THE headline figure, as the financial marketeers would say, is £27 for Sunday lunch. That's not £27 for two or multiples thereof, not £27 inclusive of as much red wine as might reasonably be assimilated, of the services of Polly the pole dancer or of four tickets for the pantomime at the Empire Theatre.

At the Seaham Hall Hotel it's £27, three-course, table d'hote, full stop.

There are readers who will instantly take umbrage - the huff, as they say in Seaham Harbour - who will insist that £27 feeds a family of five for a fortnight. The Eating Owt columnist, they will anorexically add, should be put on bread and water - what in Durham jail they used to call the Number One diet - and see how clever he is then.

They would have a point, of course, but as the Good Book almost has it, thou shalt not live by bread and water alone...

The Seaham Hall Hotel, close to where Vane Tempest colliery once cast a rather dirtier shadow over the Durham coast, was bought by computer tycoon Tom Maxfield who had spotted the former fever hospital from the air and, feet firmly on the ground, spent £12m on his incredibly grand plan.

"A hotel made for the way we live NOW," says one of the brochures, though they may not suppose so down Dawdon Miners' Welfare. Nor, in passing, should the hotel get away with yesterday's insidious cliches. Sufficient unto the day is the weevil thereof.

The hall is the former home of the coal-owning Londonderry family, the place where Lord Byron married Lady Anabella Milbanke and now the hotel whose 18 suites cost up to £600 a night and which (adds the brochure) "offers an unpretentious mix of 21st Century design with standards of quality and comfort from another, gentler era."

The doors slid open as we approached, a gentleman in a slightly rumpled suit asked if we were the Amos party, an enquiry rendered somewhat less perceptive by the subsequent realisation that we were to lunch alone.

It was 1.20pm. In the lounge two or three others drank coffee - perhaps it was all they could afford - or read the Sunday papers. Observer, Sunday Times, Telegraph - no sign of the News of the World, not even cut into squares in the netty.

We asked if there were real ale. "It's all in bottles," said the man in the rumpled suit, offering the sort of smile which indulgent mothers reserve for a child who asks if David Beckham (or his dear lady wife) can come to its birthday party.

"Shame on you," we said, and he smiled again. It was the sort of smile which Dracula reserves for a seventeen-and-a-half-inch neck.

A bowl of olives appeared. We considered asking for a bit black pudding an' all, but repented at once of the temerity.

Apart from the surprisingly shoogly table, and the price on the bottom of the lunch menu, it was to prove the last of the irritations.

The ubiquitous motif is a Seaham S, on literature in the form of a Byronesque quill, elsewhere in the twist of a lemon, the carving of the bed posts, the tiny sliver of poppadom stuck into the handle of the soup bowl.

The carpets are interwoven with the works of the 6th Baron Byron, though not the complete works - not even Tom Maxfield could afford that - and not (since he was talking of Scotland) the bit about a land of meanness, sophistry and mist.

Three or four waiters waited. One brought the glasses, another the bottled water - "suggested wines of the day" range from £15.50 to £38 - a third the spoon for the curried parsnip soup, one of three starters.

The Boss, determined to extract the most from her £27, sat sucking the lime from her gin and tonic. Frank Sinatra popped up on the music system, singing The Lady is a Tramp.

The tramp thought the red mullet salad stupendous, the John Dory enjoyable too, the sauce fervent in flavours, the roasted onions delicious.

All sorts of other little things were cut into tiny morsels on the plate. Be warned, however, that it is not the sort of place for those who like Sunday lunch with a week of vegetables, nor those familiar with the North-East adage of taties and gis.

Mallard had featured both among the starters and among the three main courses. As a main course - the other option roast beef - it came with a fondant potato, chestnuts, red cabbage, tiny cubes of beetroot and a sauce so dark it was almost satanic. The guy can cook, no question.

We dropped a piece of potato on the floor, two waiters rushed to take it to a place of safety. "I can't take you anywhere, not even Seaham," said The Boss, and it is to her that the denizens of east Durham should address their complaints.

The banana and vanilla parfait high-stepped with vivid tastes, the cheeses - mainly French, always unusual - included something for which the chap had forgotten the real name but which was nicknamed the Devil's Suppository.

"It's very nice," he said. The Boss supposed him to be right.

Strictly they aren't waiters but part of the service team, the more senior members - like the chap wrestling with the devil's suppository - dressed like a cross between John Lennon and Mao Tse Tung.

He looked like the young John Denver, sans spectacles, offered a guided tour, spoke with a Sunderland accent. They were all very good, this one was brilliant, and just when folk might suppose that hotels can't get much swisher, Seaham Hall gets swish and squares it. There are Japanese pools, private gardens, long terraces and lovely views. An oriental spa is under construction. The lighting, it's said, is intelligent but, then again, aren't we all. There are limestone fireplaces, pillow menus, power showers, bathside telephones, two-person baths, CD banks, walk-through wine cellar, original art and sculpture.

Even the light switches may need an HND in applied electronics in order to work them. Perhaps that's what they mean by intelligent lighting, too.

After the 30-minute tour we had coffee and petit fours (inclusive) back in the lounge and after that took a stroll along Seaham promenade - one of those places into which great oceans of European money has been poured and - save for the infuriating traffic-calming measures - very successfully.

"Residential development opportunities" - what used to be called houses - are planned where the colliery yard once groaned.

Since it's just 40 minutes from Scotch we strongly - all right, trepidantly - recommend a visit. Get a club out, pawn the candlesticks, discover the way the other lot live now.

* Seaham Hall Hotel, Seaham, Co Durham, (0191-516-1400). Sunday lunch £27, set dinner £34, "winter warmer" weekends from £120 per room per night. Tom Maxfield also owns the Treacle Moon and Fisherman's Lodge in Newcastle.

Published: Tuesday, November 20, 2001