The Swan @ Stoford

If you find yourself in the Salisbury area wondering where to go for a nice meal in the country, allow me to recommend The Swan at Stoford in the Wylye Valley. It's a lovely pub which sells excellent, restaurant quality food at not quite restaurant prices. We've been several times (usually we stay there when we are in Wiltshire).

Yesterday was the first time we've been for Sunday lunch. We will certainly go again. The roasts on offer were beef, pork, slow roasted lamb shoulder and pheasant. Can't remember ever having seen pheasant on a pub's Sunday lunch offerings before!. The Builder had the pork which came with a little pot of apple sauce. His mother had the beef (which she declared delicious but which was rather more than she could eat). We all had fluffy Yorkshire puddings, roasted potatoes, beautifully cooked broccoli, cauliflower and carrot. And I had the slow roasted lamb shoulder. I have to say - it was fabulous. It was served on the bone and it melted as you ate it. And it was in a very slightly sweet, very slightly sticky sauce (but not too sweet, or too sticky and it wasn't a Chinese style sauce). I asked the waiter what the sauce was - and he said it was the gravy that everyone else had with some mint added to it. Oh, and perhaps something else. Actually, I think it had red currant jelly in it, along with the mint. But I'm sure it had something else. And it had been reduced - it was thicker and darker than the gravy on the other plates was. I have a shoulder of lamb in the freezer. I may have to try to replicate the sauce!