Overnight stay at Le Petit Chateau
We've heard a lot of good things about Le Petit Chateau, the new wedding venue based in Otterburn, Northumberland. The Le Petit Chateau operates as a hotel and pub (the William de Percy) when not being used for weddings. When we attended a wedding at nearby Woodhill Hall, my husband arranged for us to stay at Le Petit Chateau as a treat.
Unfortunately, because the wedding started at 1:00pm, we arrived at the hotel too early to check in. We therefore left our bags with reception to check in later.
We returned from the wedding at about 10:00pm (we were conscious that we wanted to get back to enjoy the hotel) and checked into room 5 which was a gorgeous room with the focal points being a large vintage french style bed and a iron bathtub. Chocolates were left on the bed but we quickly realised these had nuts in and put them in the bin quite a common practice when we stay at hotels.
What a lot of people without nut allergies don't realise is that allergy sufferers have to check the ingredients of everything. It become a habit. So when I decided I wanted a bath before bed, I checked the ingredients of the products provided (L'Occitane). The shower gel was ok for nuts but unfortunately the conditioner had sweet almond oil in so neither me nor my husband could use it.
The biscuits provided with the tea and coffee were Borders crunchy oat. The label said may contain nuts but I had ate these before so took the risk (and was fine).
In the morning, we headed down to William de Percy to eat our breakfast. There was a small selection of continental choices with cheeses, meats, cereals, croissants and pain au chocolat. There were no labels identifying allergens so we had to ask a waitress.
We ordered hot breakfasts from the menu; eggs florentine for me and a "William Stack" for my husband (poached eggs, mushroom, bacon and black pudding on english muffins). We made the usual disclosure to the waitress about my nut allergy and asked at this point about the pain au chocolat as well. She headed off to the kitchen saying it was probably ok but she would check. She returned and stated that there were no nuts in the food that we had ordered but that the kitchen does have nuts in so they can not guarantee. She reassured me however that the chef would do what he could to clean down the surfaces and make sure our food was kept separate. At this point we had to enquire again about the pain au chocolat (which my Husband really wanted) of which she said actually no you can't due to them having hazelnuts in.
In terms of a response, this is probably as good as it gets in terms of hot food. I appreciate most kitchens will have nuts in and therefore the restaurant cannot guarantee their food is nut free (and would not want to do so for fear of liability). I felt as comfortable as I could and knew the food we had ordered was low risk in any event.
The food was delicious and we thoroughly enjoyed our experience at the hotel. We definitely want to return to try the evening menu at William de Percy. They allow dogs in too so we are going to bring along our cockapoo.
If I was being picky, it would have been nice if the chocolates left on the bed didn't have nuts in. In addition, we did have to ask the waitress for a second time about the pain au chocolat and we could have assumed from the waitress' first response that they were nut free. A better way of dealing with this would have been for labels to be set out on the continental buffet identifying allergens. This would have avoided the need to ask (and ask again). However, overall there were no problems and the food was lovely. So I rate our first experience here as 4 out of 5.