In danger of becoming Little Parwich in Ashbourne, at the Horns, the Jewitts provide familiar friendly faces for those of us visiting the big city. An old Ashbourne pub on Victoria Square (known locally as the Butchery), it is at the bottom of the market place, and has over the years been extended into neighbouring shops.
They have been running it for some months now, with Richard heading up the Restaurant and son Cameron the Bar. Having gone there with Brian F for Sunday lunch, I thought I should add it to our Out and About series. The menu is traditional good cooking, with main meals served in generous helpings. We went for the Carvery, currently Saturday and Sunday lunchtimes, where you get excellent locally sourced roast meat just like mother used to make, or perhaps just like people imagine mother would or should have made. With the open fires and fellow Parwickians to chat to, it was home from home. Today there was a choice of roast beef or pork. Now all I need is an old black and white movie on the telly.
Cameron Jewitt
I am impressed that a father and son team are working so well together (though it is interesting to note that they have an intervening room between Carvery and the Bar). Asking Jo-anne if she had any mediating to do, the answer was “No they both tend to gang up on me”. Perhaps it is just as well that she is developing her own independent business interests.
Richard Jewitt
PARWICH.ORG 
Rob and I have had some fantastic meals at the Horns. The atmosphere and service is great. I would recommend it! For the non-veggies the rib of beef off the carvery is always excellent; even the chips are not just your average chip!
My favourite part of the menu is the cheesed off chiken and obviously the scrummy chocolate cake is extremly scrummy.
Just come back from another excellent Sunday lunch here. I had the roast pork. The quality of the meat as always was excellent, locally sourced and organic.
l have just returned home after enjoying another fantastic meal in the Horns ,
l started with a revisit to the old favorite king prawn platter a remake of prawn cocktail-served in a giant shell with a brandy paprika sauce,my wife had home made pate made by Jo-anne whoops! it was the best pate l have ever tasted.
To follow l had the Highland steak , sirlion topped with haggis and then a red @ black peppercorn sauce , cooked med rare it was perfect then topped with deep fried leeks..my wife enjoyed a whole sea bass, baked with lemon butter.
the veg was fresh and unusual in that l have never had toffee parsnips before along with fresh broccolli and carrots.
The chip’s were amazing home made , huge and cooked in beef dripping. We had no room for pud , but the very attentive waitress persuaded us to take a portion of sticky toffee home made cake which we devoured later on our return home.
We had a lovely bottle of Fleurie and a glass of ice cold chablis each with our starter,we took the rest of the bottle home to enjoy with our cake…
Highly reccomended,
Gordon ?
Here Here Gordon !!
l’ve just had a great meal at the Horns as well…l had the garlic butter king prawn’s followed by 16oz T.bone the meat is sourced locally from Tissington ,all organic and free range , that will please Jaimie !!!
Funny you should say that Raymond …l was in the Horns last week and commented on the cheesed off chicken…chicken breast ,stuffed with cheese wrapped in smoked bacon ”topped with BBQ sauce and cheese then baked ,,free range and organic ..fantastic..that should please Delia…
Amazing that we all eat in the Horns, not that l would speak to any of you if l saw you but we all enjoy good home cooking ….l had the crab claws followed by fishermans pie…huge chunks of cod , salmon and king prawns in a cheese and parsely sauce , topped with piped fresh mash and shrimp..with a lovely fresh salad.
All very healthy…that should please…..AWT
No only is it fabulous at how many well known personalities are eating at The Horns, but how wonderful that so many famous people are reading & contributing to our blog.
Jane, yes it’s great we have all these truly famous people (Emma S, Shannon J and Peter T) checking out PARWICH.ORG, but who are all the others?
Wow!
Visited the horns this sunday, never had a carvery like it!
