A dish for meat lovers with large chunks of spicy sausage among a thick casserole. It was piping hot – you could even say too hot – and perhaps some of the liquid had evaporated in the process. A rich, thick, full-on dish while Ruth went for fillet of sole in a creamy pernod sauce. Again a large chunk of tender, moist fish in a terracotta-coloured sea that had sweetness to it. Don’t spill this one on your clothes.

Sides were green beans – crunchy and cooked with olive and garlic just to lift them out of the ordinary – and chunky chips. Big, fat juicy fellows with crispy coats. These hadn’t come out of a bag.

The signature dish is Fatty’s Cow Pie – Gert and Sidney (steak and kidney) cooked in hoppy Yorkshire ale, topped with Gran’s suet pastry (£9.50). If Last Of The Summer Wine was still being filmed around these parts, the cast would live on this.

Then there was slow roast pork with scrumpy cider gravy (£9.95), creamy wild mushroom risotto with roast cherry tomatoes and beetroot puree (£6.25), seafood and chorizo paella (£11.95) and a choice of steaks – rump, sirloin and fillet – from Hereford cattle matured on grass and hung for four weeks.

If vegetarians are still reading this don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Other animals for the chop and special treatment include rabbit and pigeon.

The tapas is only served in the bar area and, unlike the two restaurant rooms, the six tables here can’t be booked.

The tapas includes bread with a selection of oils and balsamic vinegar (£2.50); mixed Spanish olives (£2.50), traditional and beetroot hummus served with toasted pitta bread (£3.75), large prawns cooked in garlic (£5.95), fresh squid, cooked in beer batter (£4.55), brie and goat’s cheese bread-crumbed and deep fried (£4.25), chickpea croquettes, served in a pitta bread with salad (£3.95), spicy marinated chicken piri piri kebab on skewers (£4.95), a Greek salad of feta cheese, tomato, cucumber, olives and red onion (£4.10), fried potatoes served with chilli sauce and aioli (£2) and chef's sticky barbecue ribs (£4.95).

So the Victoria is now under a new reign – and the crown jewels are on its menu.

Toad And Tatie

38 Woodhead Road, Holmfirth, HD9 2PR.

Tel 01484 689635

Website www.toadandtatie.co.uk

Opening hours Tuesday to Thursday 5pm onwards (food starts 6pm); Friday 4pm opening (food 6pm onwards); Saturday opens 3pm (food 6pm onwards); Sunday 2pm-9pm (food 2pm-5.30pm)

Children Yes

Disabled access Yes and toilet

The bill £59.95

Would you go back? Certainly