The Catherine Wheel — Restaurant in Mid Devon

Ok, so let's address the common whine from outsiders and grockles: "Mr Grumpy" is basically Basil Fawlty and one of the many local eccentric characters. He doesn't mean most of the rude/grumpy things he says; he just has a very dry sense of humour. Customer Service wasn't invented when he took over the pub, and he was socialised with dairy cows rather than humans; if you stay long enough he will probably tell you stories of what "real work" are (because only dairy farmers know what real work are) and how this one time he drove a tractor into a slurry pond, although it was entirely the tractor's fault for not being able to drive itself whilst he was hungover.

A few people have negatively mentioned Sergio the Cane Corso pub dog. That is based on his appearance; he's a big dog and was adopted from Serbia so sadly has cropped ears and tail. However, he's the softest old boy I've ever known and never hurt anybody. He doesn't like blokes in hi viz jackets for some reason, and will grump at them a bit but it's never nasty. He loves kids and they love him. He also loves playing with other dogs and is always on the receiving end of aggression from precious grockles with smaller, badly-socialised dogs but he never fights back.

Anyway, since Tom the chef took over, the restaurant has gone from strength to strength. His culinary skills are legendary in the local area, and the prices are definitely reasonable for the enormous servings of deliciousness you get.

The bar side is full of very friendly locals who do their best to keep Mr Grumpy's worst excesses in check when outsiders come in. Finally, it is worth mentioning that the pub is very LGBTQ+ friendly, with plenty of us "rainbow collective" folk both...

DONT GO HERE UNLESS YOU LIVE IN THE VILLAGE NOT WELCOMING TO NEW PEOPLE Was told food would be 30 mins, didn’t get it till an hour later (even though people who came in after got their food first) then when we got the food it was wrong and after having to wait an hour and a half for the order to be done correct we requested a refund as we no longer wanted to the food as we ordered it an hour and a half ago. The women behind the bar then raised her voice demanding I wouldn’t get a refund because she had to fix the order (an order that they got wrong in the first place) came to devon for nice weekend with my partner but it was ruined by the staff at this pub who treated me and my partner like outsiders being rude from the get go. They even had the audacity to offer us a £2 refund after the total order came to £43. A waste of money, should’ve...

I would honestly give it less if i could. Staff were arrogant and most were below the age of 18, we were served by a child no older than 12, nothing against that; however I do find it quite unprofessional for an establishment to use children as a form of cheap labour.... the wait for food was awful. We waited 2 hours (despite the pub not being busy at all) before asking where the food was to no avail. The food was terribly overpriced and was definitely not worth the price they charge (not to mention that there were no menus, instead there was a chalk board in which i was forced to take pictures off to show my family what was on offer, which was awkward and time consuming). Overall, shoddy service and quite shoddy food. Was not a nice introduction to the holiday and we certainly won't be...