Close Your Pie Lids

The Five Bells, 101 High Street, Henlow, Beds, SG16 6AE 01462 811125
 

Another Sunday but this time there is a hint of freedom in the air. Baby Belly is taking a bottle these days and this allows for periods of absence. Not that we don’t love her of course but as any parent will know, sometimes you just need a little breather, oh and I also don’t mean we throw few bottles in her cot and go out for the day either. She is very much under the supervision of an adult. Yes, Today Baby Belly gets to spend some time with Grandma & Granddad while we GET TO GO TO THE PUB!

Ok, it’s A pub and we’re not there to “booze out” just have a meal with some friends. The Five Bells is located in Henlow, a nice setting between Baldock & Bedford (a little past Hitchin and to the left). We arrive and head inside where some of our friends are waiting, we’re still waiting for a couple more, in total (including children… but not ours HA!) there will be 12 of us. So that’s a [pretty good taking right there for any pub or restaurant.

About 10mins after our official booking time we’re still waiting for the last of our friends to arrive, the (I think manager) comes over and starts getting a little huffy:

“Is everyone here then?”
“Not yet no”
“Well, I’ve got this tabled booked out at 3pm”

What I would have liked to have said was: “Oh, well in that case all 12 of us will just piss off and spend our money somewhere else then”

What was actually said was: “Oh, they’re just pulling up now”

This seemed to appease the sweaty pub beast and he grumbled off to, I presume get shirty with someone else (throughout our visit I saw him a few times waddling at speed around the pub getting grumpy with various members of staff).

So grumpy pub beast aside let’s get down to the eats.

I’m a greedy git so I did have a starter. My friend and I both wanted the haggis starter but they only had one left so he ordered that and I ordered the Japanese prawns which we shared. I’ve never had haggis before and was informed it was a bit like a spicy white pudding which sounded great to me. What we got though was more like deep fried stuffing balls, it tasted fine but it wasn’t at all what I was expecting to come. The Japanese prawns were pretty darn good too and came with a sweet chilli sauce, both came with fresh side salads. Portions were reasonable, not too big nor too small.

For mains most people went for the roast but the special board caught my eye with beef & Guinness pie. I love beef, I love Guinness and let’s be fair who in their right mind doesn’t love a pie? Who? Well, I do at least but what came, to me anyway wasn’t what I would call a pie.

A pie to me is filling wrapped head to toe in pastry, cooked in some kind of pie dish (yes obvious). Now what came can (and is) technically “a pie”, it was filling served in a dish with a pastry lid. To me, that IS NOT a pie, that is stew with a bit of pastry. How can this be possible? You wouldn’t get away with this when it comes to any other type of food. I can’t just spread some jam on a plate, throw a bit of bread on it and call it a sandwich. I can’t serve up a mince beef & tomato dish, pop a tortilla wrap on top and call it a burrito so why should anyone be allowed to call this a pie when clearly IT IS NOT A PIE!

Anyway, beside it not really being a pie it was good. The beef was tender, the sauce was finger licking goo (so sue me KFC) and the pastry LID (not pie casing) was flaky and tasted great.

As far as I am aware there were no complaints about the food, I know some were beaten by the portions but I wouldn’t have said they were too large. These people were obviously not hungry enough in my opinion, they need to sort themselves out and get hungry in future.

If you’re looking for some good food and don’t mind pies not actually being pies then by all means head on down to the Five Bells in Henlow, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. If you want service with a smile then you might want to take a cut out of a smile with you that you can super glue to the sweaty pub beasts face (I would like to add that the serving staff were in fact very good and efficient and the girls at eth bar were friendly and cautious too).

Just in case you were wondering (and I wouldn’t want you to go away disappointed that I didn’t answer that one burning question you’ve had running around in that brain of yours) we did manage to eat and get out before the 3pm booking had even arrived!