The King's Arms, Great Stainton, Stockton

Just a few minutes northeast of Darlington, en route to Sedgefield, Great Stainton’s King’s Arms welcomed new licensees just over a year ago.

Richard and Jessica Hindson have had a busy 12 months.

The pub was full on our Saturday evening visit.

Attractive offers and local marketing seem to be doing the trick – we were surreptitiously passed some newspaper coupons by diners on a neighbouring table when I asked what they’d enjoyed: two 8oz rib eye steak dinners for £16.

Chef Richard, from Aycliffe Village, trained at Amsterdam’s Grand Hotel and has worked for the renowned Terry Laybourne.

Jessica, from Newcastle, has spent her career in the pub trade. The King’s Arms, a former Enterprise Inn, is the young couple’s first pub together. The pub’s new owner is planning further investment inside and out, including a larger kitchen.

Our foray across the border was prompted by a rendezvous with a former colleague who hails from further north – it was an appropriate halfway point.

The chef’s love of real ale is evident with three hand-pulled guest beers, including the newly added All the King’s Horses – its own first birthday celebratory brew made by the Yard of Ale Brewing Company at Ferryhill.

Those horses had yet to arrive when we called, so we equipped ourselves with a pint of Steam Beer from Coxhoe’s excellent Sonnet 43 brewery and installed ourselves in the pub’s comfortable surroundings.

It’s clean, tidy and pretty traditional.

Although we weren’t in the mood for steak, even a rib eye at £8 a piece, there was still a good range of posh pub favourites to choose from, with the odd surprise thrown in too: seven starters and eight mains, plus steaks and sizzlers (spice marinated beef, chicken, king prawns – or a vegetarian option – served on a noisy metal plate).

A sucker for scallops, Anna went for king scallop thermidor (£6.95). Not sure how much it owed to the better-known lobster dish (did you know it was named after the uprising that brought an end to Robespierre’s Reign of Terror in the French Revolution?) it seemed to me the familiar cheesy white wine concoction in a scallop shell variety. Nevertheless, she thought it a winning combination that was surprisingly light.

Claire was similarly happy with her spiced crab, prawn and spring onion cakes (£5.95). Served, like the scallops, on a slate with watercress.

Thom and I both shared the same complaint about our dishes: for him a slice of pressed ham hock with spiced chutney and water cress, for me a poached fillet of sea trout with pickled cucumber, tapenade and olive oil (both £5.95). They were simply too chilled.

Pretty enough dishes, if a little meagre, but served too soon from too cold a fridge.

The result was flavour strangled by being served at morgue temperature – in the same way good cheese or proper strawberries suffer from being dragged from fridge to table.

We boys faired much better when it came to main courses, with slow-braised shin of beef for me (£13.95) and roast rump of lamb for Thom (£15.95).

Served on a bed of mash with buttered spinach and a rich red wine sauce, his was suitably tender. Mine, basically beef bourguignon, was similarly afloat on a bed of mashed potato with a moat of gravy. Extra potatoes in the stew were rather superfluous, even for someone who loves spuds.

Claire’s chicken sizzler (£13.95) did its turn as the show-off dish shouting ‘Look at me!’ as it arrived, threatening third-degree burns for the incautious.

Anna’s option was far less threatening: a nicely cooked pan-fried fillet of sea bass with spinach, mash and lemon butter (£14.95). No complaints from the fairer end of the table.

Other options we might have gone for included beer-battered fish and chips (£11.95), beef, mushroom and ale pie (£10.95) and blue cheese and walnut ravioli (£9.95). Optional sides of chips, vegetables, new potatoes or house salad (all £2.50) were not called on this time and we didn’t go hungry.

What’s more, we had room for puddings all round.

Crème brûlée with shortbread, sticky-toffee pudding with toffee sauce and ice cream, lemon and lime cheesecake and vanilla panna cotta with forest fruits (all £4.50).

Again, that flavour killer chiller had struck again – Anna thought her brûlée “tasted a little of fridge”

while the surface of my panna cotta was oddly skinned, like a school dinner blancmange, suggesting it too might not have been terribly fresh.

All told, the food notched up just over £25 a head for three courses. Two rounds of drinks took the bill for four to £127.05.

Some of the pub’s special Monday-Thursday deals (check the website) might help it over the value hurdle, while Sunday lunches are no doubt a good draw at £14.95 for two courses.

If they can just warm up the fridge a bit I’d even be happy to venture out of my God’s Own County comfort zone again.

Ratings:

Food Quality: 6/10

Service: 7/10

Surroundings: 6/10

Value: 6/10