Get ready to finally find out what is upstairs at CPK.
Join us in our kitchen and take a seat at our custom-made, Chef’s Table to enjoy an exclusive dining experience in Buckingham.
The Chef’s Table Experience
Open on a Friday and Saturday evening, your booking will give you exclusive access to Cornwall Place Kitchen for you and up to nine guests.
On arrival you will be greeted with a glass of English bubbles while waiting for your party at our licensed bar.
We will then invite you upstairs and seat you at our locally made, bespoke table in the kitchen.
The night then belongs to you; watch chef cook your dishes right in the heart of the action whilst enjoying the time with your friends or family. Take control of the atmosphere and ambience with your choice of music via our Sonos sound system and laugh as loud as you like, safely in the knowledge that yours is the only party there.
Chef has prepared a seasonal set Taster Menu which can be adapted upon request for dietary requirements or a bespoke menu can be created and priced accordingly. Your meal is accompanied by a drinks flight chosen to pair with the dishes or alternatively individual bottles of wines, beers, cocktails and soft drinks can be ordered from our drinks list.
Both food and drinks menus focus on seasonality, flavour and celebrating British producers. We source our meat from Smith and Clay, located just a few footsteps away and collect on foot our fresh produce from the local market twice a week. We have enjoyed finding and learning about craft drinks and tasting English wine to create the drinks flight, so we’re confident you will share our enjoyment.
Bookings
Taster Menus will be bookable for Friday and Saturday evenings while other days of the week may be requested for bespoke packages. A minimum spend of £500 will be applied to all bookings so it is suggested that bookings are of 6-10 people to get the true experience.
A deposit of 25% will be requested upon booking and the rest can be paid in full in advance or on the evening. Cancellations less than 48 hours before will be charged at £50pp.
All guests and staff will have to adhere to current COVID guidelines at the time of dining. Tables of 6-10 will be taken on the anticipation that the “rule of six” will be eased in late June. Should this not happen we will happily move your booking to a later date or refund your deposit.
To make a booking fill out the contact for below. Bookings are currently open until the end of December.
A message from us
The past year we have been on such journey, it feels like it has been a very long time since we were able to cook and serve guests in person. Cornwall Place Kitchen is our new home and we cannot wait to welcome you to our place very soon.
Since letting everyone know about the next chapter in our story – taking the keys to Cornwall Place Kitchen and giving Inspires Dining its first home – we’ve been a little bit overwhelmed by the response. There’s been so much support from people we know and those we’ve yet to meet, which only helps to make this journey even more exciting as it’s great to know that there are people who are interested in what we’re working on.
Thank you so much to everyone who has followed us on Instagram or Facebook and let us know that you’re interested in what we’re working on – it all helps to keep us going and we hope you’re enjoying the updates from our work to get Cornwall Place Kitchen ready and open.
Over the last few months we’ve had a great response to the ventures which started this whole process – IDeli and IDIY – so we’re going to continue them both and, thanks to the space we now have at Cornwall Place Kitchen, we’re looking into ways of expanding our offering.
Our new location in Buckingham gives us space for two really exciting opportunities – we’re currently installing a kitchen upstairs and seating for up to 10 people. This will allow us to offer a uniquely intimate fine dining experience that will have all the quality of a restaurant service but with the friendly feeling of a private party. We’ve been offering this kind of modern high end dining at home for a little over a year now and we’ve had some fantastic services and experiences, so to be able to offer this is something of a dream come true.
Downstairs we’re working on a coffee shop and counter for people to pop in and see us for a drink, a cake or a quick bite to eat. We think that a really good cup of coffee, served exactly how you like it, is actually a really important thing, as it can set you up for the day, bring back a happy memory or give you a great excuse to meet up with someone after a while apart.
With everything that’s been happening in the last few months, we’ve all had to adjust and change the way we do things. Even in the few weeks we’ve been working on Cornwall Place Kitchen, we’ve seen the ‘The Rule of Six’ come into being and a clamp down on larger gatherings. As you can imagine, this has forced us to be flexible and consider how we open and what we offer when we do.
For example, we’ll have space for up to 10 people upstairs, but for a while we can only serve up to six – that’s fine though, as it won’t impact the experience as far as we’re concerned.
In a similar way, our plans for downstairs will need to evolve over time – eventually we’d like to serve food in the evenings and host events here, but for the time being that might be difficult, so we’re going to focus on making the best use of the space we can and ensuring that everyone can feel comfortable with the few tables we have space for.
Overall, we want to offer a warm, friendly and homely experience where the quality of the products we serve can speak for themselves. We want our place to feel like an extension of yours so the relationships that we build up with the people and businesses in our area as almost as important as the food and drink that we want to serve. One of the things that place like Buckingham are so amazing for is the feeling of community and togetherness, which are probably more important now than they have been for a long, long time. We’re really excited about becoming part of that community and growing into our place over time.
———
We’ve already had a few questions about what we’ll be doing when we open and what to expect. Here’s a few of the most common ones and a couple of answers: –
Where are you going to be?
