Inventive cooking of beautifully presented dishes impress at this gastropub overlooking the Evenlode valley, with four rooms that are smart but not ostentatiously 'designer'.

A landmark on Dedham's picturesque High Street, looking onto St Mary's Church, Piers Baker's medieval coaching inn impressed our inspectors with a comfortable bedroom 'overflowing with character', swift and personable service, and expert cooking of elevated pub food, especially seafood.

Welcoming and unfussy, Charles and Edmund Inkin's dining pub is an 'effortlessly stylish' base from which to explore some of Cornwall's best scenery on the coastal path.

The quintessential local gastropub in a Wealden village never ceases to please readers, with imaginative food, four good bedrooms and a warm, friendly ambience.

With its wing armchairs, antique settles, warm lighting, and Farrow & Ball palette, the bar of this 19th-century ironstone and limestone village pub with rooms is reassuringly cosy and welcoming.

Chef-proprietors Guy and Brittany Manning have brought skills honed at triple-Michelin-starred Per Se in Midtown Manhattan to this thatched gastropub on the edge of Salisbury Plain, with 'stupendous' food in the bar/restaurant and garden, and stylish guest bedrooms across the road, with decking from which to watch the ducks on the River Avon.