Roots (*) – Sunday Menu – York, England

The day after visiting Sushi Nakamura in Leeds, I ambled on over to York, sauntered 'pon the banks of the River Ouse, and plopped myself down in Tommy Banks' Roots for a rather fine Sunday roast. Roots is open Wednesday to Saturday for dinner (as well as for lunch on Friday and Saturday), but on Sunday the usual tasting menu is swapped out for their 'Sunday Feast' menu, which incorporates a Sunday roast, as well as appetizers to share and a dessert, to the sum of £70pp (rising to £75pp from April).

Roots is the second Michelin star restaurant overseen by Banks, who – in 2013 – retained the Michelin star won by chef Adam Jackson in 2012 at his family restaurant, The Black Swan at Oldstead. In 2018, Banks – along with Will Lockwood, who started his career at The Black Swan at Oldstead, becoming head chef there in 2017 and is now head chef at Roots – opened Roots. A Michelin star followed in 2021, making it York's first Michelin-starred restaurant.

And though the menu that I had this past Sunday was not the usual tasting menu, this Sunday roast was worthy of that starry accolade. To start, beetroot, goat's cheese and hazelnut awakened the palate (a slight citrus element would have been nice), with the pork terrine (accompanied by a delightfully tangy piccalilli ketchup) and the haddock croquettes providing the weight to the first round of the meal. It was already looking like it might be a struggle. After a twenty minute break came the main course: roasted garlic wild porchetta with duck fat roast potatoes, leek and Tunworth cauliflower cheese, roasted Savoy cabbage, Yorkshire pudding stuffed with braised pig cheek, apple and mustard butter, honey-glazed carrot (singular), and pork dripping gravy. Excellence must be commended, and the porchetta stood above the rest as being exceptional – the fat glistened and the skin crackled, each bite providing depth of flavour and a contrast of textures. The stuffed Yorkshire pudding (which was a small supplement, the unstuffed version being standard), was well worth the extra £7, the Yorkshire pudding itself being nicely fluffy with a slightly crispy exterior, but being taken to the next level with the addition of a generous helping of braised pig cheek. The worst thing about the honey-glazed carrot was that there was only one; yielding immediately to the cut of the knife, the honey didn't overwhelm, but added a nice sweetness and scent to the plate. The only component of the main course that felt lacking were the duck fat roast potatoes, and that is purely because – while still fine roast potatoes – they felt quite rote, and similar to those you can find at a great many gastropub.

To finish, a trifle of rhubarb and woodruff custard. A pretty pot to ponder, but one might have hoped – after the preponderance of savoury food – for something a little sweeter.

Every year, Estrella Damm publishes a list of the Top 50 Gastropubs in the UK. We all know that lists can be hit and miss (and this year's list has The Devonshire at the top, so I suppose we can throw the whole rag in the bin), but they at least present that most human of emotions through their publication: hope. Hope that this one, surely this one, will leave me with the feeling that I won't find a roast, or a scotch egg, or a sticky toffee pudding better than this (judged by one's own entirely arbitrary standards, of course). For me, it's the yearning for a roast that stands at the summit of Mount Roast. I've not yet had anything that comes close to the Sunday Feast at Roots. And while this isn't a recommendation for the usual menu at Roots (extrapolation from this would be sheer folly), it most certainly is for the Sunday Feast.

Of course, if you've been and had better Sunday roasts, elevated in such a way as this, then I'd be most interested to hear.

Menu:

1. Pablo beetroot salad with Sinodun Hill and hazelnut

2. Oldstead charcuterie

3. Sourdough with wild garlic honey butter

4. Smoked haddock and aged Killeen croquettes

5. Oldstead pork terrine with piccalilli ketchup

6. Roasted wild garlic porchetta, apple and mustard butter, duck fat roast potatoes, braised pigs cheek Yorkshire pudding, leek and Tunworth cauliflower cheese, spruce honey glazed carrot, roasted savoy cabbage with pickled onion, pork dripping gravy

7. Forced rhubarb and woodruff custard