It's been a while since Rob and I had been out for dinner 'properly' - sometimes if we can't be bothered to cook, we'll pop to the local pub for something cheap and cheerful, but this was a fancy earrings occasion. It was a gloriously beautiful day - Summer making its first appearance - so we hopped in the A40 and took a drive to the Cock Inn, Mugginton.

We'd been before, around a year ago, where we enjoyed steaks in the sunshine on their garden terrace.  It just has a really great, warm-weather feel about the place. So, earrings in, off we went.

The views from the car park and beautiful. It almost makes you want to lay down a picnic blanket and ask for it to be served from there, but we instead opted for a window seat inside, where we could still admire the view.

When I go out for dinner, I am terrified of getting food envy, and thankfully Rob's the same so we always order whatever we both fancy and swap half way through. For our starters, we had pan-fried squid, on a bed of lettuce with olives, tomatoes, feta and honey dressing, and also the chorizo Scotch egg with spicy tomato sauce and Manchego cheese.


The squid was a little lacklustre for me but then every time I order squid I remember that I'm not that bothered by it. The olives and feta made it for it though. And my-oh-my, the Scotch egg was incredibly delicious.

When it came to choosing our mains, we were a little stumped. The starters and sharers are definitely the highlight of the menu, and I kind of wish we'd have just ordered a few plates from the starters section, however we eventually decided on the lamb pitta which was served with tzatziki and had warm feta within the actual patty (!!!) with a side of chunky chips. Plus, the sweet chilli chicken skewer, which came with satay sauce (I thought that was kind of odd... sweet chilli and satay are great flavours, but together? Weird.) The chicken was nicely cooked and had a nice subtle chargrill taste,  and it was nice with skinny fries.


All washed down nicely with a white wine spritzer for me, and a 3 Weiss Monkeys white IPA for Rob. We both decided that the dinner was nice - but I think we made the wrong choices with our mains. We absolutely should have ordered a bunch of starters, or one of the sharing platters, but we'll know that for next time - and there will definitely be a next time, after all, the views are stunning and it's such a great summer pub setting.

I definitely recommend popping in for a drink, sitting on their terrace, and enjoying a few nibbles if you're in the area. You can even get your jazzy earrings out for the occasion...