Chain hotel focussing on locally sourced and grown produce

The Pig Hotel is a chain of now seven Pig Hotels at time of writing across the country that all share a similar conservatory dining room setting for their restaurants and take great pride in sourcing their produce locally, from their gardens, farms and coops or nearby producers. This visit included staying for the night as well as having dinner. The food was hearty and a general pleasure at a simmering level with service that felt slightly amateur on occasion. I would offer that breakfast here is a very fulsome experience and the grounds are wonderful to walk around in the sunshine and take a very good look at seasonal produce.

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There are various snacks to choose from on the a la carte only menu and we chose Piggy bits (crackling) served with apple sauce and cod’s roe with crackers. The latter was arguably better as the crackling was extremely hard to get through and unfortunately not even close to an example such as served at The Sportsman pub in Seasalter.

Wye Valley asparagus with truffled hollandaise and hens egg was very good however a slightly higher form of this dish can be seen at The Walnut Tree in Abergavenny. Pork tomahawk with garden greens and Somerset cider brandy and mustard sauce was generously portioned and the sauce being very good. A Cadgwith Cove whole mackerel with beetroot vinaigrette and chard stalks was another simple and well-presented dish and reportedly very good. The only dampener on the meal was the “Yeah, that’s alright” and “Yeah, give me a minute” from one of the waiting staff with only marginally better from others.

I should mention that the breakfast had the following morning, after a pleasant but not exactly mod-con stay (the lack of air conditioning in the room at the height of summer was missed), was very good indeed and especially nice to have in the grounds of the hotel. Having been to the Pig Hotel in Brockenhurst as well, I can easily see the attraction of these venues. If the service was a little more polished (professional) and the food enhanced, it would be much more on my hit list to go back to more often.

Food Grade: 65%