This is about as Jacobean as they come. For admirers of Charlotte Bronte and the Jane Eyre cult, Holdsworth House remains a fine example of these low-slung, sturdy houses with their robust mullions and stone slate roofs. Within it is even better, with an oak panelled dining room that is one of the most inviting of its kind to be found. It is one of those rooms where the business of eating could easily become secondary.

A winter menu could have amongst the starters a duck, vegetable and new potato ragout, a pave of fresh market fish and crayfish salad with saffron aioli, or Isle of Lewis smoked salmon, layered with cos lettuce, anchovies and parmesan. Main courses include pan griddled veal cutlet with Orkney clapshot, pommes parisienne and Calvados jus, a char grilled fillet Galloway steak, or a tranche of salmon with a red onion and caper crust. A delicate iced fig and Satsuma parfait is pretty innocent, for others there is the house plum pudding, baked in crisp filo pastry with brandy and butter custard. Amongst the cheeses on offer look for Fountains Gold , made at Hawes, Northumberland smoked from Blagdon, and the up and coming Yorkshire Buffalo Blue, a blue veined, soft cheese made at Cropwell Bishop.

All this and more in that outstanding dining room, with the open fire flickering gently, the murmur of conversation and perhaps the thought that the weekend lays open before you as you reach for the port list that caught your eye earlier.