Restaurants in Lincolnshire: The Petwood Hotel

With its Edwardian elegance, The Petwood Hotel’s fascinating wartime heritage and beautifully restored gardens offer a dining experience that more than matches its setting, making it a perennial favourite for summer visits in Woodhall Spa

Returning to The Petwood Hotel is like visiting an old friend. The reassuringly familiar Edwardian hotel is set in about 30 acres of parkland. And together with its aviation connections, its restored Harold Peto-era gardens are a real draw in the summer months. The leafy setting is very much Woodhall Spa, and the building is as handsome as the grounds.

It’s little wonder that the place is so busy in summer, with a large terrace providing a sunny position from which to enjoy lunchtime dining or afternoon tea. Happily, the standard of dining on offer equals the look and feel of the place.

Woodhall Spa was little more than farmland surrounding a much smaller village back in 1811, when John Parkinson began excavation work, intending to create a coal mine. He was soon scuppered by underground springs and gave up his endeavours as a bad job.

Fortunately Lord of the Manor, Thomas Hotchkin, was more adaptable. He realised that he could turn the village into a town with spa baths, where visitors could enjoy bathing in the mineral-rich waters.

A railway to the village was opened in 1855, and accommodation was established for visitors, one of whom was Baroness Grace van Eckhardstein, who was reeling from a recent divorce and seeking a country retreat. Woodhall Spa was just the job and, when her father bequeathed her a sum of money, she planned to build a property adjacent to her favourite, or ‘pet’ wood.

The first property was a bit too modest for her tastes and so architect Frank Peck, an associate of Lincolnshire’s Sam Scorer, was commissioned to scale things up a little. 

The Tudor-Jacobean Petwood was the result. Grace lived there and married her second husband, Sir Archibald Weigall, remaining in the house and entertaining a range of politicians, music hall stars and sportsmen until they permanently relocated to their other country pile, Englemere, near Ascot.

In the interim, Petwood was used as a hospital for First World War soldiers convalescing after their traumatic experiences on the battlefield. Though briefly returned to use as a country house at the end of the war, it became a hotel in 1933.

The next, and most significant, stage in the hotel’s history was as the home of 617 Squadron, the place to which just 80 of the 133 aircrew participating in the Dambusters’ raids would return after their mission to compromise industrial Germany’s Ruhr Valley.

The hotel’s Squadron Bar remains home to a range of 617 memorabilia and, appropriately, the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight can often be seen overhead when flying northwards from RAF Coningsby.

Current owners, the Brearley family, have been custodians since 1996 and have successfully negotiated the balance between preserving the style and character of The Petwood whilst ensuring guests are offered all of the modern comforts and a first-class experience.

The Petwood is, of course, open to non-residents as well as hotel guests. The terrace itself and the Terrace Bar provide great views of the gardens, and the drawing room features timber panelling, stone mullion windows and a stone fireplace that befits a former country house with a Grade II-listing.

The dining room itself is available to lunchtime and evening diners seven days a week and enjoys a dedicated menu with pre-starters, seven starters, six main courses, a couple of grill options and five desserts, plus a cheese board option. The Terrace Bar menu provides a choice of sandwiches and salads, grill options, small plates and Petwood Classics.

Head Chef Dan Thurling leads a team of 11 chefs; a sizeable brigade, but necessarily so as The Petwood does a roaring trade in afternoon teas, with cakes and patisserie all made in-house. 

The hotel has always been popular as a wedding venue too, with around 50 such events each year, plus black-tie functions and RAF dinners. So, as well as being responsible for the consistently high quality of the hotel’s dining, underwritten by the hotel’s AA rosette, the team are also adept at preparing dishes for large functions. 

Dishes are all fresh, well prepared and presented cleanly, with plenty of choice and plenty of technical talent invested. The chefs are keen to make the most of local ingredients where quality and consistency allow, with local butchers Mel Ward and Graham Fidling providing meat, and daily deliveries of fish courtesy of Marrfish, at Grimsby Docks.

A final word, too, for The Petwood’s summer outdoor entertainment as it’s always worth keeping an eye on the hotel’s calendar of events.  As Pride goes to press, the grounds will host an outdoor cinema showing Notting Hill and Dunkirk. Next month, The Take That Show on 17th July will celebrate the career of one of the most successful bands of the 1990s, with a barbecue in the grounds.

You have to wonder what Lady Grace Weigall would make of Take That songs on her front lawn, over a century after she created her country retreat in Woodhall. 

The music might not be to the taste of ears more accustomed to Vaughan Williams and Edward Elgar, but one thing’s for sure: the old girl would definitely approve of the quality of dining and the warm welcome that have both become hallmarks of The Petwood, guaranteeing its place in history as one of Lincolnshire’s best-loved hotels. 

The Petwood remains a definite recommendation for enjoyable and warm-hearted summer dining, offering excellent dishes in a really great setting.

On the Menu at Petwood Hotel
Pre-Starters:
Marinated olive mix, £4.50.
Artisan bread selection with olive oil and butter, £6.95.
Smoked almonds, £4.50.
Starters:
Pan roast salmon fillet with crab and dill salad, £9.45.
Spiced tempura king prawns with red onion & turmeric khichdi, herb chutney, £11.45.
Sous vide chicken terrine with pickled girolles, tarragon mayonnaise and Italian herb vinaigrette, £8.95.
Chestnut mushroom and miso risotto with green peas and spring onion, £9.45.
Main Courses:
Marinated lamb rump with pine nut and wild garlic crust, spinach gnocchi, charred stem and lamb jus, £29.95.
Spring pork tenderloin with prosciutto, goat’s cheese, roasted new potatoes, seasonal vegetables, and light jus, £19.45.
Lemon and basil chicken roulade, buttered spring greens, parmentier potatoes, plum tomato coulis, £18.45.
Lightly Crumbed Plaice Fillets with warm butter tartar, pea gel, and crisp potato sticks, £18.85.
Desserts:
Liquorice panna cotta with rhubarb, parkin crumb, £7.45.
Raspberry gin and lemonade cheesecake, £8.95.
NB: Sample menu and featured dishes, subject to availability and change.

The Petwood Hotel
Opening Hours: Terrace & Bar menu served Monday-Saturday 12-9pm, Sunday 4-9pm.
Restaurant menu served from 12-2pm Monday-Saturday, 6pm-9pm Monday-Sunday.
Contact: The Petwood Hotel, Woodhall Spa, LN10 6QG. Call 01526 352411 or see petwood.co.uk.

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