'Buy local means pay more' claim pub landlords in Ryedale (From Gazette & Herald)

'Buy local means pay more' claim pub landlords in Ryedale

USING local produce has helped to push up pub food prices, Ryedale landlords say.

Research by the Good Pub Guide 2004 found that the retail price index, excluding housing, rose 2.67pc from May 2001 to May this year but pub food prices had risen 13pc over the same period.

It also found that new "gastropubs" charged "astronomical" prices for their grub.

But some of Ryedale's traditional dining pubs said their menu prices were determined by the high quality local produce their dishes were made from.

Andy Cole, owner of The Wombwell Arms, at Wass, which won the Licensee of the Year award in the Good Pub Guide 2003 and has won awards for its steak pies, said: "We pride ourselves on using good quality local produce. Consequently, the demand for that from our customers is such that we would not want to take a step backwards. Unfortunately, prices for that local produce are significantly higher."

Gary Benson, licensee of The Malt Shovel, Hovingham, said: "Pricing food is a difficult one. We use all local produce, our vegetables are all grown just outside Hovingham, the meat comes from butchers in Easingwold and Helmsley and we make all our dishes from scratch, so we could probably charge a bit more than we do."

Andrew Pern, head chef and owner of The Star Inn, Harome, which has won Pub of the Year 2004, said: "I'd say that you get what you pay for at our pub and restaurant.

"The standard of our food and the standard of the chefs that cook it all costs money. I know of prices in towns and cities which are the same price or more than ours but the food doesn't reach the same standards."

Good Pub Guide 2004 editor Alisdair Aird said: "It is much more difficult to find good value for money in pubs now than it was two or three years ago.

"Very often a new outfit comes along, takes over a pub and opens it again as a 'gastropub' with a fancy menu with fancy prices but with food which is not necessarily that good. Some of the best food we have found is very simple and standard looking, but is made using really fresh ingredients."

Updated: 09:53 Wednesday, October 29, 2003