The Crown at Woodbridge

If we had a pound for every time we heard about a rough old boozer that had been reinvented as a gastro-pub with rooms, we'd be, well, er, comfortably off. Sometimes seems like one of these places are born every minute around the shires of Britain, but doing it properly isn't as easy to pull of as you might think. If you're considering it, you could worse than check out the Crown at Woodbridge, a formerly rundown old inn on the edge of Woodbridge's town centre that not only has a series of commodious and lovely rooms on its upper floors but complements it with a superb ground floor restaurant that is worth travelling to,. Run by chef-owner Stephen David, it has a modern British style and a passionate attachment to English traditions and local suppliers. It’s not that expensive either, and was rightly listed as one of the country’s top 50 gastro-pubs in the Independent in 2011. The dining room is comfy yet relaxed, a bit like the menu, which serves straightforward starters like crab cakes as well as more adventurous ones like cockle and curried cauliflower fritters, and a lovely selection of different fish and seafood mains – hake with cep and butternut squash risotto, roast orford cod and chorizo, orford crabs and brancaster mussels, fish pie... Inspiringly, they also have short menus of both superfood salads and stuff on toast (kidneys, smoked eel, sardines). appealing to both the health-conscious and gluttonous amongst us. Lovely.