flights from - have I spelt this right? - Reykjavik. She calls me Diamond Geyser, but that sounds like a Brasingamens regular, don't it?

A walk along the Edge - Edge of Darkness as the sun dipped behind a hide of trees and the lights twinkled menacingly across the Cheshire plain - set us up for a glass of Fleurie and a reading of the menu runes in an eerily deserted dining room.

The split-level conservatory is tacked on to the sandstone main building, an 1850s cotton baronial pile. Lots of warm browns and subdued lighting make it comfortable - as does an assiduous front-of-house staff

There was an element of what I call 'bread-botherer' about. Brown, white and tomato accompanied by butters, salted, parmesan and roasted cashew were offere so repeatedly I felt it was only a matter of time before a monstrous pie was rolled in an amuse gueule.

The ice maiden, thawing out as the Montes Alpha chardonnay (£28.50 worth of upfront biscuity oak and buttery fruit) started to circulate through her roseate veins, plunged for the seared hand-dived scallops (£9.95). These arrived with a delicate cassoulet of English peas and Cheshire ham. Cassoulet!

Young Mr Holland, you deserve a curse on you for 'borrowing' the term and a blessing for the delicate match. My chunky terrine of quail and rabbit, with a carpaccio of beetroot and orange salad, was just as toothsome, the flavours and textures singing like a stromkarl in a tree.

We cannot escape the pull of the sea, quoth Freyja (whose night-time distractions centre around salsa and karaoke) and chose as her main a 'composition of seafood', with buttered young spinach and bouillabaisse (we'll let you off this time, Childe Hollande) sauce. The Whole was not quite as interesting as the sum of its fishy parts, for £25.50. My pot-roasted wild halibut (£23.50) was altogether more fun. A sour-sweet Muscat caraway emulsion lifted the firm-flaked fish and married perfectly with celery and apple mash. It fought back feistily against the slightly strident Chilean chardonnay, to which Freyja had taken such a shine. Our sommelier recommended something subtler from Burgundy next time.

I suppose it's the influence of all those warm springs, but Freyja was lured by the hot melting chocolate fondant, white chocolate ice cream with Bailey's sauce providing the unctuous puddle of temptation. Too sweet for me, but she gobbled it up - well, like a goblin.

For the same price (£6.50) I had a gorgeously-executed caramelised thin (and it was properly thin) apple and hazelnut tart, escorted by a compote of blackberries and vanilla ice cream.

The Chardonnay was supped, the imaginary mead cup was passed around, tongues were loosened and the flushed Icelander was telling me some far-fetched tale about her sharing the same name as Odin's mistress, who coveted a gold necklace forged by dwarfs and called the Brisingamen.

"Pull the other Saga, Freyja, it's time for double espresso and off." And with a wave of my magic American Express card, we vanished.

Alderley Edge Hotel, Macclesfield Road, Alderley Edge, Cheshire (01625 583033).