About Us

A little background history on your hosts

Prior to opening the Old Vicarage Tim & Helen enjoyed 16 very successful years at the George & Dragon, Rowde, Wiltshire. Having started in 1989 at the very beginning of the modern gastro-pub movement, they created an award-winning, internationally renowned venue.

Awards from the George & Dragon days:

• 6 in the Good Food Guide
• The Good Food Guide Wiltshire Restaurant of the Year 1992 and Seafood in 2000
• The AA Best Seafood Pub 1998 with 2 Rosettes
• Twice winner of the Financial Times Lunch for a Fiver 1998 and 1999
• Michelin Bib Gourmand

Tim & Helen have impeccable pedigrees; both worked with Joyce Molyneux, whose Carved Angel at Dartmouth was one of the country's best restaurants in the 1970's and 80's (they met there). Prior to that Tim was at the famous Hole In The Wall Bath, where proprietors Tim & Sue Cummings gave him the opportunity to appreciate and cook real food. It was George Perry-Smith who opened this iconic restaurant in 1952 and for whom the Cummings worked.

So it's no surprise to find the Withers' kitchen shelves, adorned with the works of food writers Elizabeth David, Jane Grigson and more recently Simon Hopkinson, who once wrote of Tim's cheese soufflé; "possibly the finest example of this twice-baked affair outside the kitchens of Le Gavroche". 

All this translates to the fact you are unlikely to find over-elaborate, mucked about food in the restaurant. What you will find are dishes prepared without fuss, and honesty, using the best of local ingredients.