You might find Cornish lamb on the menu at Rick and Jill Stein’s flagship venture in a harbour town on the Camel estuary, but it is for fish and shellfish that fans have come here since Stein transformed a dodgy nightclub into a basic hotel in 1975.

Embedded firmly in the Wye valley, Chris and Kirsty Harrod’s Michelin-starred restaurant-with-rooms again delighted readers’ taste buds in 2018.

An 18th-century former coaching inn, which gave its name to the village that grew up around it, is run today as a restaurant-with-rooms by chef/proprietor Geoffrey Smeddle and his wife, Katherine.

A passion for all things Orcadian infuses this ‘delightful’ and ‘welcoming’ restaurant-with-rooms overlooking Scapa Flow and the southern Orkney islands.

On ‘one of the steepest, narrowest streets’ in a ‘town of sudden vistas’, just above the castle, this restaurant-with-rooms has been run by chef/patron Glyn Roberts and his wife, Jacqueline, since 1989.

Perennial visitors reported ‘a warm welcome’ from Clive James and David Stott at their restaurant-with-rooms – ‘a cherished institution to many Glyndebourne regulars’ – at the foot of the South Downs.

‘Derek and Celia are just fabulous,’ praised visitors this year. ‘Friendly, efficient – and they’ve done a magnificent job in maintaining and enhancing this former tweed mill.’

‘Wow, what a wonderful place this is!’ A regular reader lauded Andrew Pern’s restaurant-with-rooms on the edge of the North York Moors, which has a Michelin star and ambience on tap.

The overnight sleeper from London arrives in the middle of nowhere in time for a breakfast of porridge with Drambuie at Scott Meikle and Stephanie Graham’s restaurant-with-rooms.

A 17th-century house, ‘in a delightful position opposite the quay’, in an ‘attractive little town’, is today run as a smart restaurant-with-rooms.

‘Opposite the walls of the castle in this ancient market town’, Lee and Katie Williams run their Grade II listed Regency town house as ‘a top-notch, great-value’ restaurant-with-rooms.

In a hilltop market town familiar from Ridley Scott’s classic Hovis ad (Dvořák, New World Symphony, brass band), this restaurant-with-rooms, launched in 1991, is as good today as it has always been.

Facing the ‘wide sweep of tidal mudflats’ surrounding Pagham Harbour, this whitewashed restaurant-with-rooms stands as a ‘tucked-away’ beacon of ‘delicious food’ and ‘exceptional hospitality’.

‘It was all excellent,’ praise visitors in 2018 to ‘attentive but informal’ Alison and Fabrice Bouteloup’s red-stone former coaching inn-cum-restaurant-with-rooms.

‘An informal alternative’ to Pimlico’s pricey traditional hotels, The Orange is more like staying above a local pub – albeit a classy, artfully distressed local with an upmarket clientele.

Closed down because of ill health at end of September 2018. Gerry and Ann Price ‘set the standard’ at their ‘well-run’ pub/restaurant-with-rooms, where the ‘hands-on owners’ foster a hub-of-the-village atmosphere. Closed down because of ill health at end of September 2018.

Gerald and Margo Smith have created a gourmet destination in a lonely pub at a crossroads just to the south of the Scottish moors,’ write Guide inspectors this year.

In the middle of their Pembrokeshire working farm, the Evans family ‘warmly welcomes’ visitors to their laid-back, pleasingly rustic restaurant-with-rooms.

A regular visitor to this ‘old favourite’ in 2018 found The Clive to be ‘as good as ever,’ with plenty to satisfy epicures.

Take a Michelin-starred kitchen, throw in equally impressive bedrooms and a soupçon of laid-back glamour, and you have Paul Kitching and Katie O’Brien’s splendid restaurant-with-rooms.

A colonial-style veranda wraps around this refined 19th-century restaurant-with-rooms in a picturesque village.

With extensive views over the Tywi estuary, David and Wendy Beaney’s Georgian restaurant-with-rooms has brought ‘stylish minimalism down to a fine art’.

Rebuilt and reinvented by Bassam Shlewet, this small hotel brings ‘great service’, chic style and impressive cuisine to a picturesque stretch of the Thames Path.