The Mash Inn

Nick Mash wants guests to step back in time and reconnect with nature at his restaurant-with-rooms on a leafy back road in a scattered Chilterns village. Duck into the low-lit, atmospheric beamed bar of the former 18th-century Three Horseshoes, and you leave the high-tech modern world behind. Everything is authentic, from a wood-fired range forged by local ironmongers in the open kitchen of the dining extension, to bespoke oak furniture. There are four bedrooms above the restaurant, with contemporary comforts such as a king-size bed, organic L:A Bruket toiletries, a hip bath or monsoon shower. Two larger annexe rooms have French doors on to a private terrace, a monsoon shower. Former sous-chef Tomas Topolar is now head chef. His days are spent foraging, pickling, fermenting, curing, harvesting produce from the kitchen garden, while the no-choice menu is devised around the finest ingredients on the night. Typically, it might include wild garlic vichyssoise, lobster, flame-grilled Aberdeen Angus rib of beef with confit duck fat chips. Breakfast in the restaurant includes home-baked pastries, house yogurt, home-made jams.