There is no more exciting or romantic way to enjoy lunch or dinner than on a train. Planes, yachts, cruise ships – whatever. There’s something timelessly stylish about getting on board a locomotive, and then having the full, silver service, three course dining experience while travelling across the country at high speed.
But these days, you’re lucky if you can find this opportunity in anything other than the high-end private trains, the British Pullman and the like, which offer you such an opportunity for a sky-high price and on a round trip, during which you don’t even leave the train.
Thank heavens, then, for the Great Western Railway, which still clings to the glamorous idea that train travel and fine dining are not mutually exclusive. They run a limited number of services which originate at London Paddington and head across the country in the so-called “Pullman Dining” car to Plymouth or Swansea.
It used to be that you might expect a whole plethora of options for breakfast, lunch and dinner, but there is now one three-course menu, with a comprehensive (and extremely reasonably priced) wine list on offer. The dining carriage itself is based in the first class coaches, which are magically transformed into a restaurant on wheels for the couple of hours that you’re on board, and when you set off, the whole shebang gets under way in style.
You wouldn’t expect Michelin-starred food here, but it’s very good value at £37 for two courses and £44 for three; steak being a £15 supplement, but if you’re a fully paid-up carnivore, it might be worth the extra. There’s a slight oddity when we board the train at Paddington – you might expect to be ushered into the dining carriage straight away, but it’s not ready, so we spend an awkward few moments sitting at a white-tableclothed but otherwise ordinary part of first class amidst our fellow travellers, who are not privy to the delights we are about to enjoy. Then it’s all aboard, and we’re into the dining car for what proves to be a terribly fun couple of hours.
It’s a meal that ends up being surprisingly generous on the booze front; we kick off with a couple of cans of Bombay Sapphire gin and tonic, and then the wine selection is available by the half bottle – we opt for a very decent white Côtes du Rhône – and the bottle; a particularly good option for the latter is an excellent Billy Bosch Shiraz from South African. (We are informed in confidence that one of the regular diners is nicknamed ‘Billy Bosch’ because it’s his preferred order.) The food menu is necessarily limited but served with charm and pizzazz by the staff; ham hock terrine to start is very good, as is asparagus and pea tart, and mains of glazed confit of pork belly are delicious, only slightly let down by a very peculiar samphire that’s served with them, and not listed on the menu.
But to be honest, the food is not the USP here; it’s about the standard of a good gastropub, and at that sort of price, too. Instead, what you’re paying for – and if you’re travelling with a standard class ticket, you’re also getting a de facto upgrade if there’s space – is the glorious experience of racing through the English countryside, eating and drinking and chatting away at high speed.
By the time that we finished the final course of English cheese and port, and were ready to disembark at Exeter before a double-quick journey back (alas, no dining car this end), there was no doubt in our minds that the British Pullman experience is an exemplary one. Train fayre? First class!
For more information about GWR’s Pullman Dining Restaurant, including details of routes and timetable, please visit www.gwr.com.
