Restaurant in Holt, United Kingdom
Book early. Ten courses. Serious value.
Meadowsweet holds a Michelin star and operates from a quiet Georgian townhouse in Holt, Norfolk, with a ten-course tasting menu at £150 per head and a wine programme that is the strongest in the region. Book four to six weeks out minimum. Saturday lunch at £85 is the most accessible entry point; staying overnight in one of the three rooms is the optimal way to experience the full food-and-wine offer.
Meadowsweet takes reservations that disappear fast. The restaurant opens Wednesday through Friday for dinner only, adds a Saturday lunch and dinner service, and stays closed Sunday through Tuesday. That compressed schedule, combined with a Michelin star earned in 2024 and glowing word-of-mouth across serious food circles, means the booking window is long. Aim for four to six weeks out minimum for a weekend slot. If a Saturday lunch opening appears, take it: the four-course menu at £85 per person is the most accessible price point in the house, and the kitchen runs the same produce-led precision as the full dinner service. Mid-week dinner (Wednesday through Friday) also carries the £85 four-course option alongside the full ten-course tasting menu at £150 per person, so there is a genuine choice depending on appetite and budget.
Meadowsweet occupies a Georgian townhouse on Norwich Road in Holt, a small market town in North Norfolk. Greg Anderson cooks; Rebecca Williams runs the floor and the wine programme. The room is calm and considered: handmade tables with menus and cutlery stored in a drawer, an illuminated garden at the entrance, and a dining room that reads as quietly confident rather than decoratively ambitious. Three bedrooms upstairs make it a restaurant with rooms, which matters for the booking strategy: staying overnight means you can take the wine pairing seriously without worrying about a drive home.
The kitchen is classically rooted and ingredient-led. The ten-course tasting menu moves through snacks, bread, fish, meat, and dessert with a level of technical control that sits comfortably alongside Michelin-starred peers elsewhere in England. Reviewers who know the wider category have noted that the food compares favourably with top-tier restaurants they have eaten at internationally, which is a meaningful data point given Meadowsweet's setting in a town of this size. The format involves the chefs themselves bringing dishes to the table and explaining them, which gives the meal a directness that larger, more formal operations can lack.
Rebecca Williams's wine expertise is the detail that separates Meadowsweet from comparably priced tasting-menu restaurants in the East of England. The six-glass pairing with the ten-course menu is carefully considered rather than formulaic. One confirmed pairing includes a fresh, red-berried Viña Tondonia Rioja from López de Heredia poured from a magnum alongside the pork course, and the sequence closes with a Provençal vin cuit — sweet, fruit-forward, and structured enough to carry the dessert phase. These are not generic sommelier selections. They reflect a programme built by someone who understands wine at producer level, and the decision to pour some pairings from magnums is a practical choice that affects how the wine shows at the table.
If wine is a serious priority for you, the pairing is worth adding rather than building your own selection from the list. The overnight room option exists partly for this reason: reviewers specifically flag staying in one of the three rooms and leaning into Williams's wine knowledge as the optimal way to experience the full offer. For a food-and-wine-focused trip to Norfolk, this is a stronger combined proposition than booking a separate hotel and restaurant. Compare this with [Midsummer House in Cambridge](https://www.joinpearl.co/restaurants/midsummer-house-cambridge-restaurant) or [L'Enclume in Cartmel](https://www.joinpearl.co/restaurants/lenclume-cartmel-restaurant), both of which have wine programmes of note, but neither offers the same intimacy of a six-table Georgian townhouse in a quiet market town.
At £150 per head for ten courses, Meadowsweet sits at the lower end of the Michelin-starred tasting menu price band in the UK. [CORE by Clare Smyth in London](https://www.joinpearl.co/restaurants/core-by-clare-smyth-london-restaurant) operates at a meaningfully higher price point in a much larger city. [The Fat Duck in Bray](https://www.joinpearl.co/restaurants/the-fat-duck-bray-restaurant) and [Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons in Great Milton](https://www.joinpearl.co/restaurants/le-manoir-aux-quat-saisons-a-belmond-hotel-great-milton-restaurant) both carry higher tariffs with the overhead of larger estates behind them. For a first-timer weighing value against quality, the Meadowsweet tasting menu is defensible on the numbers alone: a ten-course Michelin-starred meal with chef-led service and a wine pairing calibrated to the food, in a room with 102 Google reviews averaging five stars, in a town where the nearest direct competition for this level of cooking is a significant drive away.
The £85 four-course menu is the right call if you are uncertain about format or are pairing the visit with a broader Norfolk trip rather than making a dedicated dining pilgrimage. It is also the better option for groups with mixed appetites for long tasting menus. For a special occasion where the evening is the point, the full ten courses is the version to book.
