Osip restaurant Bruton

My fourth visit to @osiprestaurant , my second at its beautiful new home, and somehow it still manages to surprise me.

This was the first time I stayed overnight in one of the rooms upstairs, which gave me the chance to experience not just dinner, but the full rhythm of Osip. From an exceptional breakfast the following morning to a seat at the kitchen table for dinner, it felt like being welcomed into somebody’s home rather than visiting a restaurant.

The weather couldn’t have been better. I began outside, surrounded by the Somerset countryside in all its summer glory, before moving inside for dinner. Then, as the evening drew to a close, we found ourselves back outside once again, watching the sun slowly disappear beyond the fields.

There is a quiet confidence to what Merlin and the team have created here. Nothing feels forced. Everything feels considered. The food is deeply connected to the surrounding landscape, the service is warm and genuine, and the setting encourages you to slow down and appreciate every moment.

Four visits in, and Osip continues to remind me why it’s one of the most special dining experiences in the UK.

Nasturtium with yearling sheep
Carrot tart with blood orange kosho
Juice of garden leaves
Treacle and stout bread
Kefir cream and grilled herbs
Salad of Tokyo turnip, apricot and smoked almond
Beetroot taco
Grilled scallop, elderflower sabayon, green asparagus
Grilled Cornish lobster with carrot satay
Lobster toast
Devonshire Gold chicken, grezzina courgette, nasturtium, roasted yeast
Meringue, strawberry sorbet, lovage
Pump street chocolate, fig leaves, cherries
Pistachio and marjoram macaron

#Osip #Somerset #MichelinStar #FarmToTable #BritishFood Less

🇬🇧 Osip, Bruton, Somerset : There’s something special happening in the British countryside. The food I had there was not only delicious, I wish I was living nearby (like my lucky friend Rémi who started @commune.cc ). The Chef Merlin Labron-Johnson created this restaurant-guesthouse that has a few rooms upstairs since last year.

He mastered his craft in Belgium at In De Wulf. Opened a first version of Osip in Bruton in 2019 and relocated in its current form in August 2024 in this 300 years old former coaching inn. He started growing vegetables that became so bountiful that it outgrew the little kitchen of the first Osip. Merlin’s ambition and care are now exquisitely served in this new spot. His sensitivity, talent will be something I’ll passionately follow for the years to come.

Was that the perfect little fireplace at the entrance? The local Bath cheese melting offfffff its cider brandy sticky toasted bread? The delicate silverware and ceramics? The kind service? That quail and venison pithiviers making you forget winter? The blackberry, sea buckthorn and meadowsweet pate de fruits? The way mushrooms, celeriac and pumpkin had never felt so elegantly alive? All of this. Thank you @merlin_johnson @osiprestaurant Less

In the twilight of 2025, we returned to Osip, a farm to table restaurant in deepest Somerset that we last visited in 2023.

I keep a list of restaurants that I want to visit on Google Maps with notes. Osip sat at the top of my list. I subscribe to their newsletter and read about the renovations of this 16/17th century coaching in-turned-pub reborn with a lived in, English countryside chic.

On entering I instantly had some regrets that we did not book on of the four rooms above the restaurant; a regret amplified when it also dawned on me that we had not booked a return taxi to Frome because Osip is isolated. So much so that on the winding journey here I accepted that no one would ever find our bodies if it came to it.

The reception room is cozy. There is a short pile of newspapers in a basket; both the logs and decorative pillows are hand-chopped, the latter as if by protocol. It all looks thrown together in that deeply considered, designer way. An indoor fire exudes warmth and a flickering glow that softly whispers, “Stay a while, drink red wine and throw on some thick socks.”

Versus our last visit, Osip’s dishes are intense, studious and bold. Two years ago, the cooking felt displayed rather than harnessed — admired, rather than realised. Now, Merlin decants flavour by coaxing what’s delicious from places we know instinctively, then assembles disparate elements as if they were always meant to sit together. The kitchen plumbs flavour depths with a finesse that feels intuitive and honed.

Take the Orkney scallops, lacquered in sticky roasted-chicken jus beneath a ten-tog duvet of Jerusalem artichoke purée, those crispy tubers and a dusting of cep powder. It’s a modern surf-and-turf by which others should be judged.

Osip is now a local hero turned world class restaurant but for one caveat, and that’s the service. It’s fine. It’s professional and well-informed, but it is under powered. The food invites you to lean in while the hospitality keeps you at arms’ length.

Read more about Osip on EatGoSee or my Substack. Both links are in my profile.

📍 Osip, 25 Kingsettle Hill, Bruton, Somerset, BA10 0LN.

#itsliamcollens #osip #foodwriter

Would you go? Less