Margaret's

The bistro alternative to Sam Carter and Alex Olivier’s acclaimed Restaurant Twenty-Two, just two doors away, is casual and cosy but feels expansive, helped along by service that is utterly charming. It’s appreciated for being open all week, ‘unheard of for a little independent like this,’ and for making fine dining accessible and neighbourly. It’s bound to win you over. The food, based on first-class seasonal, often local materials, is sophisticated and comforting rather than experimental and challenging. It nourishes, gratifies and cheers, from the opening rosemary and sea-salt focaccia and sublime snacks to the finale of just-baked madeleines, and from the ‘unmatched’ Sunday roasts (‘who doesn't want ox cheek inside their Yorkshire pudding’) to a set lunch menu that feels like Cambridge’s best. Settle into the window seats and watch the world go by or book a booth on the upper tier to glimpse the kitchen action. As for drinks, the well-curated wine selection does an agile job of satisfying the novelty-hungry as well as traditionalists, but they already had us at the aperitif stage – every cocktail has a spot-on alcohol-free version.