Reservations: Essential; book four to six weeks out for weekend slots, sooner for Saturday lunch. Hours: Wednesday–Friday dinner from 6:30 PM, Saturday lunch 12:30 PM–3:30 PM and dinner from 6:30 PM; closed Sunday–Tuesday. Budget: £85 per person for four courses (mid-week and Saturday lunch); £150 per person for the ten-course tasting menu; wine pairing additional. Rooms: Three bedrooms available; recommended if you plan to take the wine pairing seriously. Getting there: Holt is a small North Norfolk market town; a car or pre-booked taxi is the practical option. Check [our full Holt restaurants guide](https://www.joinpearl.co/restaurants/holt) and [our full Holt hotels guide](https://www.joinpearl.co/hotels/holt) for wider context on the area. Dress: Smart casual is appropriate given the room's tone; the setting is calm and considered rather than formally stiff.
For context on the East of England tasting-menu category, [Midsummer House in Cambridge](https://www.joinpearl.co/restaurants/midsummer-house-cambridge-restaurant) is the nearest peer of comparable standing. Both hold Michelin recognition and operate tasting-menu formats with serious wine lists. Meadowsweet is the more intimate of the two and the stronger argument for an overnight stay. Further afield, [hide and fox in Saltwood](https://www.joinpearl.co/restaurants/hide-and-fox-saltwood-restaurant) and [33 The Homend in Ledbury](https://www.joinpearl.co/restaurants/33-the-homend-ledbury-restaurant) operate in the same register of small-town, high-quality modern British cooking, but neither offers the rooms-and-wine-programme combination that makes Meadowsweet particularly practical as a destination. If you are building a food-focused UK trip that reaches Norfolk, [our full Holt experiences guide](https://www.joinpearl.co/experiences/holt) and [our full Holt wineries guide](https://www.joinpearl.co/wineries/holt) are worth checking for context on what else the area offers around a Meadowsweet booking.
| Venue | Cuisine | Awards | Booking Difficulty | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Meadowsweet | Modern British | “Goes from strength to strength – an absolute treat” – Greg Anderson & Rebecca Williams’s simply but tastefully converted Georgian townhouse provides “exceptional service and attention to detail in calm, and beautiful surroundings” . The cuisine is “exquisite” too ( “the food stands comparison with any of the top restaurants we’ve eaten in the world over” ). At dinner, there’s a ten-course tasting menu for £150 per person (a cheaper four-course menu for £85 is also available earlier in the week, and on Saturday lunchtimes): “it’s good that the chefs themselves bring the food to the table and give an introduction” and “each course has many ingredient combinations, blending into a perfect composite and displayed with great artistry” . Top Tip – “Stay in one of their three rooms if you can, and take advantage of Rebecca’s wine expertise” .; Rebecca Williams and chef Greg Anderson deliver effortless class rather than try-hard conceptual at Meadowsweet – a contemporary restaurant with rooms that is a joyous treat from start to finish. Dinner is bookended by Anderson's spirited flurry of snacks and desserts. First up are last year’s walnuts in the form of a shimmering black gel covering a mousse of Baron Bigod cheese on a Parmesan sablé (a one-bite umami hit) as well as Amarena cherry, similarly glossy, over a little rabbit parfait. Standouts among the snacks proper range from a chickpea wafer heaped with crabmeat, bound with aromatic Indonesian bumbu spicing and topped with a flutter of fresh herbs to a beef tartare ‘sandwich’ – the Angus/Limousin meat dressed in the sultry smoke of charcoal oil and contained between tuiles made with rendered bone marrow. Home-baked breads (a nutty rye loaf and a sourdough focaccia) come with raw Jersey butter, and rightly get their own moment in the dinnertime sun. The fat sweetness of a scallop, hand-dived off Orkney, is lifted by a purée of strawberries and grape juice, and offset by the butter-richness of a tomatoey sauce split with lobster oil. This being a classically rooted kitchen, butter also shines elsewhere: mixed with garlic, it finishes a bowl of risotto made from aged Acquerello rice topped with an elderflower honey-glazed sweetbread; it emulsifies a smoked eel dashi that is poured round kohlrabi ‘tagliatelle’; and it delivers richness in a Vadouvan-inflected lobster-stock sauce with monkfish. Roasted, herb-crusted saddle of Middle White pork from Huntsham Farm is spellbindingly tender, the centrepiece in a supreme dish that includes a farce made from the trim, two purées – one a peppy sobrasada, the other an earthy mix of sweetcorn, bacon and girolles – and yet another beautiful sauce, punchy with sage, mustard and bacon. A hotpot of the slow-cooked shoulder is un-lidded to truffly swirls of steam, anchoring the dish in the realms of seasonal comfort. It feels right that the paired wine should be poured from a magnum, a fresh, red-berried Viña Tondonia Rioja from López de Heredia – one of a carefully considered six-glass pairing that ends triumphantly with a 'vin cuit' from Provence, sweet with red berries, apricots and plenty of balancing acidity. This is a blinder with the fruit-celebrating desserts. Highlights? Cherry clafoutis, portioned from the pan and served with meadowsweet-infused custard, and a cloud-like apricot soufflé into which is poured an orange-blossom sauce. Heavenly.; Tucked next to the steely skeleton of the Williamsburg Bridge, Meadowsweet cuts a stylish