Shropshire Magazine

The Pound at Leebotwood.

Neil Thomas coins a few phrases in favour of The Pound Inn. Pictures: Russell Davies

At The Pound in Leebotwood we unexpectedly bumped into friends Graham and Pam Leddington. We had arrived from entirely different directions, driven by sharply contrasting impulses.

I rather laboured over the decision to go there. Faced with a choice of four or five restaurants in which I fancied treating my wife Vanessa, I was the epitome of indecision, taking three or four days to mull over where best to go. The result of this dithering was, of course, that when I phoned my first choice it was fully booked. The Pound, which someone had commended to me, was first reserve.

Graham and Pam, by contrast, acted swiftly on a whim. They had visited the Saturday of Ludlow Food Festival where they were at a cooking demonstration by chef John Williams, who owns The Pound with wife Debbie. This brief tasting so whetted their appetites that they decided, there and then, to try to book a table for that evening.

“We were a bit spontaneous but they said that, although they were busy, they would squeeze us in,” said Graham.

“The food was just so lovely at the festival that we just fancied a full meal,” added Pam.

Though fate had brought us there in completely different ways, the end result was the same – a superb evening out.

The Leddingtons said that their food was every bit as good as the tasting had promised. For us, it lived up to the glowing recommendation I had been given.

John Williams, one of just 25 Fellows of the Master Chefs of Great Britain.

This is perhaps hardly surprising, given the pedigree of its proprietors. John and Debbie previously owned and ran Sol restaurant in Shrewsbury, garnerning a host of honours. They achieved the only Michelin star in the town, gained three AA rosettes and a Good Food Guide award, all of which put them in the top two per cent of restaurants in the UK. John is a Fellow of the Master Chefs of Great Britain, an award given only to those who have held top accolades for 10 years or more. He is one of just 25 in the country to hold the title.

It’s quite a culture change, moving from the heart of a thriving county town to a 15th-century thatched pub in the sticks. 

In a town, those who enjoy dining out get to know the restaurants pretty quickly and word soon gets around if you are any good. What’s more, with thousands of people milling about every day, there’s always plenty of passing trade potential.  

Challenge

Trying to lure customers through the door in the middle of a sparsely populated area presents, I suspect, a different type of challenge. Sure, you can offer a dreamy location but how do you continually get enough bums on seats to cut a profit when there ain’t that many bums around?

The answer is surely to get talked about . . . in a positive way, of course. There are probably two ways you can do this – be so cheap that you undercut the entire field (though the provenance of some recession-busting menus doing the rounds doesn’t bear thinking about) or to offer a dining experience so memorable that customers will not only want to return but bring their friends. The Pound undoubtedly falls into the latter category. 

It also starts with the advantage of not being entirely in the middle of nowhere, since it stands next to the busy A49. It makes it pretty easy to get to, though the drawback with trying to entice passing trade is that it is generally passing at 50 miles an hour and by the time the sign, the thatched roof, the whole cosy, welcoming rural idyll effect has had time to register, the driver is in Church Stretton or Dorrington.

What The Pound offers as much as anything is classiness. It is clearly run by people who, whether running a town restaurant or a country hostelry, want to be the best at what they do.

The Pound has been given a major refurbishment so that there is a contemporary look to the dining area. John and Debbie have been careful, though, to hang on to the inn’s traditional character, retaining the thatched roof, beams and timbers. The welcome is warm and friendly, the service good-natured yet sharply efficient.

The Williamses say they intend to establish The Pound as a destination pub and eating house and I can see diners being tempted enough to make regular journeys there. They have certainly achieved the informal style they are looking for. Their stated aim of combining simplicity and affordability with high standards also looks like a trick they have pulled off.

There’s little reason to worry about the provenance of The Pound menu – John uses some of the best local produce around.

Where the produce comes from further afield, like my pan-fried sea bass main course, the emphasis remains on quality and flavour.

This being a pub/restaurant my aperitif was a pint of excellently kept Shropshire Gold ale ahead of wine with our meal.

My crayfish and orange cocktail with crispy parsley and caperberries was a delightful contrast of textures and tastes, the slightly salty chewiness of the meat contrasting with the tang of the fruit and sauce.

Vanessa loved her seared fillet of smoked salmon with horseradish crème fraîche, a delicate starter of rich flavours.

My sea bass was billed as ‘fish of the day’ though tasted good enough to be in the running for fish of the year, and arrived with perfectly prepared fresh vegetables.

Perfection

Vanessa’s 28 day, dry-aged sirloin steak was, again, cooked to perfection – dark outside and blue in the middle. It came with excellent thick-cut chips, confit plum tomato, roast flat mushrooms and delicious Madeira sauce.

Pound chocolate cake with white chocolate, malt and mint ice-cream.

Dessert matched the high quality of the first two courses. I was warned my hot chocolate cake with white chocolate, malt and mint ice-cream would take 15 minutes to prepare, but that relatively short wait was well worth it for something freshly made and at its very best. Delicious. Vanessa, too, was delighted with her light and creamy panna cotta.

There was a wide and varied choice for all courses and it’s worth whetting your appetite with a quick glance at the sample menu on The Pound’s website.

Good coffee rounded of a top-notch meal and the bill represented excellent value at just over £90 for two, including wine and pre-dinner drinks.

Atmosphere and ambience are also vital parts of a dining experience and The Pound scores there, too. This half-timbered building is believed to have been put up in around 1457, is dated as the oldest in the village and was founded as a drovers’ hostelry. It is uplifting to know that a place built just two years after the start of the Wars of the Roses, in the year that King Henry VII was born, still has a vigorous life 550 years later as a first-rate pub and restaurant. Through evolution The Pound has survived several centuries and outlived countless generations, ensuring, like so many other historic buildings in the Shropshire Marches, that we have a tangible reminder of this country’s rich heritage. With owners like John and Debbie Williams, it looks set to flourish for many years to come. 

• The Pound Inn, Leebotwood, near Church Stretton SY6 6ND. Telephone: 01694 751477. www.thepound.org.uk

The dining area.