Lazy Sunday Lunching at The Greyhound in Brentwood, Essex

 I am all about a good Sunday Roast and I mean a really good Sunday Roast. I don’t want any bog standard vegetables and my Yorkshire Pudding has got to be the size of my fist to make me be impressed, and I think locally we are really lacking that. I know Essex is a HUGE county with hundreds of pubs serving up a Roast option every Sunday but I was yet to find one that really got me excited! That was until we took a 15-minute drive to The Greyhound in Brentwood.

This Vintage Inn owned establishment was first open for business during the First and Second World Wars, and is rumoured to have been a haven for German prisoners of war. The soldiers, who were held half a mile away at the Costain compound, used to sneak to the inn where they enjoyed a few drinks before heading back to their camp. How crazy is that? I love a bit of history and this stunning Inn is dripping with it, if only these walls could talk aye?!

You might start to call me fussy now, but I do have a few boxes to tick when it comes to a good country pub and those are an open fire, country farmhouse style decor and be dog-friendly. Yes, I like to have the option of petting people’s dog’s in-between courses! And The Greyhound ticked all of those boxes. The menu didn’t look to bad on first glance either, which leads me on to the best bit… Oh, if you’re not a fan of photos of lots of meat, I’d click here now you might enjoy this a little more!

We, after chatting with our lovely waitress, decided to share a starter as the dinner had chosen could be a big of a monster.

The starter we chose to share was something we both love, and was the Salt & pepper calamari and tempura prawns on a crispy prawn cracker with chipotle mayonnaise. The batter was so light and fluffy, pretty much how it should be, but so many places get it wrong. I actually wanted to order a portion of chips or some more bread to be able to soak up what was left of the chipotle mayonnaise as it was so bloody good. Even Mike was lapping up and he claims to not like mayonnaise!

So, our waitress may have been right about our monster sized dinner! We did order the Roast Trio platter for two but we didn’t quite expect what was put in front of us.

We had a chunky slice each Roast beef, a good few slices of roast breast of turkey and two herb-crusted pork loin with lemon & thyme stuffing wrapped in bacon each. On top of that, there were the Yorkshire puds that were quite a bit bigger than my fist, a ton of roast potatoes, and a platter of honey & thyme roasted carrots, roasted parsnips, seasonal greens in the form of savoy cabbage.

And of course, a jug of gravy each! Sorry, Slimming World, you were 100% on hold whilst I devoured this plate of goodness! I did actually manage to clear my plate which I was shocked but it was just that good. Mike also cleared his plate right up. We did leave some on the main platters but being a dog-friendly pub they didn’t mind potting up what we had left to take home for my cheeky puppers, they also topped the pot up with what they had left in the kitchen as we were the last to eat so thank you ever so much for that!

Well, we were super full to the brim but something I love about the menu’s in Vintage Inn owned pubs are the hot drink and mini pudding option you can have for dessert. So it does exactly what it says on the tin; you pick a hot drink and you pick a mini pudding. I had the Brownie and Mike had the Treacle & Pecan Tart which just filled us up enough to be able to waddle back to the car!

We obviously had a lovely pot of tea each as it’s the only British was to finish of a truely British meal in a building so steeped with incredble British history!

Our service was impeccable, the value for money was more than worth it as all of this came to £50 with a large glass of Rioja and a pint of Guiness, and the setting was everything I had hoped it would be and more. If I were you, I’d be booking a table right now.