Out of Bristol we go. 20 minutes in the car, we’re scooting along high-hedged country roads, slicking the paintwork with mud. A further 15 minutes later, we’re through a series of covetable, hotch-potch villages with dinky names: Westonbirt, Culkerton, Tarlton. We’re on our way to John Betjeman’s favourite pub, a curious building hidden away down a bumpy track, lying in wait by a disused canal.
On arrival, we discovered that its timber-vaulted, cosy interior was packed to the gunwales, the drinkers of a distinctly monied variety. There was overheard chat of London flats, Jake and George the terrible toddlers, George and Charlie the absoleetly gawgeous garls. So we hid in a corner, surrounded by braying adults, teenagers and children. Three generations of relaxed chins and amour propre. Would they ruin the day?
They went away. The food arrived in a thankfully quietened room, affording us airspace to worship our roasts – I cannot remember the last time I ate beef that had been hung for so long and cooked so well. Tender, rich and warming, in an unctuous gravy that spoke of hours of diligence, accompanied by enormous roast potatoes of the ideal constitution, crisp carapaces with floury, doughy hearts, a yorkshire pudding certainly not from cardboard packaging, and enough crunchy vegetables to make the inner nutritionist happy and the tastebuds sing. Drowned by a pint of Old Spot for me and a Stowford Press cider for my dining partner, this was Sunday heaven.
Not completely, though. We are idle Ulysseans, a louche Lewis & Clark. We strove ever onwards, riding the rainbow of earthly pleasures to its very end, the pot of gold – a pot of fresh-leaf tea and the golden moat of custard around a treacle sponge from Two Toads tearooms in Tetbury.
Sated.
So sated.
The Tunnel House Inn
Tarlton Road, Coates, Nr. Cirencester, Glos, GL7 6PW