It was my turn to venture out to the burbs and visit my friend and co-InReading contributor Phil. There isn't a huge amount of choice up in Woodley. There's the lovely Yaprak and Cozze - but this column is in danger of getting overtly Italian (which is not necessarily a bad thing), so we decided on that most traditional of British pastimes - a pub lunch.

 

In fact, I decided on a pub lunch since this is something that is unfortunately rare in central Reading unless you're willing to put up with what passes as food at Spoons, and the inReading expense account would be challenged by the Rising Sun. There are very few pubs and even fewer that do a decent lunch in the middle of town.

 

But Woodley does somewhat better with The George, The Chequers, The Bull & Chequers,  Good Companions and The Waterside Inn. Randomly, and since I had never been to this corner of Woodley, I selected The Waterside.

 

It is a massive, beautiful thatched old fashioned pub, built in the 16th century as part of the Bulmershe Estate, with a large car park, huge beer gardens (with outside TV screens) but is not on any waterside that I could see. Apparently it used to be called Thatchers and South Lake is down a path leading from the car park.

 

It really has to be seen to be believed. If I was local this would definitely be my local and I'm sure it's packed at weekends.

 

There are three menus - all of which were on offer on a very quiet Wednesday lunchtime when we, somewhat worryingly, had the whole place to ourselves.

 

There is a pizza menu, a gluten free menu and the main menu.

 

We went inevitably, for the main menu, which was a pub food greatest hits of all the de rigeur choices - steaks, burgers, fish and chips, a Thai curry, a pasta and some lighter lunchtime options such as Phil's choice of steak baguette. That came with chips or the option, if I understood correctly, of tomato soup. The steak was accompanied by rocket and fried onions. A bargain for a tenner.

 

 

For my part it was the fish and chips.

 

 

Phil said that he enjoyed his meal and mine was fine - 'triple cooked' - frozen - I'd guess, chips (the other day I heard that Brakes, on the other side of Woodley, supply seventy seven different kinds of chips to UK pubs and restaurants - 77!), but it was a nicely battered fish with skin on one side of the cod, accompanied by basic and vinegary tartare sauce and mushy peas, which I had forgotten to swap out for garden peas which I much prefer. That said, these mushy peas were sweet and salty and actually tasted of peas (my love of garden peas is only matched by my hatred of marrow peas, whcih were a staple at my grandma's since she grew them by the bushell).

 

With work to do and driving to be done we settled down with our pints of diet Coke for a proper catch up covering everything from the state of local journalism to how boundary changes are likely to affect Reading. It's unfortunate to admit, but we quickly became a couple of 'glass of coke half empty' grumpy old (sorry, Phil) men.

 

A recent article in a national newspaper commented on how pubs had gone from ham sandwiches, chicken in the basket and pickled eggs to gastro pubs, and then back again... A few miles away you can pay nearly fifty quid for fish and chips at Tom Kerridge's 'pub' in Marlow. Here it was only £16. Most of the starters are under £10 and the mains under £20 apart from the steaks. This is great value for money these days, and it was difficult to find any fault with the food whilst we found plenty at fault with our world.

 

We sat outside in the warm sun and reflected on what we could say about the food at a British pub that was original or different and landed on that word that every food writer tries to avoid - it was nice. A nice location with nice food, nice drinks and nice service.