Llys Meddyg

There’s ‘an affable air’ to Edward and Louise Sykes’s ‘smart’ restaurant-with-rooms, in an ‘appealing’ Georgian coaching inn in this ‘attractive’ village. ‘It is the best of its kind – small, family run, equally professional and personable. There’s a strong ethos here – you sense that hospitality comes naturally to the Sykeses and their modest team. And the cooking is exceptional,’ say Guide inspectors in 2016. There are three dining areas, each ‘with its own spirit’: the ‘lively, popular’ cellar bar; the ‘charming’ summertime-only kitchen garden; the modern-rustic dining room, ‘all raw wood and Welsh art’. ‘Everything was pretty without being precious. And what punchy flavours! Razor clams freshly foraged came as an amuse-bouche with black pudding; smoked duck breast in a spiced consommé was deep and subtle.’ Head upstairs, afterwards, to ‘chic’, ‘cosy’ bedrooms ‘comfortable as home’ (some may have noise from the bar). In the morning, glasses of ‘frothy, freshly squeezed orange juice’ are brought to linen-clad tables; dig into ‘fine’ breakfast crêpes, ‘blueberry jam made by Ed’s brother’, ‘delicious’ home-smoked salmon. (Agathe and Louis Homberg, and others)