Middlethorpe Hall & Spa

Overlooking the racecourse and surrounded by gardens and parkland, this gem of a William and Mary house with its ‘stunning exterior’ feels deeply rural yet is just over a mile from York. Staying here is ‘absolutely super’ according to one guest and, with its grand drawing room and library, and wood-panelled dining room, it feels like a minor stately home – indeed, it was given to the National Trust in 2008. Bedrooms, split between the main hall and converted stable block and cottages, are country house in style with antiques, patterned wallpapers, blankets and eiderdowns. Everything is top quality, including the fresh flowers, fruit and home-made biscuits. Canapés before dinner are taken in the drawing room, with its ‘deep sofas, and roaring fire’. The meal itself is a four-course affair of Modern British dishes – crab ravioli with sea vegetables, perhaps, or beef fillet with oxtail bonbons and rounded off with Yorkshire rhubarb with parkin and stem ginger. Breakfast offers ‘excellent 
molten scrambled egg, freshly squeezed juice 
and leaf tea’. A pampering stay. (Richard Morgan-Price, and others). This hotel is a member of Pride of Britain.