Scilly isle home to better restaurants than Manchester

The 110 residents of St Martin's in the Isles of Scilly cannot complain that they have nowhere fashionable to eat. The Tean restaurant on the windswept island at the most westerly point of Britain, 30 miles from Land's End, has just won a Michelin star.

The distinction means the island, which measures just one square mile, officially enjoys better dining than the four million inhabitants of Leeds, Sheffield, Liverpool and Manchester, none of which has one restaurant with a star in the latest edition of the Michelin Guide Great Britain and Ireland, published yesterday.

Despite the spread of fine dining around the UK, 41 of the 122 starred establishments are in London. There are 11 in Scotland, two in Wales and only one in Birmingham.

Tean, located in St Martin's Hotel, is only open between March and October.

Diners who pay £50 a meal overlook an uninhabited island and dine on "modern British" dishes such as brill and lemon-poached lobster with potato salad, or cannelloni of leg, pea and mint purée and rosemary jus.

Under head chef Kenny Atkinson, the restaurant specialises in local produce, such as strawberries from the island of Bryher, St Martin's lobster, Newlyn mullet and Bodmin lamb. Derek Bulmer, editor of the 2008 Michelin guide, said: "It's the first on the Scilly Islands to be awarded a star and it's a remarkable achievement because they used to import all their produce from the mainland. What they are trying to do now is grow produce on the island with polytunnels and arrange for fishermen to deliver fish straight on to their jetty."

The hotel hoped the star would attract visitors to St Martin's, the northernmost of the six populated islands in the Scilly archipelago.

"We have become this culinary lighthouse and being awarded a star is fantastic news. It puts us on the map," said Keith Bradford, the hotel manager.

Tean is one of 15 new one-star establishments in the guide, among them the Rhodes W1 restaurant in Marylebone, London, run by the celebrity chef Gary Rhodes, and two in Dublin, increasing the Irish capital's star haul to six.

However, 14 restaurants lost their stars, including Winteringham Fields in Humberside, Waldo's at Cliveden country house in Berkshire and Jessica's in Birmingham, leaving Britain's second city with only one, the one-star Simpsons in Edgbaston.

There are no new two- or three-star establishments in this year's guide, so the top level of British gastronomy, three stars, is enjoyed by just three restaurants, two of which are in the Thameside village of Bray in Berkshire, the Roux brothers' Waterside Inn and Heston Blumenthal's Fat Duck. The other is Gordon Ramsay's in Chelsea.

Across the country, Mr Bulmer, who has been a Michelin inspector for 30 years and the guide's editor for 10, detected a trend towards more casual dining and a more European style of cooking.

New one-star Michelin venues

ENGLAND

La Trompette, London

Rhodes W1, London

Quilon, London

Hibiscus, London

Wild Honey, London

The Goose, Oxfordshire

West Stoke House, West Sussex

Apicius, Kent

Nathan Outlaw, Cornwall

Tean, Scilly

The Sportsman, Kent

SCOTLAND

Ballachulish House, Highlands

Champany Inn, West Lothian