Once upon a time this was an old pub called the Duck and Swan. It was very dingy, but we loved it. We sat out on big wooden tables in the beer garden, drank carlton, and everybody smoked and nobody bothered us. We often had the place to ourselves.
These days, the Duck Inn is more of a restaurant that just happens to have a pub on the side. I agree with Lital - the food here is bloody great. Definitely well above average for pub food (well, like I said, it's not really pub food these days). Even bangers and mash was a gourmet achievement (pork and fennel sausages with excellent mash). The menu does the standard main meal set: 4 kinds of meat, 2 kinds of fish, and only 2 vego dishes (a pasta or a veggie burger). When we were here they had sugar snap peas as a side dish -- beautifully cooked, crunchy and lemony -- just perfect.
The decor is quite bizarre. There's some tacky bookshelf wallpaper, lots of random bits of furniture with boardgames available for play ... and the restaurant section is strangely in a sort of "beach house" style. It's quite nice, but it's odd. I think the idea was for it to look classy but homely. Kind of like an upmarket bed and breakfast? Home away from home? In that respect it's a little confused, but I would go back for dinner there any day.
If you're trying to get a table on the weekend, best to make a reservation. It's not super cheap, but the food is mostly good enough to warrant the prices. I liked how they use little white tiles as reservation plates, writing our details down with a whiteboard marker, and rubbing it out afterwards.
I still miss the old Duck & Swan, but I am comforted by the fact that the Duck Inn does a good sausage. read more