LamBert's Reviews

In many ways the Blue Lion at East Witton is about as idyllic a pub as you could hope to find. A few miles south of Middleham, N.Yorks, you can stay there too but, in spite of the accommodation being very nicely done, it's much more a pub with rooms than a country inn or hotel. The food's excellent – high-end pub to restaurant quality – and the building itself is an absolutely charming place to eat and/or drink. Complete with all the features that regularly have Alistair Sawday types crossing their legs – open fires, flagstones, wood panelling, local ales – it is indisputably a pub. Did I say that already? It feels like a pub. The way it carries itself, though, it nevertheless feels entirely wrong.

There was a distinct air, having walked in, that no one quite knew what to do next. You're funnelled into the main room past the back of a curved settle and into the heart of a curiously amassed throng gathered at the bar, none of whom appear to be getting served. There's a guy leaning obtrusively at one side with a broadsheet newspaper, apparently waiting for a train. A number of people are wandering in between tables, none of which are occupied although they're all reserved, looking at the huge blackboard menu which dominates the room. ( I've bleated about this before, but it's inconveniently situ…oh, who am I kidding ? It's in the wrong place.) The Maitre-d, dressed as if he's off to a Prom and old enough to know better, is scurrying between customers writing orders on the hoof. Everyone is in everyone's way. It's a mess. I want to stand on a stool in the middle of the room and blow as hard as I can on a whistle.

Having had our order taken and opted on booking to eat in the restaurant ,we're led down a bizarrely unkempt and brightly lit corridor to a very handsome, high-ceilinged dining room. A bit like a mortuary with a fireplace. One couple in the corner, whispering so as not to wake the cadavers, were far too polite to ask a second time for more wine after their waitress… More

At the tail end of an Easter weekend spent gorging on pap, drinking everything I was invited to and playing poker, I rather felt an obligation to my physical being to make a relatively modest selection. A shout that was, arguably, moot as I simultaneously sipped through four pints of London Pride. 'You're going to tell me I'm as crazy as a sh*thouse rat', I said,' but I'm going to have the vegetarian lasagne'. ‘You are crazy’, I was told with a disapproving look. Not for the language, you understand, but for the show of conservatism. ‘Is it a bad thing that I want everything on the menu?’.

Of course it's not. With an ostentatiously furnished interior matched by a showy array of motors in the car park, the Boot has long been an institution in this well-to-do spot not far south of Birmingham. As a visual spectacle it's as rewarding as they come, attractive in red-brick with real fires in either bar, stripped tables, deep coloured walls and tons of personality. A personality matched, particularly on this occasion, by the service which was polite, prompt and executed with good humour. And Sky Sports' own Andy Gray drinks here. His weapon of choice on home turf seems to be a white wine spritzer, an affectation I can't think he gets away with when he's on the tile with Keys, Kammy et al. If the marauding style of his playing days is any clue, Gray's the type that would normally tie one on while beating his chest and throwing his own faeces.

The dining room at this pub, in line with the expense of the Boot's overall aesthetic, can feel a little try-hard. Often in the past I've been ever so slightly underwhelmed by the food, maybe because of the way it has compared to the environment. If you're looking to eat I'd recommend booking a table in the bar. In fairness to the restaurant, and as Benson's comment implied, I think this was as varied and appealing a menu as has been offered here for some time. With back-to-work blues for two out of three of us beginning to kick in, and… More