industrial figure with its glass-fronted façade, whitewashed brick walls and original mosaic-tiled floors. Inside, the restaurant jumps with a steady stream of locals and regulars, all here for well-priced and well-executed food.The fuss is quite merited. Despite ample competition in this section of town, Owners Polo Dobkin and Stephanie Lempert elevate the kitchen’s dishes ranging from crispy baby artichokes with shaved parmesan and orechiette with blue crab tossed in a lemon beurre fondue to spiced duck breast with sweet corn polenta, grilled escarole and Mandarin orange. It's all done in a lovely, urbane setting with loads of charm and friendly service.; A lovingly restored Georgian building is the setting for this charming restaurant. You enter via the back of the building, through an illuminated garden, and are then warmly welcomed into a beautiful dining room, where the lovely handmade tables have the menu and cutlery hidden in a drawer. The finest produce, be it lobster or quail, is delivered via a skilfully prepared tasting menu, where deep flavours come together perfectly and there's the odd playful touch, like dessert served across several dishes to share. Three restful bedrooms provide the perfect overnight escape.; Michelin 1 Star (2024); {"wbwl_source": {"slug": "meadowsweet", "page_type": "star_accreditation", "category_slug": "2-star-accreditation", "award_result": "Accredited", "is_global_winner": "False"}, "scraped_details": {"hero_image": "", "page_title": "2-Star Accreditation", "page_url": ""}, "source_row_snapshot": {"raw_name": "Meadowsweet"}} | Hard | — |
| CORE by Clare Smyth | Modern British | Michelin 3 Star, World's 50 Best | Unknown | — |
| Restaurant Gordon Ramsay | Contemporary European, French | Michelin 3 Star, World's 50 Best | Unknown | — |
| Sketch, The Lecture Room and Library | Modern French | Michelin 3 Star, World's 50 Best | Unknown | — |
| The Ledbury | Modern European, Modern Cuisine | Michelin 3 Star, World's 50 Best | Unknown | — |
| Dinner by Heston Blumenthal | Modern British, Traditional British | Michelin 2 Star, World's 50 Best | Unknown | — |
What to weigh when choosing between Meadowsweet and alternatives.
Meadowsweet is a small Georgian townhouse restaurant, which means capacity is limited and large group bookings are not straightforward. Parties of two to four will find it the most comfortable fit at the tasting-menu counter format. If you are planning a group of six or more, check the venue's official channels well in advance — the three rooms upstairs make a private dining or overnight group trip more feasible than a purely dinner-based booking.
Holt itself has no direct competition at this level — Meadowsweet is the only Michelin-starred option in the town. For comparable tasting-menu dining in the East of England, Midsummer House in Cambridge offers two Michelin stars at a higher price point. If you want something in Norfolk at a lower spend, there are solid regional options, but none currently hold the same combination of Michelin recognition, wine programme depth, and rooms-above-restaurant convenience.
Saturday lunch is the move for first-timers: a four-course menu at £85 per head is significantly easier on the wallet and easier to book than a weekend dinner slot. Dinner — the full ten-course tasting menu at £150 — is the full statement, and the six-glass wine pairing (sourced by Rebecca Williams) is a meaningful part of the experience. If budget is a factor, Saturday lunch is also available on Wednesday and Thursday evenings at £85, which gives you the kitchen at its peak without the full dinner price.
Book four to six weeks out for weekend slots — Saturday lunch goes fastest. The ten-course dinner runs to £150 per head before wine, so factor in the pairing if you want the full experience Rebecca Williams has designed. Staying in one of the three rooms on-site removes the logistics of driving back from a wine-paired dinner in rural Norfolk, and reviewers consistently flag it as the smartest way to do Meadowsweet properly. The kitchen is classically rooted with a Michelin star awarded in 2024.
At £150 for ten courses, yes — Meadowsweet sits at the accessible end of UK Michelin-starred tasting menu pricing, where comparable experiences in London regularly run £200 and above. The Michelin 1 Star (2024) and World of Fine Wine 2-Star Accreditation provide independent validation for the price. The wine pairing is a genuine strength rather than an afterthought, which makes the total spend feel more justified than at restaurants where the food alone carries the evening.
Specific dietary policy is not documented in the available venue data. Given the format — a structured tasting menu kitchen with Michelin recognition — it is standard practice for restaurants at this level to accommodate dietary requirements when notified at the time of booking. Contact Meadowsweet directly when you reserve to confirm what they can accommodate and whether any substitutions affect the menu format or pricing.
It is one of the stronger options in the East of England for a celebration dinner, given the combination of Michelin 1 Star status, an accomplished wine programme, and three rooms upstairs if you want to stay the night. The ten-course format at £150 gives the evening a clear shape — you are not navigating a large à la carte menu — and reviewers describe the service as attentive without being formal. For an anniversary or milestone birthday in Norfolk, it is difficult to find a more complete package at this price point.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
