THE Cock Inn in Sarratt has the best of both worlds: it's just a few minutes from the M25, but a world away from the hustle and bustle of town life. It looks like a picture postcard, an old building, set back from a bend in a country road, opposite a lovely 12th century church.

The fine ales and village ambience are good enough reasons to visit the Cock, but the thriving restaurant that adjoins the pub adds to its popularity.

The main dining room, which seats 50, was gently thrumming with activity and conversation when my friend and I arrived on a Saturday lunchtime.

The room, with its high ceiling and exposed beams, looks like a converted barn, and the farming feel is heightened by the selection of antique farming tools scythes, hay forks and the like scattered about among the roof beams. Customers of a nervous disposition are assured these objects are well secured, and will not bounce off your head mid-starter.

The food is not your average pub fare (you will not find chicken in a basket here) and the prices reflect the fact this is a cut above. Starters range from around £3 to £5 and include the mouthwatering baked brie in filo pastry with fruit coulis and salad, and grilled field mushrooms with a filling of leek Welsh rarebit and mustard-dressed salad.

My friend, Clair, opted for the crab and sweetcorn chowder, a kind of spicy soup, which made her talk a lot (always a good sign with food), while I had the mussels, which made me slurp a lot.

We both went for fish for the main course: toasted medallions of monkfish with French beans, cherry tomatoes and olives in a light chilli and lime oil (£14.95) for me, and red snapper fillet on pilau rice, with a mild oriental sauce (£12.75) for Clair.

For those meat-lovers out there, you could have had honey-glazed shank of lamb with parsley mash and rosemary jus (£11), fillet of pork in mustard and turmeric marinade on a bed of sauteed leeks, with a cream of mushroom sauce (£11.95), or the rather weird-sounding roasted soya-glazed duck breast on buttered noodles and apricot sauce (£12.95).

Something to appeal to the lighter appetite would be the chef's salad, a chargrilled chicken breast on a bed of salad leaves, garnished with olives, eggs and tomato, with a warm mustard dressing and crusty bread (£9.50).

The pudding tray includes a welcome selection of the sort of things your mum would cook, such as bread and butter pudding and rhubarb crumble, and if ours were anything to go by, they are jolly good.

The restaurant is open seven days a week, for lunch from noon to 2.30pm, and for dinner from 7pm to 9.30pm. Advance booking is well advised at the weekends. - RS

The Cock Inn, Church Lane, Sarratt

Telephone: 01923 282908.

Reproduced from Limited Edition magazine, exclusive guides to living in Hertfordshire, Middlesex and the London Borough of Barnet (01923 216295)

December 19, 2001 15:00