Review of The Feathers Hotel in Dersingham: Country pub has a good choice of food and matches it with quality dishes

For many years, The Feathers has been a welcome stop off point for my family and I after visits to Sandringham or the coast.

They’re dog-friendly, there’s plenty of space outside for children when the weather is pleasant, they serve food all day and there’s so much room you’re almost always guaranteed a spot to eat or drink.

But my recent visit, after a day at Hunstanton, was a little different as it was my first since adopting a vegan diet, so I was interested to see if one of my favourite places could look after me in that respect. Spoiler alert – it could.

There’s a couple of larger rooms where you can eat in The Feathers, but me, my wife Josi and German Spitz dog Riley wandered through to the bar area, where we were greeted by friendly landlord John.

Once I’d ordered a Pepsi Max (£2.65) for me and a medium Pinot Grigio (£5.60) for my wife, we found a seat and were soon attended to by a young waiter. He was polite and attentive throughout our early evening visit.

There was a main menu and a specials one, with heaps of choices for starters, mains, desserts and sides. This included a decent vegan choice of two starters, three mains and three desserts, which isn’t bad at all.

There were plentiful vegetarian and gluten-free options available too.

I really enjoyed my vegetable spring rolls with sweet chilli sauce and salad (£6.50) and Josi was impressed with her deep fried mozzarella sticks, with salad and a salsa dip (£7.25).

My only (tiny) complaint would be that the mains came almost as soon as we’d finished our starters, but Josi said her bacon and cheese burger with hand-cut chips (£12.50) was gorgeous and well flavoured.

My Mediterranean vegetable tart with red onion marmalade, salad and chips (£12.25) was good too, and extremely filling.

I was delighted to find out they do a vegan apple and blackberry crumble with custard (£6.25) and it was absolutely lovely. As for Josi’s caramel shortbread chocolate stack (£6.25) – she said it was as lovely as it looks in the photo above.

During the meal, Josi had another Pinot and I indulged in a sparkling elderflower drink (£3.75). The whole bill totalled £68.61 (£51 for food), which we both agreed was great value for three courses and two drinks each.

I’m looking forward to visiting again in the summer when we can sit in the spacious beer garden, but in the meantime, it is lovely to have somewhere where dogs owners feel genuinely welcome to bring their beloved pets.

Ratings out of five

Food: A great selection across two menus, and a decent vegan choice too. And the quality matched the quantity. ****

Drink: A large selection of alcohol drinks and quite a few soft options too. ****

Decor: This place has a real country pub feel. It’s homely, comfortable and not at all pretentious. ****

Staff: Both landlord and waiter were polite, chatty and informed. ****

Price: Three courses for slightly more than £50 is good value, and the drinks weren’t too expensive either. ****