Bells ring at the Dog & Bear Hotel
Sat in the dining room of the Dog & Bear Hotel in the lovely Kent village of Lenham as the sun was going down on a late-Summer evening seemed pretty idyllic. Then when the church bells started to chime from the bell-ringers’ regular Tuesday night practice session we definitely were soaking up the quintessential village vibe.
The Shepherd Neame-owned pub sits on an incredibly active square in the centre of Lenham and in the true sense of an inn it is also ideally located for travelling workers doing a stint in the county and tourists looking for a base from which to explore Kent. It also sits close-by the Pilgrims Way that still takes Pilgrims from Winchester to Canterbury. Over the years some must have stayed at the Dog & Bear and enjoyed its food & drink during their journey. On our visit we did a short stretch of the route – onto the next village at Charing – before we took the train back to Lenham.
The Dog & Bear is certainly packed with history. An inn has been operating on the site since 1602. There is a list in the pub showing the names of all the landlords from that date until the present custodians of the premises. It holds this history very lightly and today it very much represents a working pub with rooms rather than some chocolate box affair that lacks boozer characteristics.
It is also, thankfully, very Kentish, which as visitors from London we were very pleased about because we wanted to enjoy some local food and drink. The regular Shepherd Neame cask and keg beers were available along with a choice of Kentish wines, which I’m always very pleased to see and Sheps does a pretty good job in this department. These were supported by Biddenden apple juice and various cocktails that incorporate Grants Morrella cherry liqueur (Shepherd Neame own the brand, which was founded in 1774).
The cherry brandy appears in various forms on the pub’s menu – within the chicken liver pate and as part of the Folkestone Pudding. These sit alongside plenty of classic dishes and we took a mix including a sharing platter and the nachos followed by salt & pepper squid, loaded fries, cheeseburger with local cheese, Steak & Bishops Finger pie, and the aforementioned Folkestone pudding for which it is worth detailing here because it is a multi-faceted affair.
Cherry brandy-soaked cherries give some tartness to a cheesecake-style pudding with a cinnamon flavoured biscuit base and an accompanying scoop of gypsy tart ice cream. Gypsy tart is a Kentish delicacy that I’m not too keen on but in ice cream format it reminded me of butterscotch flavour Angel Delight (please take this as a positive), which made for a great combo of sweetness.
After all that it was good to have another brief stroll around Lenham’s square before following the well-trodden pilgrim’s route up to our room before we retraced our steps for the next day’s breakfast.
Glynn Davis, editor, Beer Insider