Chapters Bistro

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• What are these?

• Average price 2 courses: £22.50
• House wine: £13 per bottle

• High point: Genuine Borders hospitality from a well-established husband and wife team
• Low point: OTT menu descriptions
• Food served: Tue-Sat 6.30-10pm. Closed Sun/Mon.
• Private dining: Up to 30 covers
• Open since: 1999
• Also offers: Childrens portions, Childrens high chairs, Wheelchair access

The List's Eating & Drinking Guide 2008 is now in the shops.

This review is from the 2007 edition.

Gattonside village's welcoming bistro is a short drive from Melrose or a pleasant summer evening's walk by church and river. Locals and visitors congregate, and there is a real buzz of the gentle 'Borders' kind, you understand. Inside is a study of warmth and relaxation: truly comfortable dining chairs, candlelit tables, discreet spotlighting, rustic tiles and adobe arches with south of the border (Mexican) influences. Confident menus (including a new midweek fixed price selection) team together familiar with unconventional dishes, all carried off by dependable, talented cooking. Start perhaps with char-grilled king prawns with a lime and chilli dip or a longstanding favourite, a crab and prawn gateau set on a portobella mushroom baked with mozzarella balsamic syrup. Then try to choose between prime Border steaks with classic sauces, daily blackboard seafood specials, such as fresh sea bass enlivened with citrus butter and crisp capers, or go for 'Chapters Mexican stroganoff' - juicy strips of beef, tingly chillies, peppers, paprika and saffron rice, which is carelessly eclectic but sensationally tasty. A short, well-selected wine list includes Chilean house label wines by the glass, and wine jugs. There are tasty puds too - be sure to save room for the apple crumble ice-cream if it's on.