Merseyside restaurant named as the best in UK in annual poll

A restaurant in Merseyside has been named the best in the country.

Fraiche in Wirral came top in the prestigious Harden’s Best UK Restaurants Guide.

The annual list is based on 50,000 reports from a survey of 7,500 diners.

Marc Wilkinson’s Fraiche, which is Merseyside’s only Michelin star restaurant, took top spot despite London dominating the guide.

Fraiche was based in Oxton for 15 years before closing in December 2018 with plans to move to Liverpool. The restaurant then decided to stay put.

The North West’s had 10 entries out of 100 in the list of restaurants.

Mana in Ancoats, which this year won Manchester’s first Michelin star in decades, was number three in this year’s guide.

It’s joined in the top 20 by Adam Reid at The French – the restaurant at the Midland hotel came in at 19th place.

Restaurant MCR, the former Manchester House which is now run by Aiden Byrne, also made it onto the top 20.

Moor Hall, L’Enclume, Hipping Hall, Lake Road Kitchen, Roski and Northcote were all included.

Just over 40 restaurants in the top 100 were in London.

Peter Harden, co-founder of Harden’s Best UK Restaurants, said: “This is an exciting time for the quality UK restaurant scene, with a feeling that expectations amongst diners continues to rise ever higher and a sense that the trade is rising to the challenge of meeting those expectations.

“For many years now it has felt hard to keep up with the pace of change and innovation amidst the capital’s ever-changing restaurant scene, and this dynamism

“Particular congratulations to Marc Wilkinson with impressing our diner survey so much. Marc’s dedication to providing the very best in his extremely small and personal Wirral venture is emblematic of the personal passion that’s driving the continuing improvement and success of the UK restaurant trade.”