Fantastic service from a lady called Theresa, food was out of this world!! Locally sourced from Tissington, top quality, fresh vegetables, excellent yorkshire puds (made by Jo-anne) relaxing surroundings, can’t find fault with this establishment!! Thanks Theresa for a most pleasurable experience, we will be visiting you soon and looking forward to the Tiramisu as promised, love homemade puds!!
Just had a super late carvery lunch at The Horns and thoroughly enjoyed it, delicious local meat and plenty of it. It is great that on a Sunday you can eat anytime between 12pm and 4pm; so I haven’t had to think about lunch or dinner having eaten at 3.30.
Had a lovely sunday carvery today, we eat out a lot & have been to many places, can honestly say that nowhere can match the quality of the food served at the Horns, well done to all involved.
we stumbled accross the horns on our first visit to Ashbourne. I was initially against going in as I do not usually enjoy carverys’, however we found the food to be excellent, locally sourced organic beef is fantastic, so good in fact we got the butchers address and bought a load to take back home.
We have visited Parwich a couple of times now and I must admit we always go to the horns on sunday, in fact we go there for about 3-4 meals during a 1 week stay. Richard (the chef) knows how to cook not bad for a hetton lad !!! We are due in the summer again and no doubt will be poppping in several times working our way through the menu.
Cant wait for the summer
cheers
Again we visited the horns several times on our visit to parwich, and as ever the food was fantastic. Our son james loved the beef cob, so much in fact he managed to eat two in one go, not even i could do that.
We also visited the George too where I thought I had tasted the best steak pie, however, I have to say freda’s home made pie recipie at the horns topped it, absolutely fabulous.
Janet stook to her guns and ordered the roast dinner which has to be her favourite all time meal.
No doubt will be calling back early next year and hoefully the Horns will be just the same.
A big thankyou to Richard, Joanne and Cameron and Shannon, we hope to see you soon
Steve
Address & phone number supplied
1st August 2009
The Horns: A Legend In Its Own Lunchtime
Dear Richard & Cameron
I’m not in the habit of writing complimentary letters to businesses (its usually the opposite, to be honest) – however I could not let our visit to your establishment yesterday go without comment after being extremely impressed by the standards of cuisine, service and décor.
I wont waffle on – because you’ll only blush in embarrassing fashion, but basically my wife and I came on out on a motorbike run and used Ashbourne as a stop off point. So we only intended to have the usual ‘bog standard’ pub baguette and chips.
We decided on The Horns because it seemed well appointed, the menu seemed varied but not confusing, and the prices were competitive in comparison to the nearby hostelries. So, two carvery cobs and home made wedges were ordered with two plain coffees.
Firstly, the staff attitude and efficiency throughout was impeccable. Polite, smart and keen to help at all times. The coffees were served in synchronisation with the meals, cutlery and comestibles all accompanying – nothing was too much trouble for anyone . All this for two mid day snacks on a budget?. There had to be a catch!.
But it got better. The carvery cobs were the best we’d tasted in years and the chips were more like a meal in themselves – each being about half a potato’s worth – we’d never seen or eaten anything like it before. Delicious .I commented to the other half that this was more like a high end evening restaurant meal standard than what was initially intended to be just a quick bit to eat.
I could go on about the overall cleanliness of the place, the understated (yet thoughtfully appointed) natural wood furnished decoration and the overall sense of natural welcoming geniality we received that day. A very well balanced combination.
Ok. I may seem to be singing your praises to the rafters here– but its all deserved, Yet despite what folks might think, I am NOT on your payroll or have ever visited your premises in the past – but as far as I am concerned, any individual or company that goes out of their way to be a bit ‘above the average’, without extra cost to the clientele (in other words, are doing it for want as well as need) – then praise should be due where deserved – and you lot certainly qualify for that.
To summarise: You’ve found the winning formula the majority of British pubs sadly, have not yet managed to do. So. You can either sell on the secret, keep it to yourselves or write a book on the subject. Just DON’T change anything!. Well done to all concerned and thanks once again!.
Yours Impressedly,