After a night at this pub, I felt like I really got to know the English! Good folks, great beer and…read moregreat food. I've dreamed of going to England all my life. From my early punk rock days, to my days as an award winning home brewer (beer geek), and now as a dad, the experiences I have wanted changed, however, beer has been a constant! Personally, I love English style cask ale, and i wasn't disappointed.
The kids and I spent two weeks in London and Paris, and before we left England I wanted to visit a traditional country pub. This was it! After reading Ira's review, I knew we would be trying the pies and puddings. I started with beer.... and we started with prawns for an appetizer, but then the real food began! I had the venison pie, my 13 year old had turkey and cranberry, and the 10 yr old went for chicken and ham. Yum! All three were huge and tasted fantastic! Next came dessert.... and more beer. We're Americans, so the waitress helped us negotiate the dessert menu just as she did the pies. We decided to go for one traditional English dessert (jam rolly polly) and one non traditional (berry covered flan). Thankfully we got only two because they were huge! We visit cities often, but we live in the country, and we can eat a lot. At the end of this meal, we were stuffed!
When we first came in a little past six, there were a few locals around the bar and one couple eating. One of the owners, Joyce, greeted us and checked on us throughout our meal. As we were leaving, she introduced us to her son and we talked kids for a bit. Our server also was helpful and fun to talk to. The locals made us feel at home. By the time we waddled out, the place was filling up, and it looked like the local crowd was coming in for beer. What can I say? What a great experience on the last night of our trip