The Knife’s Hotel of the Year 2025: Mallory Court
- James Massoud
- 4 days ago
- 4 min read
Named The Knife’s Hotel of the Year 2025, Mallory Court in Leamington Spa enters a confident new era with the opening of The Warwick, the highly anticipated restaurant from MasterChef: The Professionals winner, Stu Deeley. Set within the historic grounds of the Warwickshire country house hotel, The Warwick delivers a refined yet relaxed expression of modern British dining, rooted in seasonality, the hotel’s kitchen gardens and Deeley’s quietly assured cooking. Together, hotel and restaurant form one of the most compelling luxury food-led destinations in the UK right now.
A New Chapter
There are hotels that trade on heritage, and then there are those that quietly earn it. Mallory Court has always belonged firmly in the latter camp, a country house hotel that understands restraint, rhythm and refinement better than most. But in 2025, something has shifted. The opening of The Warwick, led by MasterChef: The Professionals winner Stu Deeley, hasn’t just refreshed Mallory Court’s dining offer, it has redefined the hotel’s sense of purpose.
This year, Mallory Court is named The Knife’s Hotel of the Year, not because it has reinvented itself overnight, but because it has done something far harder: evolved with confidence, clarity and conviction.
At the heart of that evolution sits The Warwick – a modern British restaurant rooted in place, memory and seasonality, and a deeply personal homecoming for a chef who first walked these kitchens long before the accolades arrived.
A Hotel in its Element
Set within 10 acres of immaculately tended Warwickshire countryside, Mallory Court has long excelled at the art of English hospitality. The 42 individually designed rooms balance traditional country house charm with contemporary polish; the Elan Spa remains one of the region’s most restorative retreats, and service is pitched with an ease that feels genuinely human rather than rehearsed.
What elevates Mallory Court now is alignment. The gardens, the kitchen, the dining room and the wider guest experience all speak the same language. Ingredients flow directly from the Kitchen Gardens into the restaurant. The pace of the hotel mirrors the rhythm of the seasons, nothing feels bolted on. The arrival of The Warwick hasn’t disrupted this ecosystem, it has sharpened it.
Modern British
Named after the historic town nearby, The Warwick is deliberately understated in its ambition. This is not British food dressed up as spectacle, nor nostalgia repackaged as gimmickry. Instead, Deeley’s cooking here is confident, grounded and quietly expressive; classical technique applied with modern sensitivity.
The restaurant offers two menus:
Taste of the Season, a five-course tasting menu (£105)
À la carte, three courses (£90)
Both reflect Deeley’s instinct for balance: generosity without excess, finesse without fuss.
Dishes read like familiar references, but arrive with precision. Cornish crab with Isle of Wight tomatoes leans into sweetness and clarity, letting peak-season produce do the heavy lifting. Tunworth and potato agnolotti with vichyssoise and garden leeks is comforting but exacting, rich without becoming heavy. Native lobster with Thai spices and Stornoway black pudding shows Deeley’s confidence in contrast: surf, spice and savoury depth handled with control rather than bravado.
Main courses underline the restaurant’s confidence in British produce: poussin stuffed with fennel and garlic salami, Cornish monkfish with borlotti beans and basil sauce, or beef rump cap with ox cheek and Jerusalem artichoke, each dish anchored in flavour rather than formality.
Desserts nod gently to nostalgia, none more so than Stu Deeley’s Baked Alaska, a playful but polished throwback that feels earned rather than ironic. Even the miso and brown sugar custard carries that same sense of comfort, lifted by precision. This is food designed to be enjoyed, not decoded.
A Homecoming
For Deeley, The Warwick is more than a new opening, it’s a full-circle moment. Early in his career, he worked at Mallory Court, long before winning MasterChef: The Professionals in 2019, before founding Smoke at Hampton Manor, and before becoming one of the most quietly influential voices in modern British cooking.
Returning now, as a more assured chef and a father of three, there’s a noticeable maturity to the cooking. The bravado has softened; the confidence has deepened.
His philosophy remains consistent: respect the ingredient, trust classical foundations, cook with memory as much as technique. But at The Warwick, that philosophy feels fully settled; less about proving something, more about expressing it.
There’s also a warmth to the operation that reflects Deeley’s wider values. His ongoing commitment to mentoring young chefs and working with local colleges quietly feeds into the culture of the kitchen here. The result is a restaurant that feels alive rather than performative.
Why Mallory Court
After completing a £1.6 million refurbishment last year, Mallory Court Country House Hotel & Spa won the AA Award for 'Small Hotel Group of the Year 2024'. We believe being awarded Hotel of the Year isn’t about flash or novelty. It’s about coherence, how well a hotel understands itself and how clearly that understanding is communicated to guests.
Mallory Court’s success lies in the way everything now pulls in the same direction. The gardens inform the menu. The menu enhances the stay. The stay encourages you to slow down, to notice detail, to feel looked after rather than impressed. The Warwick doesn’t dominate the hotel; it completes it.
In a year when many hotels chase relevance through reinvention, Mallory Court has chosen refinement instead, and in doing so, has quietly set a new benchmark for what modern British hospitality can look like.
Hotel of the Year
Mallory Court in 2025 is confident, elegant and assured. With The Warwick, Stu Deeley has given the hotel not just a new restaurant, but a renewed sense of identity, one rooted in place, season and genuine hospitality.
That rare sense of alignment is what makes this year’s decision for The Knife an easy one.
