My first visit to the Coach and Horses was last autumn. We were on our way to a gig and needed some quick food and a pint. Time being of the essence, our eyes were immediately drawn to the snacks menu on the wall; Scotch egg and devilled kidneys on toast. Perfect.
When the Scotch egg arrived at the table - yolk still runny, delicately seasoned - my wide-eyed enthusiasm was soon tempered by simple arithmetic. Only two halves of the egg, three people. Panic set in, and my eyes darted around the table like Lee Van Cleef's in the climactic scene of a Spaghetti Western.
Fortunately, one of our party turned out to be a vegetarian. Good job too - this was the best Scotch egg I'd ever eaten, and I vowed to return (see ingredients, method and video below).
Months later I was back at the Coach and Horses, this time to talk pub snacks with husband-and-wife team Giles and Colette Webster, who run the pub, and head chef Henry Herbert. Henry recently featured on the BBC's Great British Menu, representing the South West, where he grew up.
The pub itself is an unassuming place. Set in London's bustling Farringdon district, it faces stiff competition from other food and drink outlets in the area.
Its Victorian exterior houses an old-fashioned wooden interior, with sections for drinkers and diners, a few tables out the front, and a small garden at the back.
Giles and Colette took over the Punch lease in 2003, coming from outside the pub trade. Colette admits it was a steep learning curve. They hoped the pub would reflect their love of food and wine. They were quickly rewarded, winning Time Out Gastro Pub of the Year in 2004.
While the dining area of the pub is something they have always prided themselves on, their snack offer at the bar is also hugely important, explains Colette. "You could buy in extra ingredients to make your snack offering that much more enticing, but that would be to miss the point," she says. "It's about using what you have left over from your main dishes to make simple but delicious snacks".
The Coach and Horses has always been a make-it-from-scratch type of place - former head chef Scott Walsh used to insist on making his own ketchup. When it comes to meat, they regularly take delivery of half a pig. With excess crackling they make pork scratchings, and use the trotters for snacks such as pig's trotter spring rolls, and pig's trotters on toast.
Other snacks available include homemade pork pies, herring roe on toast, chips and alioli, and the Coach and Horses' very own charcuterie board.
From simple bread and olives - the Coach and Horses also makes all its own loaves - to duck hearts on toast or lamb pasties, it's all about making the most of what's in your kitchen, and being creative with it.
With prices ranging from as little as £1.20 for a small lamb pasty or a pig's trotter spring roll, to £3.95 for a pint of prawns or a Scotch egg, it's an offer that's hard to turn down: warm food and a pint for under a fiver? Colonel Sanders, eat your heart out!
Return of the snack
While it may not be possible to reinvent the wheel when it comes to bar snacks, many pubs out there are giving it a damn good try. Scotch eggs are back in vogue, big-time. Meanwhile, sweets that might have once seemed more at home in a cosy cafe, such as crumpets with honey, are also making it onto the bar.
Why are pubs upping their game when it comes to bar snacks? "Pubs have to fight for the business even though we are now coming out of the recession. The more you stand out from the crowd the better," says Geronimo Inns director of food Ray Brown. He adds: "It's definitely become an integral part of what we offer."
The pub group has a range of bar snacks priced from around £2.50 to £4.95, including corned beef hash cakes, homemade piccalilli, pork crackling, beer-battered black pudding with apple sauce, mini fish and chips, mini chocolate brownies and more.
Brown says that if the snack offers value for money - quality food, fairly priced - customers won't mind paying for it. For the past six months, to offer its customers 'value' the pub group has been offering free bar snacks between 5pm and 7pm, Monday to Friday. Brown says the offer means, "customers might get another round of drinks in and stay in the pub longer, or they might just get that 'wow' factor that might make them return."
Kevin Berkins, owner of the Fence Gate Inn, in Fence, Lancashire, says his pub has been serving interesting, quality bar snacks for years. "Anyone that hasn't been watching this space has definitely missed out," he says.
However, the trend is in many ways a continuation of the general improvement of pub food . And it's also perhaps a realisation that pubs have a unique selling point in that they can offer really quality top-notch food in a fun and informal atmosphere - all with a pint. As Berkin says: "You can't have a bar snack at a seated table with table linen and napkins but you can have the à la carte food on the bar."
How to make the perfect Scotch egg
Ingredients - makes 12
• 12 duck eggs
• 25g butter
• 100g shallots
• 300g minced pork shoulder
• 300g minced pork belly
• 1/2 tsp powdered mace
• 3 tsp English mustard
• Pinch of cayenne pepper
• Salt and pepper
• 1 sprig of thyme, stripped (optional)
• 8 sage leaves, chopped (optional)
For the coating
• 6 eggs
• 100ml milk
• 100g flour
• 200g fine breadcrumbs
• 100g coarse breadcrumbs
• Pinch of salt
Method
Boil the eggs for six-and-a-half minutes so that the yolks are still a little runny. Run under a cold tap until completely cooled.
Melt the butter in a pan and sweat the shallots until soft. Mix into the cold sausage meat ingredients.
On a piece of clingfilm, pat out a circle of sausage meat large enough to envelope the egg. Put the egg in the middle of the sausage meat, and fold the clingfilm over the egg so it is completely covered.
Remove the clingfilm and hand-mould the meat around the egg so that you have an egg shape, with the same thickness of meat all round. Repeat until all eggs are done and leave them in the fridge to harden for one hour.
For the coating, whisk the eggs, milk and salt. Remove the sausage-coated eggs from the fridge and roll them in a bowl of flour for a light covering. Dip the egg in the egg-wash, and then coat with fine breadcrumbs.
Dip the eggs into the egg-wash again, and coat with coarse breadcrumbs. The eggs may be refrigerated in this condition until ready to cook.
Heat deep-fat fryer to 185 degrees C, and preheat oven to 250 degrees C.
Deep fry the eggs for one minute, remove and drain. Lightly salt, then place on a baking tray and bake for seven minutes.
Cut the eggs in half and serve with salt, fresh pepper and English mustard.