I firmly believe that Sunday afternoons were made for discovering new country pubs; the more adventure required to find the place, the better. It was the first weekend in my new flat, and time to start finding pubs that could approximately be described as 'my local'. A lack of lovely pubs in the immediate vicinity means that the definition of 'local' needs to equate to a couple of miles into the countryside. We decided Stoke Poges would be the village, and a quick Google and look on Beer In the Evening revealed there were at least three pubs with potential, so we decided to drive in that general direction until we found a suitable location.
Off we went following signs to Stoke Poges. All was going well until the signs stopped. In the spirit of adventure I carried on down single track lanes and very large houses. Things didn't look good. There were no pubs in sight. The moment we decided I should turn around and head back, we found ourselves at The Stag. A quick look inside and discovery that there were Sunday Roasts on offer with no less than four types of meat (pork, lamb, turkey and beef - we were apologetically informed that there was no vegetarian option, but we assured them this was definitely not a problem), confirmed that this would be an ideal place to spend the afternoon.
A wonderful thing about this pub is the lack of pretentiousness and the sheer friendliness and helpfulness of the person who served us all afternoon (I should have found out her name so I could specifically mention how great she was!) There were a good number of other customers enjoying huge Sunday Lunches, but the atmosphere was very casual and relaxed. We contemplated sitting at a huge boardroom style table, before settling for a more cosy table looking out onto the large garden.
Going back to the lack of prentension, there was no real ale or gastropub type offerings, but there is Thai menu (and takeaway service), and the sunday lunches are great value at less than a fiver each. The four meat options proved difficult to decide between, but Lewis and Claudia's burning desire to have two different roast meats on each of their plates was met with no problems at all, and before too long we had huge platefuls of food in front of us.
Huge plateful of sunday roast
It's difficult to believe that after eating quite so much, that we felt the need to eat anything else, but we had spotted the dessert menu...
Dessert board
.
Showing some restraint we waited an hour or so before we dived into dessert time. We opted for apple crumble, treacle sponge, spotted dick and chocolate sponge, which were difficult to distinguish given the vast amounts of custard!
Graham loves custard
Claudia doesn't like custard, but Lewis was gallant enough to eat through a layer of custard for her.
Overall
Atmosphere - Incredibly laid back and relaxed pub where you can easily (as we did) spend hours. There were plenty of people but it certainly didn't feel overcrowded.
Service - Amazingly friendly and helpful service which makes this a lovely place to spend a sunday afternoon.
Food quality - Although not anything particularly noteworthy the portions are huge,
Value for money - High on the cheap and cheerful rating!
Overall: 7/10 - Wonderfully friendly and relaxed pub - I'd be quite interested in trying the Thai food next time! And there certainly will be a next time!
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