THE OWNERS of a multi-award-winning gastropub in Devon have now officially opened the doors of their latest venture – a new neighbourhood restaurant in the same market town (October 2019).
Chef-patrons, Paul and Donna Berry, have opened a new concept style eatery called Spelt in Bampton, not far from their ‘Estrella Damm’ Top 50 pub, with rooms, The Swan.
Paul Berry, who co-owns The Swan and Spelt with his wife and fellow award-winning chef Donna, said:
“We’ve taken on the old bakery shop in Bampton and created a new concept style restaurant and have been taking bookings for the last couple of weeks. “Now we’ve ironed out all the niggles and had a few weeks’ testing everything out, we’re open properly and taking bookings for our new brunch menu that runs from 9.30am until 3pm every day, except Sunday and Monday, and, also, for dinner from 5.30pm-9.30pm on Thursday through to Saturday.
“Here at Spelt, we started from scratch with a blank canvas and put in all the kitchen equipment, furnishings and fittings to create our restaurant. The bakery began life in the 1700s, so we came up with the name for it of Spelt, which is an old-fashioned grain.”
Paul and Donna have run pubs in Bampton for more than 12 years and prior to that worked as chefs in the South East and West.
“Designed to appeal to all Bampton’s eclectic residents and the many tourists and visitors that visit our part of the world, our new restaurant has three open-plan areas each decorated slightly differently, one with a fireplace and chandelier in a reds and purples colour palette. Another is funky with retro pictures and then the middle area is clean, bright and modern.”
The inspiration for Spelt came from the couple’s love of Barcelona, which they’ve visited for a number of years now.
“We love the Spanish idea of sharing food. However, Spelt is not a tapas bar, but it is something similar, being more about the flavour of the food than fine dining.
“It’s very different from The Swan in style, but we’re still focused on using wonderful local produce and serving up the tastiest dishes going. We offer a selection of dishes developed for sharing, so no starters as such and no mains either, so if two people are going to eat, possibly they’d have four or five plates of food.
“We’re offering visitors from further afield, or those who live nearby, but fancy a night over, special packages, so they can dine at Spelt and stay with us at The Swan too.
“Spelt represents a wonderful adventure for us and it’s great having something new and different we can get our teeth into. Whatever happens though, rest assured, we’re not taking our eyes off the ball at The Swan. We are passionate about the pub and it is just as important to us now, as it was eight years ago when we took it on.”
The Swan, which has four AA Gold Stars and two AA Rosettes for Culinary Excellence, is no stranger to celebrations and has had quite a haul of awards already in the past year. A few months ago, the AA named it as the nation’s ‘Inn of the Year’ at a star-studded awards event in London.
In the spring, it was declared for the third year running as one of the best gastropubs in the country too.
It polled in at number 20 in the ‘Estrella Damm’ Top 50 Gastropub Awards, which are voted for by food writers, executive chefs, celebrity and top hospitality industry chefs, pub guide editors, industry chiefs and food operators.
It also received a special award as the highest climber in the list in 2018, when it was rated 28th.
To add to this last year, The Swan was named Gold Tourism Pub of the Year 2018 at the South West Tourism Excellence Awards and being voted Best Dining Pub for 2018 in the Trencherman Awards.
And at the end of the year, chef-patron Donna Berry was also one of three finalists in both the Devon Life and Trencherman Awards too.
Paul added:
“Spelt is Donna’s vision. She’s is an inspirational chef and myself and our team are fully behind her with this new venture. We’ve been rushed off our feet for the past few months so it’s wonderful now to have the doors open good and proper and to be hearing feedback from our diners and loyal customers, so far everyone has loved it!”
To find out more about Spelt, please call the restaurant on 01398 331044 or visit https://speltbampton.co.uk/.