The Bower House Inn, Eskdale Green

Very olde worlde in a slightly run down (but pleasant) way. Charming place with large garden on the seaward side of the Lake District. Plenty of kiddy toys in the garden so family friendly. Great views of the hills. Nice log fires dotted about the bar and lobby.

You can eat in the bar or the restaurant. We chose the bar as the latter didn't open until 7pm.

It was pricey though for steak. A fillet was circa �20 so I opted for the Rib Eye (�15). That's Surrey prices and although the food was good it wasn't quite �15 good. You did get a enormous serving though. You won't starve there! So I'm going to mark it down a little for that. My wife and friends had other dishes which they thoroughly enjoyed. The home made (very chunky) chips were ace.

I think the temptation in some places is to aim for quantity rather than quality. I would rather have a smaller portion and knock of a few quid from the price.

Am rather ashamed to say I can't remember the name of the brewery served by the pub (it was a local Lakeland one) but the beer was delicious. I only intended to have one pint but ended up having another (just to check for consistency you understand!).

The bar staff seemed somewhat surly initially but I think that's just they way they breed 'em in those parts as they turned out to be very friendly and the service was excellent.

Will definitely return if in the area.

24 Apr 2008 20:00

Scarlett Arms, Walliswood

Found this place using this website. Wanted to try somewhere different for Sunday lunch and we didn't want to travel too far away from Dorking. I have to say I felt I was taking a bit of a punt as the comments about this place was mixed but actually it was excellent.

I'm not sure what the place was like before being "done up" but I don't really care. From the moment we walked through the door (myself and the missus and our 3yr old little chap) we were made to feel very welcome by both the bar staff and the locals. It has a nice clean and slightly modernised feel. Its bright and warm inside (with plenty of eral fires). The beer was good and the food was good too. Pricse wise �9.50 for a roast seems to be par for the course in the more upmarket pubs so I didn't begrudge that. The menu looked good and we have the roasts of the day (beef/pork) and the boy had the choice of either a child's portion roast or fish n chips or (proper bits of) chicken goujons with chips. He had the latter. The chips were gorgeous. So nice to find a pub that does proper home made chips rather than the frozeon "oven" style that seems to be ubiquitous in most pubs these days.

The food was very tasty and more than enough for my appetite. Certainly not measly. The puddings (we mostly ordered sticky toffee puds) were light and delicious.

There was a group of 7 of us there including 2 children (ours and ourt friends' 4 week old baby) and although its a fairly small pub they seem to be fairly family friendly (not baby changing in the mens though as far as I could see. Can't comment on the ladies').

So I'm scoring this place 8/10 as we had a lovely time and the food and beer was good. I'd whole heartedly recommend the place. Plus the bar maids were very cute ;-)

9 Dec 2007 15:44

The Black Horse, Gomshall

I thought I'd update this as I originally submitted it. The Black Horse has got a little better since I last wrote. They have put in a very good Indian restaurant (originally upstairs now downstairs with the Thai) and the Thai food has improved notably over the last few months. We have started eating there again.

Poor selection of beers - not a patch on the Compasses and I'm not sure they keep them very well. However they have started selling Sheer Drop which is the Surrey Hills Brewery beer (excellent stuff!).

20 Jul 2006 19:03