Cool little stop with great coffee and great service. I recommend you stop in if in the area. I may…read moretry the food here on my way back from the coast.

Me and my partner managed to discover this gem of a pub by randomly choosing somewhere close on the…read moresat nav whilst we were away for my 30th birthday. The pub is beautiful and cosy, the landlady was kind and cheerful and the food.....oh god, the food! We both had a starter of pigeon, not something you usually see on a pub menu and it was superbly cooked and tasted amazing. For my main I chose the steak burger with chips and onion rings, the burger was big, flavoursome and juicy and the touch I like is that the tomato ketchup on table was all homemade, not from a bottle! We will certainly come back to this awesome place if we are ever near the area again because it was outstanding!!

Great gastro pub. Fab food, atmosphere and really friendly service. Strongly recommended.read more

The Bear has become a good quality gastro pub recently with a nice atmosphere and a good menu and…read moresome great specials. The ambiance is relaxed country pub and the staff are very helpful. There is a reasonable ca park as it gets quite hard to park in the summer. I have visited for lunch and dinner and both were very nicely presented and well cooked. The skate is very tasty and the scampi and Jenga chips are good. The costs can be a little bit higher for lunch but the menu is very similar and therefore for dinner, I thought it was quite reasonable. Peter who used to be at another Billericay restaurant is the restaurant manager and as normal makes sure we get well looked after.

Great ambiance and splendid views of the water. Staff are super nice and accommodated my auntie who…read moreis elderly in a perfect table by the window. Delicious food and very reasonable prices. Très bonne ambiance et une vue spectaculaire de l'eau comme arrière fond. Les employés sont très sympa et ils ont tout fait pour rendre ma vieille tante confortable avec une table à côté de la fenêtre. Délicieuse nourriture avec des prix très raisonnables. May buen ambiente y una vista espléndida del agua. Los empleados muy amables e hicieron todo lo posible para hacer sentir cómoda a mi tía que es viejecita y nos dieron una mesa cerca de la ventana. Comida deliciosa y precios muy razonables.

I first heard of the Butt and Oyster when I read Arthur Ransome's "We Didn't Mean To Go To Sea" as…read morea teenager. In recent years, various members of my family have moved to the Stour valley area and so I was very excited to finally have the opportunity to go here, having just re-read the book to my own sons. The Butt and Oyster certainly lived up to my expectations. Although, like many country pubs have become over the past ten years, it's really more like a restaurant with beer, the interior is still clearly old, with terrific character. Its situation in the village of Pinmill is everything you could wish for as a Ransome fan, with a host of boats new and old lining the 'Hard', a scattering of well-preserved cottages and sailboats drifting by on the Orwell. The food here was very tasty with some local themes - seafood in particular. I had a delicious Lowestoft skate with capers and roasted tomatoes. Plus, they sell Adnams ales which instantly gives it at least four stars on my scale. A couple of pints of Broadside washed the food down a treat. After lunch we also had a great walk through meadows upstream along the river. A real English country experience that feels like it hasn't changed much since Ransome's day. Except that it takes credit cards.

Great place for a meal and ideal if you're disabled as I am from a stroke. Moving around was easy…read moreto negotiate and parking close was an added bonus. The staff were brilliant as was the meal/price. This was my first visit but I'm definitely going back! The place deserves a 5 star rating from start to finish. The Bicycle as it's now known, do great job in making sure you enjoy your meal unlike other places we have visited recently.

14th Century pub, situated next to the church…read more Has become something of a bistro pub, although it still retains some of the local pub atmosphere about it. There is an extension at the back to accommodate more diners. Excellent food here, from basic pub grub upwards I recently had the liver and bacon recently, and even my wife who won't touch liver with a barge pole thought that it tasted fantastic. The prices are not the cheapest but the quality is excellent. Also worthy of note is the fact that you can't reserve tables, so you literally can walk in and get a table. There is ample parking at the rear of the pub. There are good walks and views of the River Orwell nearby. Update: Having been regulars here over the past 3-4 years, I thought that this would be nice for lunch over Christmas 2009 - especially since my wife and I were celebrating the birth of our first son, and his grandma was visitng him for the first time. I was amazed when the landlord (quite rudely many people nearby felt) said we couldn't bring our newborn in (considering he was in a car seat, soundly asleep). The Ship will not be getting our custom again while they continue with such rude behaviour to their customers and I will be encouraging my friends and colleagues to boycott the pub, which is a shame. So my rating has been altered from 4 stars for the food to 1 star for the service and treatment

