THE WHITE HART
Just as my pre-Aspers experience of the world tied the idea of a casino to
images of excess and tack, whenever a restaurant in Usk or its rural environs
comes in, I automatically get excited. The kind of patronising, romantic nonsense
only someone who has lived in cities all of his life can come up with fills
my head; idealistic notions of ‘the way things used to be’ that
owe more to Heartbeat than any historical truth.
However, given the abundance of high quality local produce and some excellent
previous dining experiences in the vicinity, I feel that I do have a right
to get excited about eating in Usk; sitting down to eat in a village pub is
far more inviting to me than a city-centre bar with up-lighting.
The White Hart is definitely a village pub. Set back from the main road in
Llangybi, the building itself has a whole host of period features and eccentricities,
from the Grade II listed renovations that have taken place throughout; to a
priest-hole and escape tunnel that leads from behind a fire-place all the way
up to the village church. In fact, it is believed that T.S Eliot’s poem ‘Usk’ refers
to the pub in the lines "Do not .../ Hope to find/ The white hart behind
the white well". Not as olde world as the parts of the building that date
back to the 16th Century but still a greater boast than a local soap star getting
pissed and falling down your stairs.
We had arrived in time for the Christmas menu and looked forward to a little
pre-festive cheer. Upon entering the building the whiff of a wood burning fire
immediately made me feel at home.
Sitting in this warm glow, my companion for the evening took on the delightfully
rich game terrine followed by the succulent roast turkey, while for me it was
the delicate prawn and crayfish cocktail and a deeply satisfying and perfectly
cooked brisket of beef. A hard choice to make from a menu that reads like a ‘who’s
who’ of traditional Winter favourites. A reasonably priced house red
and delicious desserts of chocolate pudding and a hazelnut parfait were also
consumed before like the hypocritical country vultures we are, we took a taxi
to Cardiff and drank in bars with up-lighting till the early hours.
The White Hart
Llangybi
Usk
Tel: 01633 450258
Matthew David Scott offers some food for thought