A SURPRISE PACKAGE

The Mystery Diner finds a St Andrews country house hotel transformed into a swish, contemporary restaurant

Rufflets Hotel unveils a hidden gem to the Mystery Diner

Ilike surprises, especially good ones. And few meals have caught me more gloriously off-guard than my recent visit to Rufflets, near St Andrews.

This stentorian member of the Caledonian country house hotel brigade has long been a fixture on the Scottish dining landscape. A fine old family-owned 1920s pile on the outskirts of the town, for decades it catered almost exclusively to plaid-wearing golfers splashing out on the trip of a lifetime to the Home of Golf.

If I’m honest I can’t remember the last time I actually ate there. I’ve been to several functions over the years, but there have been no whispers to suggest that I had to beat a path to its kitchen door. In my ignorance, I’d mentally filed this lovely old hotel in the same portion of my mind that used to be reserved as a child for my eccentric great-aunt Lydia, who was a famously variable cook: when you go there, enjoy the lovely surroundings and smile a lot, but when it comes to lunch don’t expect the earth to move.

So having pigeonholed Rufflets as an archetypal country house hotel, with all the culinary caveats that entails, I was more than a little surprised when I recently heard its name being mentioned in gastronomic dispatches. At the time I presumed there had been some mistake and that my informant meant one of the other more fashionable Fife restaurants: The Cellar at Anstruther, The Peat Inn, Craig Millar at St Monans, The Adamson, Rocca or The St Andrews Seafood Restaurant. When I was disabused of that notion, it was clearly time to investigate. As soon as we arrived we could see that there had been some form of major transformation. Where there should have been a formal Big House dining room – complete with crimson walls, chairs weighing as much as bank safes and unfeasibly large portraits of bewhiskered Victorian rellies lining the walls – there was what looked like an on-trend green bamboo shoot arrangement on the walls. The chairs were super-comfy and contemporary. It was immediately clear that something curious was afoot. Not only would the interior have done justice to a city centre Michelin-starred establishment, the place was superbly well-lit, with the sunlight flooding in across a formal garden, with views out across the Kinnessburn. So far so good, but what of the grub? The new two-rosette restaurant is called Seasons, in a pretty transparent nod at the decision of head chef David Kinnes to build the menu around local freshly-sourced produce. Although the focus on provenance

and seasonality is hugely welcome, it’s also in danger of becoming a bit of a cliché as every chef with ambition clambers aboard the bandwagon. With Rufflets, though, they’ve chosen to invest heavily in the vision, spending £10,000 on the walled garden and allowing Kinnes and head gardener Phil Harper to work in tandem.

To further make the point about their headlong dive into the world of seasonality, there are two menus: a market menu for £40, consisting of three dishes and changing daily; and the Seasons à la carte. As the latter looked to represent slightly better value, that’s what we plumped for. The upshot was one of the best meals in some time: wellcrafted, thoughtful and cliché-free, this was a million miles from the usual country house fodder.

We started with an amuse-bouche of smoked haddock and leek croquettes, which were interesting if unspectacular, but within minutes we were tucking into two of the best starters I’ve had in yonks. Undoubtedly the pick of the pair was the thick-cut venison tartare, which came with salt-baked beetroot, pickled carrot and a quail egg, a combination of accompaniments which meshed seamlessly, although the dish was made by the spectacular quality of the venison.

We were also pretty taken with the East Neuk dressed white crab meat which came with a big dollop of avocado sorbet perched on top, and was served with compressed cucumber and saffron aioli. Again, it was a fascinating and wonderfully nuanced dish: the combination of surprisingly light, freezing avocado with the crab was stellar, while the texture of the cucumber was curiously similar to melon. All in all, a very thoughtprovoking dish.

Our main courses were also up to snuff. The pan-roasted rump of rosé veal with caramelised sweetbreads, artichokes and tomatoes from the gardens was almost flawless, as was the beautifully presented pan-seared lamb loin and shoulder served with potato terrine, wild garlic and carrot puree. If I really had to be supremely picky, then the hard and slightly al dente sauté potatoes would be about as near as I could come. But essentially these were two really assured, solid dishes that perfectly suited the understated, contemporary surroundings.

We rounded off a memorable meal with two decent puddings. On a sunny, light spring evening the rhubarb with pain perdu and stem ginger ice cream was the pick of the pair, although if it had been dark, cold and stormy, the chocolate soufflé with orange compote and (slightly under flavoured) cardamom ice cream would have won the day.

So my advice is obvious: go, and let us know if you enjoyed it as much as we did.