As in the name, we are based in Cornwall Place, which for those of you unfamiliar is a small shopping walk in Buckingham near Waitrose. There is plenty of parking, we will validate your 50p during the day and if you are walking the dog, bring them too for a puppaccino.
Will you be serving alcohol?
Yes – we’re awaiting confirmation of our change of use and premises licence. We are looking forward to having really cool wine and cocktail pairings with our menus, alongside some cool homemade cordial mixes for the non-drinkers.
When do you think you’ll be open?
We’re currently working hard to try and open at the start of November. The previous tenants of Cornwall Place Kitchen left us something of a blank canvas, which is great as it means we can really make it own – but it does also mean that we have to do everything from scratch, which includes sanding, painting and re-flooring – as well as things that take a bit more lead time, such as installing a kitchen and a counter.
What is your inspiration and what will you be serving?
Above all us, we’re inspired by quality – we want to share great food and drink with the people we meet and we want everyone to share in that experience. We believe in using good local produce from local suppliers as much as possible and we want to ensure that our business and practices are as sustainable as possible. We want to reduce our waste as much as we can, so we like to be creative with the ingredients we buy, looking to make as much of things as possible, so, for example, we might serve special, one-off items in our deli based on ingredients used for a fine dining experience. Reduced waste equals lower costs and better value.
We’ve yet to decide on our menus and exact offerings just yet as we want to get the venue right first. As soon as we’re ready to share what our menus might include, we’ll make sure to keep everyone updated.
How will you be handling the Covid regulations?
Probably the most important thing to remember in this respect is that they are liable to change – we’re trying to make sure that whatever we do, we’re flexible and able to accommodate. For instance, the latest rules say no more than six people and restaurants have to close at 10pm – that’s no problem for us, we’ll reduce our planned capacity upstairs and we’ll ensure that there’s enough room downstairs for everyone to have at least a metre to themselves.
Join us for our first collaboration with the awesome people from Nelson Street.
Inspires Dining Head Chef, George and Louis owner of Nelson Street (currently Louis’ Place) will be behind the pass for four Monday nights during December giving guests a fine dining taste of Christmas in Buckingham.
Guests will enjoy five courses including one of Inspires Dining’s signature canapés, mushroom suet log with truffle mayo, Louis’ crispy duck with watermelon and chilli frosted cashews and finished with macarons from Pure Patisserie.
In addition to a carefully crafted menu, as much attention has been paid to creating a wine flight paring to compliment the dishes for £30 per head.
I am excited for Inspires Dining’s first collaboration, especially with it being with Nelson Street as I have always enjoyed Louis’ style of food when working with him previously. Being based in Buckingham I am also keen to showcase local produce and cook some really good food for people in the local community and beyond.
George, Head Chef at Inspires Dining
Bookings have already started to be taken by Nelson Street’s loyal patrons so book early to avoid disappointment.
Cooking and serving the five course Exploration Menu
With years of restaurant experience, cooking and serving for everyone up to Royalty, our team know how to provide a professional service. In this blog, we’ll take a look at five things that you can rely on when you book an Inspires Dining event as well as discovering a little bit more about us and what we believe in.
Restaurant experience at home
Just like when you go out for a meal we do all the shopping, set up, cooking, serving and cleaning for you – the only difference is that you can wear slippers to the dinner table, if you so choose.
So why at home? Why not just go out for dinner? As restaurant professionals we’re passionate about restaurants and the experience they provide; they are usually lively with a unique buzz and atmosphere as well as their choice of food. However, they can also be, noisy, un-intimate and with lots of hidden costs (service, wine, baby sitter, taxi). When you book an Inspires Dining dinner, you’re guaranteed to be the centre of attention all evening; you just pay a set cost and you can give the baby sitter a night off.
Create your own menu with Chef
When booking with us you can choose from one of our pre-set menus and special offers or to make the occasion more unique to you, Chef will consult with you to create a menu with all your favourite elements. For example, allow us to help recreate a memory from a holiday or an anniversary for your dinner party.
If you have a dietary request then you will be all too familiar with “the allergy folder”, which is a pet peeve of ours. We believe that good food should be accessible to all and with our years of experience there are few allergies we’re yet to cater for, so we will create a menu that means no-one will be missing out.
Inspires Dining did ALL the work – from setting up, laying the table, cooking and clearing up to an expert standard.
Pearl Slater, Exploration Menu
Professional table service and set up
All packages come with a professional service team as standard. When we arrive we will set up the table for you and bring all the crockery and cutlery we need to serve. Alcohol is not included in the packages but the team will serve your arrival drinks and wine throughout the meal.
Table-side chef interaction
Inspires Dining is born from a passion for creating great food using seasonal produce and most importantly having a bit of fun, so no-one could better to explain the dishes to you than Chef. Food service is an art, with a story behind each dish including the elements and the flavours so our chef will explain this to you. The kitchen is always open, so if you enjoy watching people cook, come in and ask Chef your culinary questions.
We pride ourselves on having high, professional, restaurant industry standards and we want to reassure every customer of this. When you book a dinner with us you can feel safe in the knowledge that we are fully insured and DBS checked. It is important to us that from the very start of our journey our HQ was registered with environmental health and received five stars on its first inspection.
