Jöro

Originally born out of a few stacked shipping containers in formerly industrial Kelham Island, this modern eatery has gone from strength to strength at its new location. Luke and Stacey Sherwood-French's Jöro is now housed in a 19th-century paper mill amid the rolling peaks of Oughtibridge Valley, complete with seven apartment rooms as well as a terrace coffee shop and bar. As the umlaut might suggest, Jöro’s sensibilities are generally Nordic in their embrace of rawness, fermentation, and simplicity of preparation; roughly translated, Jöro means 'earth', though the ingredients and flavours take more of a steer from Asian cooking.

This clear ideology helps bring cohesion to a menu with references as diverse as Northern nostalgia (albeit with Swiss cheese-filled viennoiserie served with compressed pineapple), a touch of Sicilian rustic charm, obscure Japanese ferments, savoury French toast, and the comfort of a fresh-baked cookie finale, all within the space of an excellent-value, 90-minute 'Ö.5' lunch tasting menu (just one of three tasters on offer). Chalkstream trout – salted for 10 days and served with an Amalfi lemon remix of the Japanese yuzu ferment kosho –  has always been a Jöro highlight, but it’s a pleasure to see celeriac get its moment in the sun as well (here glazed in a ginger teriyaki and cooked over coals, served on celeriac espuma and under yet more, crispy, celeriac). 

Wines are accessibly priced and helpfully communicated (a pairing for our lunch menu was a bargain at £32), and there’s an impressively considered menu of non-alcoholic homemade sodas and juices – enough to form a pairing flight of their own.