I recently stayed at Beamish Hall for an early Valentine’s treat. When we were there we pre-booked a three course meal at the on site restaurant; The Stables. The restaurant is pretty cool and as the name would suggest it can be found in the old stable block, some of the original features are still there; or at least faked.

Immediately I was a little bit disappointed as we had paid £23 each for the three course in advance, I quickly realised that I would be quite happy with some options which totalled less than that which made it quite frustrating. However, I had a good scour and found some options which made it more justifiable.

I was also a bit disappointed as there was no cocktail menu available. We soon discovered it was “hidden” because they had ran out of a lot of ingredients and couldn’t make them all. Luckily, the barman went through them with us and we were able to still find cocktails we wanted that they had the ingredients for!

I started with a mackerel scotch egg. Wowza, it was amazing. It was basically a mackerel fishcake with an egg in the middle served with a little bit of side salad and tartare sauce. It was soooo good.

For main there was a lot of choice, burgers, steaks, pie etc. I opted for chicken with a mushroom sauce, potatoes and broccoli. It didn’t disappoint either. Matty; my boyfriend, had a pulled pork burger and I swear it’s a long time since I’ve seen a burger so big but it was equally yummy. I’d definitely pick my chicken again though!

Dessert was the course we probably wouldn’t have bothered with if we hadn’t already paid. As it was I picked an ice-cream sundae with marshmallows and malteasers. Unfortunately, they made it with bubblegum and strawberry ice-cream which definitely didn’t go with the chocolate and marshmallow; would’ve been better with just vanilla. I’m presuming kids would love it though.

I would definitely go back to The Stables again for a meal because it looked great, the food was good and it was actually really reasonably priced. We could definitely tell the staff wanted to hurry us out, but I can understand that they just wanted to go home; it wasn’t late mind, our table was booked for 7.30pm. If you’re in the area though give it a try!