There are plenty of great places to eat and drink on both Cheltenham Road and Gloucester Road. The original plan when we headed up there on a recent Saturday was to try somewhere new and different.
Having a four-year-old in tow, though, means that plans change all the time. With the boy starting to get hangry, the priority was simply finding somewhere child-friendly and relatively empty – and fast.
Bishops Tavern, the Greene King pub down near the Arches, wouldn’t normally have been my instinctive first choice: football on the big screens, the lights from the fruit machine flickering…it’s somewhere I’ve previously only visited as part of a pub crawl – and not since becoming a parent.
It was quiet, though, and the presence of another mum with a child of a similar age persuaded us through the door.
It’s a pretty sizeable place with a range of different seating areas, an attractive wooden bar with a vast drinks selection (including a decent gin range plus Greene King’s 2022 releases – their Flint Eye dry hopped lager and their Level Head session IPA) and a welcoming feel. That was, in no small part, down to the barmaid, who was lovely and chatty, talking us through the recent changes to the pub’s food menu and helping us with our choices.
The St. Johnstone vs. Celtic game was on the big screens, and the small person was intrigued by the shuffleboard tables (he’d never seen one before) which you’ll find in the room to the right of the bar, along with a small selection of board and card games.
We decided to go for one main meal plus four small plates from the Bishop’s Tavern’s “Mix & Match Pub Plates” menu. From the main menu, it was the beer-battered cod and chips (£11.79): a huge fillet of moist, flaky fish that the barmaid proudly told us was hand-battered in the pub’s kitchen, rather than being bought in. When it arrived at the table, the batter looked WAY too dark – we were fully expecting it to be overcooked and taste burnt. Appearances, though, can be deceptive. The batter was interesting – a lot flakier and crunchier than you’ll find in many pub fish and chip meals, but it worked.
The chips were a little on the salty side but otherwise decent, and the charred lemon was a nice touch, adding more flavour than a regular lemon wedge.
The Bishops Tavern “Mix & Match Pub Plates” menu is a good way of trying a few different options – and perfect if you’re sharing. Each of the ten dishes is individually priced – or you can go for three for £13.50 or five for £23.50.
The menu recommends one plate as a starter, three as a main, or five to share with friends. I’d say the “three as a main” is designed for those with a seriously large appetite.
The houmous and flatbread (£4.69) was a sizeable portion: a mound of red pepper houmous topped with Ezme (a rich tomato-based Turkish sauce), plus a sprinkling of seeds and fresh mint. Fairly coarse and dense in texture, it had a great flavour – and the toasted flatbread slices were delicious.
The chicken wings, again, were a decent portion for £5.79, and you can choose from three different sauces. Ours were drenched in Korean BBQ sauce, super sticky and sweet, which we mopped up with some of the remaining flatbread.
There were two of the sharing plates that blew me away more than the houmous and the chicken wings, though. The beer-battered cod goujons (£4.99) were mini replicas of the main cod and chips meal: four (well, four and a half) chunky strips of tender cod, coated in the same crispy batter and served with a pot of (generic) tartare sauce. The crunch from these was incredible – I’d happily order them again.
The same goes for the battered halloumi (£5.29). More of the same flaky, crispy batter gave way to super soft, thickly sliced cheese – and the accompaniments were just as good. The chilli jam and sour cream added an extra burst of flavour, but the real revelation was the pickled watermelon: super tangy and relatively sweet.
It was far too much for the three of us, sadly: we were defeated. Impressively, we were offered takeaway boxes to allow us to take the rest home with us – see what I mean about the lady who served us being brilliant? She also took the time to ask our opinions on the food and chatted us through the new menu some more – it was unexpected and lovely to have that level of service in a pub in a busy location on a Saturday lunchtime. It’s always good when somewhere exceeds your initial expectations, and the Bishops Tavern did just that.