The story
Since opening in 2013, The Cornish Arms has become a fixture in Tavistock, a historic Stannary town on the edge of Dartmoor National Park. John and Emma Hooker, the owners, set out to create a relaxed pub where the focus is on great food and genuine hospitality. You can still feel that intention today: the atmosphere is warm, the service is professional, and the cooking is straightforward but deeply flavourful.
The kitchen is led by executive chef Seb Finch, who started as a demi chef de partie in 2016 and worked his way up. The team’s commitment to sourcing the best seasonal ingredients from local suppliers shows in every dish. The menu changes with the seasons – recent offerings have included grilled fillet of sea bream with a vinaigrette of brown shrimp, chips, and seaweed béarnaise, and poached and roasted lamb belly with devilled kidneys, lamb fat onion, spiced aubergine, and lamb gravy. There’s also a dedicated Sunday lunch menu, a children’s menu, and a separate vegan menu, all of which reflect the pub’s ethos of serving good honest food with little fuss.
The Cornish Arms has held a Michelin Bib Gourmand every year since 2014, an award that recognises good quality, good value cooking. It has also been a fixture in the Top 50 Gastropubs list for over a decade, with John Hooker winning the Top 50 Chef of the Year award. The bar and restaurant are complemented by a covered beer garden, and dogs are welcome in the bar area. The pub also offers seven individually styled bedrooms, each with ensuite rain showers, super king beds, and luxury toiletries – perfect for exploring Dartmoor and the South Devon coast.
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good quality, good value cooking
Let's all get over the fact that it isn't geographically Cornish, but resident on a town-centre street in the west of Devon. This is a lively venue that manages an impressive balancing act between pub and restaurant, the more so since the extensive refurbishment it underwent back in 2022. While the menu format rests on broad choice, as before, there is a distinctly more adventurous air to the nibbles, which now embrace buttermilk king prawns with smoked paprika mayonnaise or teriyaki chicken wings. The main menu continues to offer a broad range of options, with a mixture of traditional pub fare and modern classics. Expect ham hock Scotch egg with blue cheese and beer-pickled onions to open the show, ahead of roast cod with brown shrimp vinaigrette in béarnaise or a distinctly elegant butter-roasted breast of guinea fowl, served with Jerusalem artichokes, pearl barley and hazelnuts in sherry gravy. Fifteen minutes seems a small investment of time to be rewarded with a mango soufflé, served with the full regalia of pineapple compôte, coconut sorbet and clotted cream or you could get instant satisfaction from a Yorkshire strawberry trifle in season. Fans also dote over the traditional Sunday lunch, which offers the likes of roast sirloin with sublime brisket to best end of Saddleback pork alongside maple-glazed pork belly. A user-friendly wine list is arranged by style, and the glasses come in all three sizes.
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