On Easter Monday we took some visitors from the Netherlands down to the Isle of Purbeck. After a nice walk to Durdle Door and after admiring Stair Hole our guests wanted to take us out for a late lunch. Trouble was, it was already past 14:30 and I feared that the kitchens would be closed. The guests were confident - "in the Netherlands you will be served all afternoon" - and besides there was money to be made with the vast number of Easter tourists.

We tried the pub in West Lulworth - "sorry we just closed the kitchen". No joy in East Lulworth either. I thought we would have a slim chance of finding something in Wareham being the biggest Purbeck town (though hardly a metropolis!).

Before leaving home I had printed out a listing (7 pages no less!) of all the eating and watering holes in Purbeck. We duly arrived in Wareham and tried the first pub on the list..."sorry we serve food again at six". Ditto the next 2 pubs. Finally struck gold at the bar of the Black Bear Hotel who said they served food all day.

From the outside the Black Bear has an impressive Georgian facade complete with a life sized black bear on the porch. The bar was a typical carpeted hotel bar; I never get why pubs and bars are carpeted then sell beer with brim measure! I hate sticky carpets! The menu included fairly typical pub fare plus "tapas". Well, I honestly did not expect genuine Spanish tapas but the offering was fairly true to the tapas idea by offering small portions of bite-sized snacks.

We went to the beer garden which was a slightly dilapidated affair (actually that is too harsh) but provided a pleasant shade. Our waiter must have been 15 years old and while well turned-out seemed to be lacking in training. He did not seem to notice that we needed cutlery and seemed to need to make double the number of trips to the kitchen than normal. OK, I wouldn't have been better at that age...but I think I would have known that you needed a spoon to eat soup!

My guests ordered soup of the day - asparagus soup - which tasted good but which verged on being tepid... a wasted opportunity. We then shared chicken wings, plaice goujons, 'spicy' chicken and deep-fried brie. The chicken wings were tasty though served with a flacid lettuce leaf - why use a flacid lettuce leaf which adds no value?...or why put hot food near a leaf that will spoil with the heat? The plaice was pleasantly fried, and the deep fried brie too...also served with a very good chutney. The 'spicy' chicken seemed a fairly bland breaded deep fried chicken piece again on a flacid lettuce leaf; the 'spicy' label was not merited.

The bill did not burn a hole in the pocket...sorry I do not remember the amount. Food was of reasonable quality and good value for money. If they think that adding salad leaves to hot food enchances the presentation then they should try rocket rather than lettuce.