Pubs and Bars / Pub of the Week
Pub of the Week: The White Horse
Taxidermied ducks have replaced horse brasses in the top level dining room of the White Horse in Westbury-on-Trym, but a wheel arch on the wood panelled wall opposite the bar is a reminder of this pub in days not long gone by.
It is now exactly a year since the 300-year-old former coaching inn reopened under new owners Garth and Katie Jackson, and it was only a few months later that the White Horse was awarded an AA rosette for the standard of its food and service.
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In recent incarnations it would have been unthinkable to have game on the menu. Now, on a recent Thursday, preparations were in full swing for an evening of local game shot by Ian Bullus at a price of £50 per person which included a wine flight prepared by RS Wines of Ashton.
It’s always refreshing to see a long list of local suppliers. At the White Horse these are all displayed at the back of a menu sewed into an old encyclopaedia.
Have coffee from one of these suppliers, Wogan of St Jude’s, as part of afternoon teas served from Wednesday to Saturday. It’s £6 for a cream tea, £12 for a traditional afternoon tea, £15 with added Prosecco and £5 for a children’s version.
Tribute and Butcombe were the two ales on cask recently, with a couple of other beer options from London’s Meantime brewery, more than a dozen wines available by the glass (with a new biodynamic section coming soon), cocktails, mocktails, pitchers and a spirit menu dominated by gin, including White Horse Gin made especially for the pub by Psychopomp of Montpelier.
In a clear indication of just how much this pub has changed under its new owners, a crisp linen table cloth lies on a circular table in the former snug which is now the private dining room.
The former Foresters just up the road has been transformed into a Tesco Express and the White Horse has had its own transformation from a pub into a gastropub, that with its monthly fine dining evenings and regular afternoon teas is now decidedly more gastro than pub.
The White Horse, 24 High Street, Westbury-on-Trym, Bristol, BS9 3DZ
0117 329 4900
Photos by Darren Shepherd