Having visited The Hand and Flowers last year, we were intrigued to see what Tom Kerridge would do with a walk in only pub on the High Street. The Coach is pretty small but has a great feel with bespoke furniture and fit out that shouts quality but it doesn’t have the stiff service you can often get in a high end restaurant. This still has the feel of a pub with great service and friendly staff. 

The concept of the menu is different and really interesting.  All the dishes are starter size and the reccomendation is that you choose two or three dishes per person.  I particularly liked this approach. We often like to try a few things off a menu and this menu design made that possible.  It doesn’t lend itself to a cheap lunch out but it is certainly worth every penny. 

The dishes we chose were: Rotisserie beetroot, feta, Apple, horseradish and hazelnuts 

Smoked ox tongue, crispy cheek, and sauce gribiche

Chicken Kiev with cauliflower cheese

Rotisserie celeriac with honey and mustard seed glaze

Chips with bearnaise sauce 

  
The beetroot and celeriac dishes were particular favourites of mine though everything was of a really high quality.  

We finished off with a dessert each. I had lemon tart with raspberry sorbet which was perfectly zingy and the pastry  buttery and really short. 

Mr Frivolitea had warm chocolate tart with hazelnut icecream. A sort of chocolate fondant in a tart with wonderful candied hazelnuts to accompany. 

This is somewhere I would love to go back to, not least because there are several other dishes on the menu I’d like to try. Mr Frivolitea was eying up the small but perfectly formed burger so I think that will be on his list.