The Travel Critic

There are three things in this country rarer than a competent rail replacement bus:

A week of sunshine. A pub with a view worth more than a glance. A pub lunch that doesn’t taste like it was scraped off the floor of a 2008 wedding buffet in Milton Keynes.

Today, by some celestial clerical error, I got all three.

The Windmill in Portishead is the sort of place you expect to love for what it could be, not what it is. A hulking pub perched above the estuary with a deck designed for sunset selfies and that slightly sad gastropub menu that always promises “seasonal veg” but somehow delivers whatever was dying in the back of the Booker fridge. Or so I thought.

I remember coming here before – lovely place, friendly staff, a rather tasty Barnsley Chop if memory serves. It was solidly “nice”, like a Volvo estate or a Toby Jones performance. But today? Today, the Windmill stood up, put on its big-chef whites and declared, “Actually, mate, we can cook.”

I had the set lunch. Yes, a set lunch. At a pub. In Portishead. With sun. And food that didn’t make me want to cry into my napkin about the decline of Western civilisation.

To start, a smoked haddock croquette – golden, crisp, oozing with oceanic depth – dancing about with little pistachio bits and a pesto dressing that, I swear to God, tasted freshly made. The sort of dish that makes you stop mid-bite and think, “Wait, where the hell am I?”

Then, a chicken schnitzel. You know, that battered caff classic beloved by overcooked school dinners and Viennese pensioners. Except this one was moist, properly seasoned, and topped with a salad – a salad! – that sang. Like, really sang. Each leaf perky, each radish crunchy, the dressing zippy enough to slap me round the face and tell me to stop being such a London snob.

And all the while, the sun beamed down, the view sparkled, and I sat there in a daze, wondering if I’d accidentally died and gone to some sort of middle-class heaven where even the ice cubes are artisanal and the mayo doesn’t come from a tub.

I didn’t want dessert. I didn’t need it. I just needed to sit and let the revelation wash over me: someone in Portishead can really, actually cook. And they work at The Windmill.

This isn’t just a pub anymore. It’s a dream sequence with table service.

Go now. Go before the rain returns and we’re back to microwaved pies and packets of Scampi Fries.

Score: A rare, unseasonably sunny 9/10.