The Swan Inn

With its fetching location near a little stone bridge over the river Ray, this 17th-century former pub is no ugly duckling. A major 2022 refit by an Islip-based owner has given it a modern open kitchen overlooking Majli's Lounge (a casual bar area also used for dining) and the Cygnet restaurant – a barn-like space decorated with paintings (for sale), fairy lights over the beams, and diverting model animal heads (a frog, a hippo, a giraffe) displayed like trophies on the wall. At the back is a modest garden. Peter Wilton took over the kitchen from Paul Welburn in Feb 2025, having previously deputised for his predecessor both here and at the Oxford Kitchen. His menu of snacks, small and large plates is geared to more informal dining, with dishes arriving as-and-when (sometimes inconveniently paced). Snacks of crunchy strips of pork skin paired with black garlic mayonnaise (more pungency please!) could be followed by seasonally attuned ideas such as fresh asparagus with slow-cooked duck egg and (unadvertised) crispy bacon morsels – although an extra dollop of thick wild-garlic pesto was perhaps an ingredient too far. Highlights of our visit included a ‘large plate’ of precisely cooked halibut steak ably supported by mussels, crunchy cubes of apple and a slice of seared fennel in a highly savoury sauce, while dessert yielded an inventive confection involving creamy vanilla cheesecake, a tangy apple purée and a scattering of crunchy ‘crumble’, plus a refreshing apple sorbet to complete an impressive ensemble. Efficient, friendly service and an enticingly varied drinks list add to the local appeal, though prices make this a special-occasion venue, rather than somewhere simply to swan-in.