Some eight million people now visit Canterbury annually. Yet sadly, this small, beautiful city lacks the cool, vibrant dining scene of nearby coastal towns such as Whitstable and Margate – the chain-ridden centre undermines both the historical atmosphere and the local food scene. There may be duds aplenty, but Canterbury isn’t without good places to eat and drink if you know where to look. Elizabeth Carter, The Good Food Guide’s editor-at-large and long-time resident, gives us a personal tour.
Easily spotted the minute you step off the high-speed train from London (55 minutes), the long-standing and ever excellent Goods Shed is a sustainably minded farmers’ market serving visitors and locals six days a week. Very much a one-stop shop, you’ll find lots of opportunities for grazing, eating, drinking and shopping: locally grown fruit, veg and regional cheeses; a butcher; an independent fishmonger; mini shops selling charcuterie, store cupboard staples; sourdough bread, pastries, cakes and savoury pies that are daily sell-outs.
Tucked in among all this is Wild Goose, a squeeze-onto-a-stool food counter as popular for breakfast (eggs Benedict et al) as for the seasonal small plates and imaginative cocktails served at other times. At the other end of the scale is the Goods Shed’s Very Good-rated restaurant where chef Morgan Lewis’s daily changing and devotedly seasonal lunch and dinner menus are a generous, flavour forward treat – with booking advisable.
The pick of a clutch of low-key independent coffee shops dotted around the centre is Micro Roastery. Centrally located on St Margaret’s Street yet easy to walk past, it’s a simple bare-bones, obsessed-with-coffee shop that has been perfecting the art of roasting coffee for over a dozen years and is passionate about country of origin, seasonality and flavour. Pop in for a flat white, leave with a bag of their seasonal house blend. For an even more local feel, make your way to quirky, tiny Fringe + Ginge on Northgate, which is off the main tourist beat. On your way, keep an eye out for the glorious, purple-painted Madame Oiseau on King’s Mile where French chocolatier Sandrine May makes hard-to-resist chocolates daily.
Canterbury is surrounded by vineyards – a growing industry as Kent’s chalky soil and mild climate is comparable to the Champagne region of France. Corkk, a wine bar and bottle shop on Burgate, specialises in English wine, the selection curated by Master of Wine Clive Barlow. Here, in a pleasant space, you can explore crisp English sparklers and versatile still wines via an enomatic wine dispensing machine – it offers the chance to taste before settling on a glass or bottle. There are regular tutored wine tastings too.
Lunch can be an indulgent affair at one of the newer venues in Canterbury. Dave Hart and Polly Pleasence’s French bistro Franc on Northgate has already caught the attention of two national restaurant critics, making bookings hard to come by. Fortunately, it’s a restaurant of two halves: the hard-to-book upstairs dining room serves lunch only – a fabulous weekly changing prix-fixe menu – while the casual ground-floor wine bar with its blackboard menu of good things (oysters, pork rillettes, moules) offers more walk-in and last-minute booking possibilities.
If you want to end the day with a drink at a hidden gem, I recommend the pretty Moorings Café & Bar tucked beside the River Stour in Water Lane. The headquarters of the Canterbury Punting Company (historic punting tours, highly recommended), it’s a café by day but comes into its own in the late afternoon/evening as a pleasant cocktail bar. A perfect summer evening spot, drinks are very reasonably priced, especially between 5.30pm and 8pm.
