Royal Standard of England

GRANDMOTHERS feature big in the kitchen at the Royal Standard of England. New owner Matthew O'Keeffe says: "Our grandmothers knew how to cook good simple ingredients and create wonderful dishes. It's all about the taste of the food, rather than fussing about presentation."

It depends, of course, on your grandmother. My only culinary memory of my long-gone gran was being given a cup of Ovaltine powder and sugar, into which I dipped and licked my finger, like a poor kid's sherbet dip.

Matthew's grandma was clearly of a different ilk. He wants the punters at his famously ancient inn at Forty Green near Beaconsfield to enjoy genuine, simple cooking with ingredients from the best possible sources. His lamb (superb) comes from a Welsh farmer who supplies Jamie Oliver and delivers it herself, and he reckons his beef is the best in England.

Grandma's cooking also means using the cuts that others discard, such as brisket and offal, and creating wonderfully tasty dishes.

"Most of us have enjoyed auberges in France, where good simple food is cooked well, and that's what we're aiming for here."

In fact, if his French chef David Perron starts getting pretentious with presentation, Matthew's cry is: "Remember grandmother."

Almost everything is made from scratch in the kitchen, he says, so his menu is rather amazing value. Most starters are £4.95, though you can have half a dozen beautifully fresh Rossmore oysters for £7. We were impressed with the country terrine, a really chunky, French-style pate.

Main courses include Welsh lamb chops, handmade sausages with mash, and slow roasted pork. But we'd been told the cod and chips are hugely popular. They went down a treat when Johnny Depp and Tim Burton came in recently, fresh from filming Willy Wonka. My piece of cod was huge (Matthew doesn't mind if you share a portion at lunchtime) and flakingly fresh, the beer batter light and crisp. My partner set to work on Welsh lamb's liver and bacon with mash and gravy, which his grannie certainly used to cook up, and he declared it just as good as he remembered.

Few people have room for the home-made puds (crumbles, spotted dick, chocolate marquise all £3.95). But we shared a slice of treacle tart with a hint of ginger, in a pool of custard, as traditional as it comes.

Matthew has both cooked at and run some historic London pubs in the past, commuting from his home at Burnham. But buying The Royal Standard of England was a dream come true. "We looked around for five years before buying it. I used to come here 20 years ago with my girlfriend Anna, who is now my wife. It's very special I still go round the place saying Bloody hell'.

"It's an honest pub that hasn't been spoilt. I've worked for people who have gutted pubs like this and turned them into style bars. Not here."

Drinkers are as welcome as diners, with draught beers, ales and cider on tap as well as a diverse choice of bottled beers. Wine lovers won't be disappointed, with some elegant bottles alongside the everyday ones. Matthew persuaded us to try a half-glass each of three Riojas white, ros and red which was fun.

Whether or not this is the oldest free house in England as it claims, it's certainly a wonderfully evocative inn with a 950-year history. The menu has a potted history on the back, so people can sip their local Rebellion beer or Trappist Abbey ale while contemplating the Saxons who used the local well for brewing, the Norman kings' hunters who used the simple alehouse, the roundheads and cavaliers who drank here in turn. A dozen cavaliers had their heads raised up on pikes outside the door, including a 12-year-old drummer boy.

Above the drinkers' heads is the priest's hole, where the young Prince Charles I hid on his escape bid to France in 1651. Charles II rewarded the pub by agreeing to a name change from The Ship to The Royal Standard of England, the only pub in the country with the full title. Or was it because the landlord let the king meet his mistresses in the upstairs rooms? Highwaymen such as Dick Turpin and Claude Du Vall lodged here as a base for robberies in Cut-throat Wood at nearby Holtspur, and today's guests are invited to add their story to the pub's Ghost Book.