Casamia – restaurant review

What is it that drives chefs to achieve perfection? Across the world, culinary superstardom is conferred by tyre company Michelin, whose anonymous judges confer stars on restaurants who meet their unknown criteria. A star in a small red book is the culmination of years of blood, sweat and tears from chefs, many of who strive for years yet never receive this most elusive of accolades.

The Michelin Guide was launched more than a hundred years ago as a guide for drivers to maintain their cars, find decent lodgings and eat well while driving through France. It is now the accepted standard by which all great restaurants are judged.

Bristol’s only Michelin-starred restaurant is Casamia in Westbury-on-Trym, with an entrance on the High Street as anonymous as the judges who awarded it its star, among 98 in the UK which is “a very good restaurant in its category, worth a stop”.

It’s not just about the fabulous food at Casamia. There’s a wonderful story behind this small restaurant, accessed up a small alleyway through that anonymous entrance, marked by wrought iron gates.

Two young brothers, Jonray and Peter Sanchez-Iglesias, start working in the family trattoria as teenagers, becoming fascinated by Italian cooking. They both leave school with no qualifications before leaving Bristol to set up their own restaurant in Cheltenham, called Fratelli – Italian for brothers.

Despite rave reviews, the restaurant is empty during the week. When the money runs out, they return to Westbury in 2006 where their parents let them run the kitchen at Casamia, and with majestic cooking they quickly transform it into this Michelin-starred triumph, with their proud parents running the front of house with panache.

Casamia really is a triumph, yet the Sanchez-Iglesias brothers remain remarkably grounded, choosing to stay put in Westbury when a larger and more prominent location would surely have tempted many other chefs of their calibre.

Still young men, when I ate at Casamia the two brothers had just spent the last four weeks mentoring an even younger man as part of a scheme run by YouYou Mentoring, a charity which matches keen but disadvantaged young people with professionals at the top of their game (although Peter and Jonray are obviously not yet resting on their red laurels).

17-year-old Jay Ashworth from Withywood was spending his last day in the Casamia kitchen with the Sanchez-Iglesias brothers, and had been put in charge of dessert, the final artfully-prepared dish of this special six-course tasting menu.

Jay’s ‘Summer Meadow’, inspired by childhood memories of spending time with his grandmother in Shipham, was a simple yet bold strawberries and ice cream. It was served alongside terrificly pungent bowls of flowers, which before we started eating were transformed by staff pouring liquid nitrogen over them, covering the long table in a bed of dry ice.

If this dessert was magical, the previous dishes were even more so, starting with the breadsticks (or grissini), accompanying the Moet & Chandon kindly provided by the champagne house for the evening. The grissini were served alongside juicy olives and a cream and chives style dip which was actually made with star anise and truffles.

Nothing is as it seems in Casamia. Clearly the brothers have been emulating the Fat Duck’s three Michelin-starred fare, created by genius chef Heston Blumenthal, “who sadly couldn’t be here tonight”, but whose Fat Duck cook book was the raffle prize and in a very gracious touch donated by the winner to Jay.

Tomato and fresh sheep’s curd with garden salad was followed by Loch Duart salmon with lemon, courgettes and peas, not garden peas but a pea puree thinly spread across one side of the plate.

Next up was roast best end of lamb, parsley, swede and cucumber, a quite sumptuous dish. The lamb was exquisite, beautifully tender, so good that you just wanted to eat it as slowly as possible, for these portions are not for hearty appetites.

Before Jay’s Summer Meadow was my pick of the night’s menu – kettle corn soup with Amalfi lemon sourbet, served in a tiny bowl with an even tinier spoon, just as well for this could have been eaten in one gulp with a larger spoon. It was incredible, the sorbet served on top of the small grains of corn and a hot custard gently poured on top, hot and cold mixing with liquid and solid, rough textures with smooth.

My first experience of a Michelin-starred restaurant was an evening to live long in the memory. This was adventurous food of the highest order, constantly surprising. For some, perhaps it is perfection, but not for the Sanchez-Iglesias brothers. Casamia serves some truly amazing food, but Peter and Jonray are only just beginning their journey to create even more amazement. Their shared journey to culinary perfection has scarcely even begun.

Casamina, 38 High Street, Westbury-on-Trym. 0117 259 2884.

www.casamiarestaurant.co.uk