The best restaurants serving British food in Purbeck South West

We bought this as a belated birthday gift for my MIL, after the last couple of years we were very much looking forward to it. Unfortunately, as we arrived we were told that we would be stationary for the majority of the meal as the driver had been working all day and will now be over hours. We stated that this is not what we had paid for and all we were told was “they were trying their best”. We were fine with accepting that it would be a diesel train instead of a steam train due to the heatwave, but to sit in a hot carriage with a view of Swanage’s finest COOP was not the experience we were expecting. We feel poor planning by the organisers if they are reliant on only 1 or 2 drivers for an event that had to be booked months in advance. We spent over £200 for this much awaited birthday gift and the only compensation we got was just £10 off our bar bill. Would not recommend this line. Also, do not choose the crumble, it came burnt and is served dry with no cream/custard/ice-cream.

Very friendly staff who made you feel very welcome. Food piping hot - good portion sizes with delicious flavours. Will definitely visit again.👍

Just had the best Coffee/Vanilla Milkshake. Custom made and definitely hit the spot. Service friendly, helpful and efficient. Thanks

Great fish and chips. Nice to have skinless cod. Service was good. Very happy customer, would recommend. Excellent location on the beach

Had breakfast here twice. Very nice full English breakfast, very reasonable price and quick service. My review would have been excellent but the cafe seating area needs cleaning (dusty and dirty round the counter and skirting under the windows) and a small overcharge on the 2nd visit. With a bit of attention to the little details this place would be even better.

Didn't sit inside the pub as it was a lovely day, so sat in the beer garden which was lovely. The person that served me at the bar was really friendly and chatty 😊 would definitely visit again and would recommend 😄

Great location, friendly landlord & the food was lovely, been back twice more & I recommended a lovely country old worldy Inn.

Great place, excellent atmosphere, recommend the whole trout!

Brilliant friendly clean place to stay. Thank you.

Service very poor, staff could do with a little more personality. Food good, but overpriced. Visiting the erea.

The staff helpfully opened the lower room indoors for those trying to avoid the wasps in the garden. We stopped for coffee and cake/cheese scone after visiting the castle as we are regular NT café visitors. It was very busy initially and I commend the cashier on her patience and cheerfulness. The coffee and cake was of the usual NT good standard, but it seemed more expensive than the other NT places we have visited. It was the most expensive coffee we had all week (perhaps ever)! Watch out for the upright stones on the pavement corner outside. They are probably an historic feature, but definitely a trip hazard.

Haven’t been for a long time. Decided to meet some family who were holidaying in the area and was not disappointed. Will definitely be back as food and service was on point. We had mixed grills which were advertised at 24oz and certainly met that with high quality well cooked meats. The chunky chips were crisp on the outside and fluffy on the inside. My wife said the lasagne was one of the best she has had. So whilst we haven’t been here for years l, we will be changing that to revisit again soon!

Lovely food, once again. The omelettes were piping hot and delicious, and absolutely fresh. I know they were not scrimped, as they were crisp on the outside and deliciously runny on the inside. Lots of love to you all xxxx :)

Myself and my wife stayed at the Frampton Arms because we wanted to visit monkey World which was amazing visit to see all of the rescued monkeys but the review is mainly for the stay at the Frampton Arms we stayed there from the 26th August 24 to the 30th of August 24 to start the receptionist on arrival was very professional polite and friendly which was a fantastic start to the visit the room was very spacious and well presented cleaned to a very high standard every single member of the staff members were very professional polite and very helpful and friendly we had all our meals in the dining room and I must congratulate the chef's the food there was to a very very high standard excellent size portions excellent choice of meals and very tasty we could not falt the food in any way it was quality ingredients and cooked to a very high standard in fact i would go as far as comparing the food to a a al cart restaurant in all the places we have eaten the Frampton Arms meals beats them all hands down its a wonderful place to stay and every member of staff work extremely hard to a very high standard they are all very professional polite and very friendly we are already looking forward to going back there for another visit it was our first visit there we enjoyed the stay there that much Myself and my wife will definitely be making it a regular thing to visit the Frampton Arms as much as we can in future plenty of places to visit monkey world and the tank museum is not too far away from the Frampton Arms the beaches are a bit of a drive away or you can just walk across the road to the train station which you can get to all the places you want to go you could even get a train to Southampton Harbour and get a hovercraft to the Isle of Wight for the day if you wanted we highly recommend the Frampton Arms for a visit if you want to have a nice quiet and relaxing break and be well looked after it's a young team of staff members but they are very good at their job nothing is to much trouble its a continental breakfast in the mornings plenty of choice and tasty its also dog friendly if you have a dog we can't wait to go back and will not think about staying anywhere else when we go to Dorset we are impressed with everything about the Frampton Arms we whould give it 5+ stars if we could fantastic break and fantastic service job well done all round many thanks for the excellent 4 day break

We have recently attended two Sunday carveries under the new management. Our first experience was the trial carvery day and the second was two weeks later. We enjoyed the first carvery (the meat and potatoes being particularly good), but some of the vegetables on that occasion weren't so good. However, our second carvery food experience was markedly better. The turkey, beef and gammon joints were all well-cooked, the meats were succulent and tender and the portions generous. On the second occasion, the vegetables were also well cooked and there was a good selection. The staff are friendly and pleasant, but the ‘front of house’ could be better organised, although to be fair one member of staff said that they were trying different “meet and greet” options on the day. Hopefully this will also improve as experience is gained. After seeing very mixed reviews since the pub changed hands earlier this year, it is great to see a good carvery returning to the village. Give it a try and help support your local pub. We will definitely be back.