The Dog and Partridge, Marchington

I am trying to make Thursday a day where Ted and I take Niamh out for a spot of lunch while the boys are at school.

Not only is it a great way to find more places to eat in our local area, that I can then tell you all about, but it is a fantastic excuse to spend some quality time together.

A few weeks ago we found ourselves at The Dog and Partridge in Marchington. Marchington is a small quaint village with lot’s of cute traditional houses and narrow streets, just a 10-15 minute drive from the Anslow yurts and The Loft. The Dog and Partridge pub reflects the feel of the village, in that it is a small cosy pub to be found on one of the narrow streets in the heart of the village.

We first stumbled across the D&P last year after a walk around the Fauld crater with all 3 of the children. We decided we had worked up a bit of an appetite and as the pub in Hanbury (at the start and end of the walk) wasn’t serving food on that particular day we set out to find somewhere else fairly close by. We don’t very often venture in this direction so it was something new for all of us. What a lovely surprise it turned out to be.

On arrival at The D&P I’ll be honest I wasn’t sure what to expect, a tiny car park, with an equally tiny beer garden had me questioning whether this pub would actually be any good- clearly it couldn’t get very busy, as there is no additional on street parking if the car park gets full.

However on entering the pub I soon decided that my first impressions could very easily be wrong. A lovely charming little pub with a central bar that can be circled entirely (Niamh had lot’s of fun getting us to chase her around and around the bar) with a small dining area to the Left as you walk in from the car park, a small dining area to the right of the bar, and a long narrow dining and seating area to the other side of the bar, provides plenty of seating in a small space without feeling as though you were on top of the diners at the next table.

I would describe the decor as vintage and rustic, with vintage games on the wall (purely for aesthetics) and lot’s of humorous vintage posters and plaques.

I was immediately impressed when we went to the toilet as clearly a lot of thought and effort had gone into this usually fairly bland functional space, and I know that it is  a very strange thing to judge an establishment on, but if the toilets are nice then it makes you feel like everything else will be too.

We have been back a few times since this first visit and even taken family with us. This time we chose to sit directly opposite the bar at the front of the pub on a table with cute pew type benches.

A lunchtime specials menu offered 2 courses for a very reasonable £8.95 and if you were feeling really peckish 3 courses were only £11.95

I went for the breaded Brie (you will start to see a pattern with my choice of starters- if cheese is on the menu that is generally what I will go for) with salad and cranberry sauce. Obviously I had to share this with Niamh and we both approved. One thing I am always very (easily) impressed with is when a side salad comes with a little bit of nice dressing on, it really bugs me when I get a pile of dry leaves. Today the dressing on my side salad was a light French dressing, and just enough to make the leaves taste slightly less bland without drowning the salad. Ted went for the breaded mushrooms, and polished them all off before I could steal one to try, so I am going to assume that they were acceptable.

Now in the spirit of full disclosure I am going to admit that I had an extra glass of wine on the Wednesday evening than I planned to, and when this happens I tend to crave a great big burger so I was absolutely delighted that this was one of the options on the menu (not the lunchtime specials menu, but needs must), and whilst it didn’t come in a fancy bun, which I’ve noticed a lot of burgers tend to now a days, it was absolutely delicious and really hit the spot. I couldn’t quite manage all of the hand cut chips that came with it, but I’m fine with that. The burger was clearly homemade, and cooked to perfection leaving it nice and juicy, topped with bacon AND cheese, with tomatoes and gherkins I couldn’t have been happier.

Ted also treated himself with the liver and onions. This may seem like a fairly unusual ‘treat’ but it is one of his favourite meals and because I don’t like liver we just never have it at home, so if we go out and it’s on the menu it’s a likely choice for him. Served with a nice selection of veg and a lovely gravy, he left a very happy bunny.

Niamh was also impressed with her selection of a very child friendly sausage and chips, in fact she was so impressed that we had another head thrown back in pure indulgence moment (see our blog about The White Swan) I was happy with the ‘real’ pork sausages and also the size of the portion- it would have easily filled me up. 

For the second week running we were all too full up to even think about dessert. But before we left I did peruse the gin menu, and reading it was enough to convince me that we need to come back and try some of the gins and maybe I can fast for a few days first so that I am ravenous enough to give all 3 courses a go as well.

All in all another one to add to the list; friendly staff, good home cooked non-fussy food, a nice environment and atmosphere, live music nights, and special themed food nights. All boxes ticked for a quiet lunch or an informal dinner.

Checkout their website here for what’s on and current menus