Mark Poynton launches restaurant at Norfolk’s Caistor Hall
Mark Poynton at Caistor Hall will be open from Wednesday to Saturday for lunch and dinner offering five (£75) or nine courses (£100) at lunch and the nine courses at dinner.
The 35-cover restaurant was originally set to launch in February but there has been a minor delay due to the kitchen not quite being ready.
Poynton has gone into partnership with the owners of the Caistor Hall to operate the space as a separate business to the rest of the country house hotel with the venue’s wider hospitality operation - including another restaurant, room service and events - being run by a different team.
The team will be sourcing ‘the best seasonal ingredients possible to create light but flavour-driven dishes that will change as and when the seasons dictate’.
Example dishes include steamed turbot with mussel mousseline; ballotine of squab pigeon with foie gras, confit leg, savoy cabbage and truffle; and baked Alaska filled with rhubarb and cultured cream.
The head chef of Mark Poynton at Caistor Hall will be Byron Franklin, who has been working at Poynton’s The Shepherds restaurant in Cambridge for the past year.
Poynton is best known for his time as chef-patron at Cambridge restaurant Alimentum. The restaurant won a star under his tenure in 2012 but lost it in 2018.
His cooking CV prior to Alimentum includes a head chef role at Daniel Clifford’s two Michelin-starred Midsummer House in Cambridge and the Macdonald Craxton Wood Hotel in Chester.