What a picturesque little country pub - thatched cottages just demand admiring, but thatched pubs…read moreare so much better - not only do you get to admire, but you also get to go inside, enjoy them and sup your favourite tipple too! Traditional old English interior complete with dark wooden beams and slate flooring. I was staying in nearby Foxhall with my parents and we headed to The Ship for a quiet evening drink. The bar staff were friendly and welcoming and offered Ale direct from the cask along with a good choice of simple, refreshing wines. We'd eaten before arriving, but as soon as we saw the blackboard menu featuring Salmon and king prawn tail skewers, Catfish and Homemade steak pie we quickly realised we'd made a mistake by not eating here! As the food passed the tip of our noses on its way to another table the quality of food (as well as the delicious smell!) was very apparent. Not a massive menu, but good sign as it normally means the chef concentrates on getting a few dishes exactly right rather than trying to cook too many dishes not very well! The people on the table next to us were local and had obviously eaten here before. Good sign this place is worth coming back for. Next time we're in the area we've promised ourselves a visit to The Ship to try out their gastro delights!

Okay, if I'm finally getting to review in the UK after 2 years of waiting where do I start? How…read moreabout the pub at the end of my street? YESSS Because my local is amazing. Truly. It's got strange live music, a pool table, a beer garden, free newspapers, a small but decent selection of beers, seating on the street, bar billiards (sometimes) and... thousands of pigs. That's right - this dark but warm little pub is brimful of random pig toys, pig posters and pig sculptures. It adds a unique atmosphere to an already well-known atmospheric pub. Being only about 20 houses away, you can trust me that this is a true local gem. After 5 on most nights you'll find this place packed with drinkers who can't be bothered to go home just yet or catch the train home to the villages. Even if it's near-freezing out you'll still see us taking our beers out and sitting on the grass by the BBC next door so that the smokers can smoke away. And on a hot summer night - it's just perfect. No need to go home until I get thrown out.

It's nice enough. A bit on the pretentious side a small English style pub with an intimate manner…read more Good beer but missing the pub classics. Musicians followed poets and etc on the tiny area for performing. None rated above a 'meh' but better than a sports crowd glued to the glowing grinning eye of the government.

A super country pub and restaurant. It has a separate restaurant area that can seat up to about 50…read moreas a private party. They do of course take individual boookings and if the restaurant is full you can still eat the same food in the more informal bar area. The bar area has a lovely open fire in colder weather so it may be worth eating in there anyway! The food is jolly good English fare in the main, though there are some more exotic dishes. The fod is cooked to order and the waiters and waitresses are very helpful and friendly and the chef will alter things if the place is not over busy. There is a small garden with a play area for children and also pleanty of outside seating and car parking too. The prices are very good and the place is well worth trying.

If you're looking for a good pub, it doesn't get much better than this…read more Lovingly called simply "The Axe" by locals, this pub is in a different league to most other rural pubs. I'll explain why and try to be concise. The cuisine is exceptional. There's a good selection of quality drinks. The service is excellent. The atmosphere is always friendly and welcoming -- the sort of place where complete strangers tend to strike-up conversation. The location is perfect, overlooking the Village Green, with a big beer garden behind, and a vast playing field behind that. It's a lovely village, nestled in the gently-undulating farming landscape of rural north-east Herts -- no wonder Braughing was recently awarded the prestigious "Village of the Year" accolade. The pub's menu always includes the best of local produce, from locally-reared beef to local pork sausages, alongside popular country pub dishes. (Braughing village is famous for, among other things, the delicious local sausages, and this is a good place to sample them.) Did I mention the pies? A different pie every day it seems, and you won't find better pies than these. I don't make a statement like that lightly.

A real discovery, 14th century building with friendly staff. Good, uncomplicated, pub fayre…read more Generous portions and for the area, good value.

The George is one of my favorite pubs anywhere. Beautiful drive through country roads in Kent to…read moreget here, full traditional pub with a beautiful garden with tables outside. Service is super friendly, food is amazing, beer is plentiful. I would have lunch here every weekend if I could.