The Carpenters Arms

Rambling roses and ‘an amazing display of hanging baskets and planters’ adorn ‘the Carps’, a friendly local pub-with-rooms in a hamlet 25 minutes from Bath. Part of the small Buccaneer Holdings pub group, it has been run with considerable polish since 1999 by manager Simon Pledge. Created from a row of miners’ cottages, it has picnic tables at the front and a terrace at the side. Bedrooms are contemporary in style, with a comfy chair or two, and an eclectic selection of artworks. Like the rest of the place, they sit comfortably between the no-frills and too-frilly sector of the market, say readers. A change in the kitchen has seen the return of Chris Dando, head chef here from 2003 to 2017. The menu, served in bar, dining rooms and garden, is a mix of pub classics and more inventive dishes, with day-boat fresh fish from Brixham, local beef, lamb, game in season. They do Sunday roasts, of course, which guests report come with copious amounts of vegetables and potatoes. Or you can just swing by for a pint of Butcombe and oodles of atmosphere in the stone-walled, beamed bar, by the fire or 
the log-burner.