The story
On the high street of the Buckinghamshire village of North Marston, The Pilgrim is an owner-operated pub that has become a fixture for locals and visitors alike. The setting is straightforward: heavy timbers, log fires in winter, and a spacious beer garden for warmer months. The atmosphere is unpretentious, built around genuine hospitality rather than fuss.
The Pilgrim’s kitchen focuses on contemporary, seasonal dishes designed for sharing. They serve no fixed starter-main format; instead, the menu offers snacks and specials in a casual style, best enjoyed with friends and family. The menu changes with the seasons—a Winter Menu (October–April) and a Summer Menu (May–September)—and on Sundays, a traditional three-course roast takes centre stage. Ingredients are sourced locally and sustainably, with many vegetables coming from the pub’s own veggie patch. Free-range rare breed meat and sustainably caught fish are standard, and every dish is prepared fresh on site.
The Pilgrim’s approach has earned repeated selection in the MICHELIN Guide Great Britain & Ireland, as well as listings in The Good Food Guide and a place in The Good Food Guide’s Top 100 Best Pubs in Britain 2025 (ranked 75th). Closer to home, it won Aylesbury Vale District Council’s Best Community Pub Award. This is modern cuisine rooted in its place—a village pub that does things properly, without pretension.
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Independently owned and independently run by chef Brett Newman and his wife Nadia, this cheery, ‘incredibly welcoming’ hostelry ticks all the boxes as a genuine community-minded village local. It hosts quizzes and open-mic nights, stages summer BBQs in its expansive garden, raises money for the local primary school and is cherished by the residents of North Marston and beyond. Food-wise, the owners buy what’s local and seasonal for a repertoire that runs from tapas plates to Sunday roasts, all big on flavour and generosity. Menu formats vary with the seasons, but sharing is normally the name of the game, whether you’re into mac ‘n’ cheese, devilled mushrooms or hispi cabbage with smoked almonds, crème fraîche and Berkswell cheese. Bigger plates could bring sriracha-glazed chicken thighs studded with sesame seeds or line-caught pollack with creamed corn and chipotle chilli. Rare-breed steaks and burgers satisfy too, while desserts might usher in calorific old dependables such as treacle tart, lemon posset or chocolate truffle cake with clotted cream and praline. Locals drinking real ales in the bar can also eat from a reduced menu of similar items, right down to bowls of chips and ketchup. Proper draught cider and a refreshingly priced, varied wine list complete a thoroughly likeable local package.
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