A late summer camping trip with regular MOFAD camping companions Karon, John and Sylvia. We chose our camp site for two reasons. Firstly, it was close to the start of our proposed walks for the weekend. Perhaps more importantly, it was in a village where there were four different pubs within walking distance.
We tried out the closest one first (only by a matter of yards), which happened to be Ye Olde Kings Head, which serves food every day, at lunchtimes and evenings in the week and all day at weekends. A decent menu awaits.
A whole page of starters to choose from including classics such as pate, garlic mushrooms, fishcakes and the ever trusty soup. We hadn’t earnt our starter today, so skipped straight to mains. Two pages of those to choose from as well as salads and sides. While we wait, here’s some refreshment first.
This session pale ale is Seamless from Redwillow Brewery, very nice with gentle hoppiness. An ideal liquid starter whilst waiting for your dinner to arrive.
And arrive it duly did. With lots of choice like pie of the day (several of our party had this), lasagne, gammon, lamb casserole, steak, a burger, chicken, pork and more, you might have a hard time choosing.
Not me though. As you might have worked out, I’m quite partial to a nice bit of fish, and two fillets of sea bass, pan fried with lemon, garlic and parsley butter definitely qualifies as a nice bit of fish. There were also vegetables to accompany, but you don’t need to see a picture of some carrots and beans.
Some more liquid accompaniment was required. This was Feckless by Redwillow Brewery, a classic malty English bitter. Very nice indeed and the maltiness worked well with the garlic.
Although there were several good looking puddings on (crumble, chocolate fudge cake, sticky toffee pudding, chocolate torte), we decided to pass as we hadn’t really done enough activity to justify it today. Instead we stayed on to play some classic card games as well as a spot of Two Tribes (as presented by my Pointless friend Richard).
A little more refreshment was required for this brain activity. I opted for Ye Olde Kings Head ale, and realised too late that this was just GK House Ale by Greene King, which is often found in their pubs rebadged as “Insert Name of Pub Here” ale. I’ve had it as “Bell Hotel Ale” and “Bridge Bar Ale”. You might also see it as “Old Bell Best Bitter”, “Spice Island”, “Sawyers Arms”, “Bookies Best”, “Mermaid House Bitter”, “White Hart Ale”, “Seven Arches Ale” and so on and so forth.
It is a shame that this isn’t made clear in Greene King houses, as it’s a very average beer, and I would have definitely had either of those Redwillow beers again. I shall hope to never make this mistake again.
A lovely little village pub, well worth a visit, although they don’t take dogs, which is why we won’t be back on our next trip to the village as we will have one in tow.
The Minister of Food and Drink 