IF THERE is one sector that hasn't come on in leaps and bounds over the past decade, a period in which the eating-out experience in Scotland has improved immeasurably, it's the nation's pubs and bars. All too often pub grub consists of over-priced and over-zapped microwaved food that's little more than an afterthought and whose main function is to mop up alcohol. Decent gastro-pubs remain depressingly few and far between.
There is, however, a middle way that's nicely represented by this eponymous hotel on the west coast, just south of Greenock and within easy walking distance for yachties at Kip Marina. The Inverkip Hotel is a small inn with five bedrooms, a proper boozer's bar, a comfy and rambling lounge bar with tartan carpets, plus a tardis-like restaurant hidden away out the back that can seat close to 100 people when the mezzanine level is brought into play.
Brothers-in-law Alistair Hardy and David Cushley own the place, and over the past few years they have quietly turned it into one of the most successful small hotels on this part of the coast. A large part of that is because the food is plentiful and good value, with most of the very substantial main courses coming in at under a tenner. Throw in an environment that's more than relaxed enough to make up for some fitful service, and it's easy to see why the place is thriving.
We went along on a pretty dreich midweek evening recently, and the place wasn't quite jumping, but appearances were deceptive because between the bars and the restaurant I counted almost 50 people tucking into the food coming out of chef Ken Combe's kitchen. The lounge bar was full and every second table in the restaurant was occupied, while the sound of cheerful blether filled the air.
The first shock was the sheer scale of a dinner menu that contained almost 50 options, virtually all of them fairly utilitarian pub grub staples. The second was the inclusion of a dish that completely bucked that trend, a 1970s monstrosity described as "peach halves layered with gammon and melted cheddar cheese and a lite (sic) salad garnish". There is no amount of culinary curiosity that would get me to opt for that particular dish, and despite my promptings, Bea proved utterly resistant to its allure too.
Instead, I started with garlic mushrooms and bacon topped with cheddar cheese and served with toasted Italian bread, while Bea had warmed smoked salmon and asparagus with a poached egg and mustard vinaigrette. If the salmon was a tad clammy and the bacon insipid, the asparagus was nicely al dente and the free-range egg perfectly poached. My starters comprised bog-standard field mushrooms and, although laced with enough garlic to ward off several vampires, disappointingly undercooked.
If my starter was adequate, the main was enough to feed a family of four for a week. The seafood pancake topped with cheese sauce cost only £8.25, yet there was so much of it that, even with a raging hunger and an outsized appetite, I could only just finish it. This was classic pub grub: a huge handful of prawns, mussels and fishy offcuts stuffed into a pancake the size of a large dinner plate, then smothered with cheese sauce to make grade-A comfort food.
Bea went for a more refined option with seabass en papilotte, and was significantly more restrained in her praise. The piece of fish, which came wrapped in the tin foil it was cooked in, was a decent size but it had been overcooked. Nor was there sufficient seasoning. If that makes it sound like a deficient dish, though, that would be misleading; it was just marginally less tender and more bland than it could and should have been.
As for pudding, if my brioche bread and butter pudding was a cut above the usual fare, then Bea's meringue chantilly – a bizarre dish that seemed to contain half a gallon of cream – was left largely untouched and best forgotten.
Yet for all that, if you can navigate the menu sensibly, the homely Inverkip Hotel is a good pub and restaurant that can be long on value and hospitality, even if it could do with remembering that quality generally trumps quantity. That said, the growing numbers of satisfied diners tell their own story, and if it's not quite a happy-ever-after fairy tale, nor is it a horror story from the brothers-in-law Grimm.
vital statistics
INVERKIP HOTEL
Main Street, Inverkip, Renfrewshire (01475 521478, www.inverkip.co.uk)
OUT OF POCKET
Starters £2.95-£5.95 Main courses £6-£17.50 Puddings £4.90 Cheese £6.45
RATING 5.5/10
This article was first published in the Scotland on Sunday on December 20
