WE have fond memories of Burneston, and particularly of its red telephone box. It was from there, 21 years ago, that The Boss rang the GP to confirm that it really wasn't just something she'd eaten and, having received the news she so expectantly awaited, essayed a sort of maternal military two-step all the way to the Woodman.

The Woodman was much different in the days before the dear old chip off the old block.

It was a simple, welcoming, one-roomed village boozer, though on one memorable Sunday we'd taken lunch in the private parlour, which reminded The Boss of her old grandma's front room in the Principality.

These days it's much changed, and more of that in a moment.

Burneston is just off the A1, a couple of miles south of Leeming Bar. A Victorian vicar, memory suggests, held the Wimbledon singles title in plurality and it was the Rev Clive Mansell, the present engaging incumbent, who recommended that we again visit the Woodman.

There's a convivially spruced-up bar, a small restaurant at the side with an intimate little lounge of its own and, out the back, picnic tables and quoits pitch with their own time-saving bar in a once-ramshackle shed.

There's a new landlord, too, and if ever a pint puller was made for the Woodman it's Huw Williams - built not so much like a lumberjack as like a pair of genial giant sequoias. (If, indeed, sequoias may have geniality thrust upon them.) His son, behind the bar, is no wind-blown willow, either. Liz Williams gazes affectionately upwards.

They arrived from the Cotswolds with a collection of Gloucester Old Spots - pot pigs - to confirm their antecedents. (Robert Runcie, a former curate of Gosforth and Archbishop of Canterbury, had an affection for Gloucester Old Spots, too.) It was Tuesday night, as so often it is on these expeditionary occasions. Burneston's golden jubilee raffle was being drawn in the cask conditioned bar; though no one else was in the restaurant, Huw happily agreed to turn on the gas.

Starters included baked goats' cheese on a garlic slice with pesto dressing and black pepper (£5.25), fresh crab and prawn fishcakes with a spicy salsa dressing (£5.95) and "Huw's" bacon and chicken pat with apple and blackberry chutney (£5.25).

The pat came in prodigious proportions - Huw Williams didn't get to be what he is today by serving small portions - though chutney never quite seems to live up to the dear departed days of Shildon Show, when the column's Aunty Betty would win best in show, and probably second, third and fourth as well.

The lady thought the fishcakes excellent, though the accompanying prawns somewhat puny.

She followed with an overflowing salad bowl, or more precisely a cauldron, we with lamb cutlets in a mint and elderflower sauce, freshly prepared and recommended by the landlord.

These were little lambs, of the sort that Mary had, and so greatly in the configuration of the State of Texas that it was possible to eat them by the handle, like a raspberry Mivvi.

They were sweet and succulent, arranged around a mound of ratatouille and with well-cooked accompanying vegetables.

Other main courses included roast duck glazed with honey and brandy (£12.95), mushroom tortellini (£7.95) and fillet steak on a black pudding crouton with "infamous" three pepper sauce.

The treacle tart and custard (£3.50) was pretty ordinary it has to be said - insipid, lukewarm, past its best, the sort of tart which used to have the price (12/6d) written on the sole of her shoe in a certain quarter of Middlesbrough. Real Woodmen probably don't eat puddings, anyway.

It was a very pleasant evening, nonetheless. Not yet pulling up trees, maybe, but definitely one for the log. - The Woodman, Burneston, near Bedale. Open seven days. (01677) 422066.

IN the Wheatsheaf at Spennymoor they'd been doing all-day breakfast from 99p. The boxing club lads rang about it, arranged to meet, forgot that the High Street pub had changed hands just the day previously.

Instead, we had 12.30pm breakfast at the appropriately named Fulltums, a two-table caf and takeaway along the road - £2.50, good fried bread - and a couple of pints in the Voltigeur.

Named after a 19th Century Classic winner - the St Leger, memory suggests - the Volti is now home to a photographic archive in honour of the town's amateur boxers. Landlord Chris Hill, it's reckoned, paid £150 for the frames alone.

The real reason for the all-day breakfast invitation, however, was to persuade the column again to hand over the awards at the boxers' annual presentation evening. On the last occasion, at the Ship in Middlestone Village, we inadvertently made a big impression on the gateau. This time there may be seats in all parts, an' all.

THE specials board at Glebe Cottage offered just two options: ham and eggs (£5) and Bonio (25p).

Special? Unique, more like.

The second choice, it's fair to add, was prefixed with "For your pet". Since budgerigars aren't notably fond of Bonio, "For your dog" might have been more particular.

Glebe Cottage is a charmingly laid-back little tea room in Kildale, a tiny station on the Middlesbrough to Whitby railway line and a welcome watering hole on the Cleveland Way.

"Muddy bums, boots and pets all welcome," it says outside, whilst inside are piles of old books - 50p each, proceeds to the village hall - and copies of Country Walking magazine in which the second and third pages were devoted to a singularly seductive blonde trying to sell Citroens. It seemed rather to defeat the object.

Main courses, all freshly cooked, include beef stroganoff, grilled Cypriot cheese with salad and toast and something described as "mushroom and onion pasta in tomato soup" with the suffix "as it says" lest anyone suppose a culinary ellipsis.

Most, probably, will choose from a wide range of teas and even more coffees, from sandwiches, cakes and soft drinks. We had an excellent "Walker's soup" (£2.50) and a mushroom omelette for £3, served by a cheerful chap in a technicolour pinny.

It's open all year; worth going out of your Cleveland Way for.

....and finally, the bairns wondered if we knew what you call a disorientated young octopus.

A crazy mixed-up squid.

Published: 04/06/2002