Review: Stage, Exeter

It’s interesting how tasting menus have become such a ubiquitous part of dining since first appearing just a couple of decades ago. You can have a £225 tasting menu at Lympstone Manor, but just up the road in Exeter you can have a £55 tasting menu at Stage. That’s almost exactly 4 times cheaper, a gigantic range within just the field of tasting menus. Most pizzas are around £15 in London… so what would you expect from a £60 pizza?

Of course a tasting menu involves less prep, less waste, easier service, so there’s plenty of good reasons to go that route. But nevertheless, even today it still implies a certain level of ambition and occasion – no-one pops out for a “quick tasting menu” before a show, or decides that they don’t feel like cooking, so will pop around to their local eatery for a cheeky weekday evening tasting menu.

So is £55 enough to deliver up a worthwhile menu? Well, the dining room at least is a grungy and somewhat difficult space, on the edge of the city centre with stripped-back furnishings and eclectic decor. But we’re comfy enough and made even more comfy by the service which was super-friendly and excellent throughout.

The menu began with a pair of oysters, one raw with elderflower vinegar and the other battered with hot mustard and a kimchi sprout leaf – both good, but the latter a really very yummy snack. We also got some hand-torn bread, soft and nicely toasted, with excellent black apple butter. First starter was a blue cheese croquette with slices of pastrami. There wasn’t much cheese presence in the croquette, though the pastrami was very good. Next starter was a piece of confit trout served with roasted beetroot and labneh. The beetroot was excellent, shiny and deeply flavoured from the roasting, the labneh nicely creamy-sour and paired very well. My piece of trout was cooked right through, which was disappointing, though everyone else said theirs was rather better.

The main course was the star of the evening for me; beautifully soft green agnolotti filled with a lovely porcini cream, topped with an excellent beef ragu absolutely full of great flavours

from the tomato and fennel seed. The pre-dessert included a nifty touch: a nice dollop of sourdough and chocolate mousse paired with a Carolina Reaper chilli granita. Sounded scary, but there was just a very nice touch of the ferociously hot chilli in there, providing a little of the distinctive chilli fruit flavour on eating but leaving the mouth mysteriously warmed afterwards. Main dessert was a slim slice of buckthorn tart with a dice of local kiwi fruit and white chocolate sauce. The buckthorn flavour was distinct on its own, but needed some sharper accompaniment to bring it out properly.

All in all a good set of dishes, but for me they felt pitched at a level that belonged on a small plate menu where you might pick five dishes between two and end up at £35 a head, instead of £55 a head for a tasting menu. I like the style of cooking and I enjoyed the experience, so I hope they do very well. And maybe if my trout hadn’t been overcooked and the tart made into a better dish, I’d be summarising slightly differently…? I’ll have to come back and try again some time! I’m certainly willing to.