AN INSPECTOR CALLS

He pays his way... and tells it like it is

MARCO PIERRE WHITE’S name was once above the door at the Pear Tree Inn in the village of Whitley, north Wiltshire, not far from the National Trust’s Lacock Abbey. But it used to be above the door of lots of places, not that he ever cooked anything at most of them. Some of us think Marco hung up his spatulas far too early.

Jackie Cosens (front of house) and Adrian Jenkins (chef) took over in 2014, with eight rooms, four of which are in a rustic ground-floor annex to the rear of the 17th-century building. And what a heart-warmingly pretty, Bath stone, wisteria-clad building it is, with flagstone floors, a creaking staircase and large dining area divided in two.

The garden is attractive, too. To eat outside in summer must be a quintessentially British morale-booster. Rooms, all named after pears, are small.

Mine, comice, has double-aspect windows and a teeny-weeny bathroom with a chunk of the door cut out so that it can squeeze past the bath.

One of the thick, stone window sills is like an altar and it’s a pity that various knick-knacks have been put on it.

In fact, there’s clutter all over the Pear Tree. There are vintage toys, large mustard tins with lamps in them, globes, chamber pots, an old suitcase loitering self-consciously and too many signs either telling you what to do or not to do, or trying to be amusing such as ‘sometimes wine is just necessary’. You don’t need props in a place like this.

Dinner is excellent. I’m here on a Sunday when there’s a simpler ‘Sunday Supper’ menu, but it includes a terrific sirloin steak cooked medium rare to perfection. Dimming the lights a touch would make everything even more convivial, and might put all those knickknacks in the shade.

Breakfast is a tour de force, with Jackie bustling about with energy and efficiency. The generous full English (one portion will do two nicely) is superb, with a ramekin of baked beans sitting alongside bacon, sausage, tomato, mushrooms, black pudding, potato cake and two sunny fried eggs.

Before leaving, I walk round the garden and admire the vegetable plot, but am not taken by the empty wine bottles stuck in the ground to line the paths. The Pear Tree has so much going for it without gimmicks muscling their way into the action.