It's a 20-cover cafe bistro, and in clement weather there is outside seating consisting of oyster grey wooden slatted chairs and tables with flowers and umbrellas.
Juliet can be seen in the small L-shaped kitchen inside the bistro, which has simple decor, modern dark wood tables and chairs and a fig tree.
There are lilies on the counter, which houses the coffee machine while the walls sport photography of food and a picture of Juliet's father in a racing car at Goodwood in the 1950s.
Already Home is garnering a following thanks to its simple, intelligent menu, and laid-back but professional approach. Mike is in charge of front of house.
Home – the name was thought up by Mike – defines the couple's love of simple, local produce-led food.
The lunch menu reads like a world atlas of countries. Thailand is represented by a tiger prawn salad with tamarind, chilli, ginger and lemongrass, mixed leaves, cucumber and carrot and crispy onions. The Med is there, courtesy of an hors d'oeuvres selection of home-made dips, pitta, roast pepper salad and olives and imam byaldi. There's also a Turkish aubergine dish with tatziki and pitta.
Britain is shown to advantage by potted shrimp, dressed crab or aged beef fillet with melting onions, rocket and mustard mayo in a sandwich. Italy scores with panzenella, that fantastically simple salad of country bread, roast peppers, vine tomatoes, basil, olive, anchovy and mozzarella.
Twice a week Home keeps its doors open for dinner, for which the set menu is a changing canvas of dishes reflecting Juliet's eclectic tendencies. Smoked haddock Florentine might sit alongside a retro crab and prawn cocktail, boeuf Stroganoff with wild mushrooms and basmati rice or fillets of sea bass with salsa verde, garlicky roast potatoes, green beans and roast vine tomato. Two courses are lightly priced at £15.95, three at £18.50. Lunch dishes range from £4 for soup to around £7 for a salad.
After a fine film at the splendid Chichester Cinema at New Park around the corner, a friend and I dived in for a meal, hoping against hope that Chichester might be able to offer at least one above-average restaurant experience in Western food. (India Gate is impressive if you want a curry in this mostly barren city).
We both chose the crab and prawn cocktail, and instantly recognised the work of a good chef. Served in a stemmed wide smart glass, it oozed quality and depth of flavour, the sparkling citric-mayo sauce a good foil for the well-sourced fish.
My friend's sea bass met with equal success as did my slow roast Italian-style pork, sourced from the nearby Goodwood estate. Rarely are diners treated to such a roast – the meat cooked at 100C after a mighty blast to start the crackling off, the result being tender, tender meat. Braised fennel, equally Italian in conception, was inspired as were the cubes of garlicky potatoes.
We're not often dessert eaters – chefs too often have a tendency to close up shop after the savoury dishes and buy-in rather foul concoctions. But, on this occasion, my friend and I chose to trust any dessert made by Juliet's hands, which have cooked for the Blairs in London and Sedgefield for more than 10 years. The caramel ice cream with poached Victoria plums in cassis provoked an 'ooh, ah' moment.
Juliet and Mike Graham are a highly welcome addition to Chichester, and the bar is now raised high. Just don't have the house white, an odd rather corked-tasting screwtop Italian white Merlot.
This was the only let-down in this otherwise stunning meal of homely quality. And I mean that in the best possible sense. You could be eating at a family-run trattoria or a Paris café, a rare feeling in the UK.
It's an indictment on our society that high rates and rents managed by chains can preclude families from running small, independent restaurants in our towns but, somehow, the canny Grahams have the gift and strength of will to do just this. But for how long? Don't dally, those who care.
Home Café Bistro, 5 Baffins Court, Baffins Lane, Chichester. (01243) 784888.
Open: Mon-Sat 9am-5pm and
Fri-Sat 6pm-8.15pm.
Food: *****
Service: *****
Atmosphere: ****
Smoking: No.
Disabled access: Fine, but the area is a small one for wheelchairs and there is no loo apart from one in the courtyard.
How to get there: Take the A27 to Chichester, exit at the West Wittering roundabout, follow Market Road past the station, turn left at Eastergate on to East Street then left down Baffins Lane. Parking on-street or in the adjacent city car park.