City Cafe

Mint Hotel, Temple Way, Bristol, BS1 6BF. Tel: 0117 910 2700

It wasn't until half way through my meal at City Cafe that I realised I was in the wrong hotel.

Well, not the wrong hotel, exactly. It's just that I hadn't noticed that what had been City Inn for more than a decade had suddenly changed into the Mint Hotel.

According to a feedback form I picked up on the way out, the entire City Inn chain of hotels was re-branded at the end of November.

The jury is still out on the hotel's new name – "'ere, darling, fancy a weekend at the Mint" doesn't quite have the same ring to it – but there have yet to be any changes at the ground-floor restaurant, which is good news as it has always been one of the most consistent hotel restaurants in Bristol.

Regular readers will be yawning already at the mere mention of hotel restaurants as they have always been one of my bugbears, not to mention the easiest way for me to get a few cheap laughs in my reviews of them.

In my experience, the majority of hotel restaurants tend to be dull places serving overpriced, soulless food to lonely, BlackBerry tapping businessmen and tourists.

OK, that's a sweeping generalisation, and there are exceptions, but hotel restaurants tend to be aimed at people who simply can't be bothered to leave the comfort of the hotel once they have checked in. For the hotels themselves, this means they have a captive audience, so why bother trying too hard to attract non-residents?

The City Inn – sorry, Mint – has always been a bit different. It has always attracted diners who aren't staying upstairs. I've never stayed at the hotel, but I must have eaten in its restaurant a dozen times in the past decade.

It hasn't always been faultless – which restaurant is? – but it has been consistently good over the years and I have never hesitated in pointing people in its direction.

Since my last visit about 18 months ago, head chef Matt Lord has settled in and has stamped his identity on the menu.

Lord used to be the head chef at Hunstrete House in Pensford and his style there was more fine dining.

That was fine for that hotel's clientele and in keeping with the grand surroundings, but it wouldn't have suited a contemporary hotel on Temple Way.

That is not to say his cooking at City Cafe is any less technically competent.

The dishes still demonstrate a good skills base and understanding of classic French techniques, it is just allowed to breath a little more in a bright and breezy restaurant rather than a stuffy dining room where waiters have one arm behind their back.

The dining room at City Cafe has barely changed and it still boasts well-spaced tables with starched white linen and discreet spotlights positioned so you can actually see the food.

That certainly makes a change from most hotel dining rooms, where the lighting is so poor that most of the food looks beige.

The service is also a lot perkier and less starchy than many hotels. The waiter who served me, Juan, has been here for 11 years, which must be a record for a Bristol waiter.

Although there are set menus and cheaper options available, I dived into the a la carte, which offers a broad choice of eight starters and 10 main courses.

If you stayed at the hotel for a week, you could eat something entirely different every night, which is not often the case.

I started with roast partridge salad (£7.25), which is a brave dish for a chef to put on any menu because small game birds are tricky to cook and have a tendency to dry out and become chewy like cardboard.

Not here, as the leg and breast of this little bird was warm, moist and juicy and served with a neat little pile of creamy celeriac remoulade, Cox's apple for sweet acidity and hazelnut dressing for extra crunch.

This was followed by the "market dish of the day" – a generous and precisely cooked tranche of halibut with thick, pearly white flakes and a tangle of warm potatoes mixed with fresh crab meat, a couple of teardrops of pea puree and two crisp slices of chorizo on top that added a salty, spicy bite. For £13.50, it was also excellent value.

A side dish of sauteed buttered kale (£2.95) was seriously good. The kale had been cooked briefly to retain its irony crunch and the butter was heady with garlic and finely chopped shallots.

A wobbly dome of caramelised banana bavarois (£5.50) brought things to a leg-buckling finale. It was served with a ball of hazelnut- encrusted chocolate ice cream and razor-thin slices of crisp, caramelised banana.

It brought to a conclusion a highly enjoyable dinner that not only gives hotel restaurants a good name to city visitors, but gives Bristol restaurants as a whole a good reputation.

It may have changed its identity but the City Cafe is still "mint" in my book.

Wheelchair access: Yes

Prices: A la carte dinner menu starters from £4.95; main courses from £10.95; desserts from £5.50.

Food: 8

Atmosphere: 7

Value: 8

Service: 9

Overall: 8