The Albion

You could be in the country at this recently refurbished wisteria-covered 18th-century inn with a raffish past – at the far end of the vast beer garden is a barn where the Sex Pistols once played. The new owners have done a good job painstakingly restoring The Albion’s wood-panelled bars & atmospheric dining room. Reasonable prices & paper napkins signal a lack of pretension, & the jolly British menu keeps up with the unfussy approach. Starters are canny assemblies of well-sourced ingredients: London-cure smoked salmon with potato cake or air-dried Cumbrian ham, pea shoot & mint salad. Main courses excite less, a simple roast mackerel outshining a dry piece of slow-roast Gloucester Old Spot. After something lighter? Try a pint each of prawns & Black Sheep at the bar.