During our stay at the Sheep on Sheep Street (read our review here), last weekend, we were invited to try out their restaurant, which has received brilliant reviews since its reopening last year and was shortlisted for the 2017 ‘best new pub or bar’ Publican Awards. It is equally popular with tourists who arrive from the Big Smoke for a quiet weekend of hiking, sight-seeing, and relaxation, and locals, who seem to have become huge fans.
Owned and operated by forward-thinking, family-owned pub and hotel group Brakspear , who’ve been in the business for over 200 years, the spacious bar and dining area combines old elements of the 17th Century with a quirky retro-touch and plenty of colour. The signature bar top runs for more than ten metres and offers the best view of the open kitchen and pizza oven. There is also a fireplace which undoubtedly adds a lot of atmosphere during winter months.
The friendly, professional, and helpful staff impressed us throughout the evening. After some deliberation we went for salt and pepper squid on a bed of rocket and watercress with aioli dressing (£7.00), maple and sesame glazed chicken wings (£6.75) for starters, breast of Gressingham duck, honey and soy glaze, baby vegetables, and wilted pak choi (£17.75), and seared fillet of seabream, cherry tomato and olive salsa, with rosemary and garlic potatoes (£16.95) for mains, and caramel and macadamia baked cheesecake with pomegranate ice cream (£6.00) and pain au chocolate bread and butter pudding with Cotswold cream ice cream (£6.00) for dessert. We followed the waitress’s recommendation for a 2015 Pinot Noir.
Our starters arrived quickly after we had ordered. The salt and pepper squid had just the right texture and went very well with the beautiful aioli and the green leaves. The huge portion of glazed chicken wings were succulent and tasty and we counted them carefully in order to make sure neither of us were missing out on our fair share.
I loved my duck, which was expertly prepared, medium-rare, and very juicy and rich in flavours. The combination with pak choi and Asian ingredients worked very well. Ms B was all taken in by her seabream.
The desserts, which we had read about before our stay, were another highlight, with both the brilliant play on traditional bread pudding and the cheesecake hitting the mark.
We are planning to return to Stow-on-the-Wold soon and will make sure we’ll book ourselves in for another dinner. For further restaurant reviews click here (La Scuderia, Frankfurt), here (2-starred Lafleur, Frankfurt) or here (Ekeberg Restaurant, Oslo).
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