Ye Olde Bowling Green Inn — Restaurant in Derbyshire Dales

We have been visiting the Bowling Green for about 19 years, every time we visit Bradwell - usually about once per year. We’ve seen several owners/landlords come and go over the years, and have attended many great gatherings of distant relatives with roots in Bradwell. I’ve stayed in their B&B rooms a few times too.

It’s always been enjoyable. Good drinks, and good food.

Today we visited and tried to have lunch. We sat at our favourite table, and checked out the new menu. The burger sounded good, and my wife wanted their cauliflower veggie dish. Went to the bar to order, and strangely, the barmaid said we can’t order off that menu at lunch, we could only order from the lunch menu. She double-checked with a gentleman sitting at a nearby table, and he quietly said no.

Presumably this was one of the owners. He didn’t even look up at me, or acknowledge me, just the barmaid. In previous visits, I’d found the proprietors to be friendly. Not even a glance this time.

So we took a look at the lunch menu. It only had a few paninis, all with cheese. There was a soup, and some jacket potatoes. Nothing of interest.

I’ve never been to a pub before where you couldn’t order regular pub food that i could see on the menu. We left, and went elsewhere.

Tip to anyone buying a pub: don’t refuse to serve food at lunch from your "Bar Menu".

We’ve always gone at lunch time in the past, and there’s always been a great selection of pub food. Paninis and jacket potatoes only at lunch is a sure way for use to not go back.

It seems the new owners have a different idea of what people want from a pub at lunch time.

We were most disappointed after driving a couple of hours, looking forward to our "old haunt" and finding that we couldn’t get basic pub food in the afternoon.

I guess that’s the end of a tradition for us. Definitely not the experience we’ve had in...

Our personal experience of the Olde Bowling Green Inn is detailed below. |The booking experience was good having booked the day before on the telephone. The pub is in the small village of Bradwell up quite a narrow village road but the frontage of the premises is large with ample free parking in a large car park. The building is well painted and looks clean and inviting from the outside. The interior is traditional with smaller rooms off the main bar, clean and comfortable. Up onto a mezzanine style second floor is further seating, one side darker and more intimate the other side which is more like a conservatory with large window making it brighter with views over the large well presented beer garden with a good number of picnic style table ms and views over the Hope valley area.|The lady owner was friendly and accommodating as we did turn up for our booking early but that was not a problem for her. We sat on the mezzanine level on the more intimate side, everything was clean and comfortable and the service from the owners daughter was excellent. She was polite, friendly and efficient about her duties. |We had the Sunday lunch menu and there was a good choice of meat options plus vegetarian/ vegan option. The meat was served with a selection of vegetables, mashed and roast potatoes and a large Yorkshire pudding and a large jug of gravy. Proper sauces were available in ramekins; apple sauce, cranberry sauce and horse radish sauce together with the standard sauce options. The food was hot, well presented, tasty and good value. They offer standard plate or smaller plate size options and a combined two course option if required. |There is a good selection of beers from the cask as well as lager and a good selection of wine by the bottle or glass. |All in all a very good experience and well worth the...

Our personal experience of the Olde Bowling Green Inn is detailed below. |The booking experience was good having booked the day before on the telephone. The pub is in the small village of Bradwell up quite a narrow village road but the frontage of the premises is large with ample free parking in a large car park. The building is well painted and looks clean and inviting from the outside. The interior is traditional with smaller rooms off the main bar, clean and comfortable. Up onto a mezzanine style second floor is further seating, one side darker and more intimate the other side which is more like a conservatory with large window making it brighter with views over the large well presented beer garden with a good number of picnic style table ms and views over the Hope valley area.|The lady owner was friendly and accommodating as we did turn up for our booking early but that was not a problem for her. We sat on the mezzanine level on the more intimate side, everything was clean and comfortable and the service from the owners daughter was excellent. She was polite, friendly and efficient about her duties. |We had the Sunday lunch menu and there was a good choice of meat options plus vegetarian/ vegan option. The meat was served with a selection of vegetables, mashed and roast potatoes and a large Yorkshire pudding and a large jug of gravy. Proper sauces were available in ramekins; apple sauce, cranberry sauce and horse radish sauce together with the standard sauce options. The food was hot, well presented, tasty and good value. They offer standard plate or smaller plate size options and a combined two course option if required. |There is a good selection of beers from the cask as well as lager and a good selection of wine by the bottle or glass. |All in all a very good experience and well worth the...