We aren't too versed in fine dining to be honest but we have gone to the Whitebrook and the Kitchen, both one less star and cheaper but she preferred them to the Hand and Flowers.
I generally find single Star places are far better than multiples. The food is usually fine, but it's always the atmosphere that makes or breaks a place.
2 and 3 star places often attract tourists, who genuinely don't know which end of a fork to hold, and it kinda spoils the event.
The Hand & Flowers seems to really divide people. My partner and I love it there and have never had a bad meal or bad experience.
The two main issues I had were the lights and the staff.
The lighting, in this case, was by candle. This is fine in principle, but the section we were in was a low-ceilinged side area with very small windows ('features' of a period building) that were shut anyway. Every table was full and people were packed in like sardines. So, no fresh air, low light, lots of bodies and with candles burning up the oxygen in a fairly confined space. This is generally a big no-no.
Not a nice, relaxing place to be, especially given how long everything was taking and how there were so many guests crowding the place out like cows in a meat market.
The staff were quite arsey, to be honest. We ended up speaking with Kerridge's wife (also the house manager), who tried to lecture us on how the food should be eaten and what we were supposed to be experiencing. If you, as a high end restaurant, have to explain what it is you're doing - If it's not immediately obvious to your guests, then you have failed.
As it is, we knew very well what they were trying to do, but it just wasn't to our tastes and she really took offense to that. We later emailed Kerridge himself to raise the issues and he tries to get all defensive about it, repeating the bleating his wife gave us pretty much verbatim like a rehearsed speech, before asserting that he gets a lot of people complaining about these same issues (we subsequently found out he does indeed, on Trip Advisor et al) and that he can't see what their problem is.
So he ******* knows about it, but still thinks he deserves my custom? Absolute nob.
I had the 'explainy' thing at one of Heston's places too, but at least the waitress was nice about it and hastily buggered off when I shot her a look that said, "I'm not your usual tourist. If your food is any good, I should be allowed to eat it however I choose and still enjoy it, no?".
