Pub to reopen after £180,000 makeover

The village pub, The Grey Horse, will reopen on Monday after a four-week closure and refurbishment - and with a new aviation theme.

Andy and Amanda Booth, who moved to the pub in January, have worked on the £180,000 overhaul with owners Punch Taverns and also with their near neighbours, The Yorkshire Air Museum.

Amanda and Andy behind the bar

A few specially invited guests gathered yesterday for a look around, there will be a few more sneak previews over the weekend, including for lucky locals who won a competition at a charity night before the pub closed. The doors will be thrown open to the public at large on Monday.

"We took over a pub that was a bit tired but we have rebuilt the drinks side and we now want to be a proper community pub and a destination pub, bringing back traditional pub values."

He says there will be a new emphasis on food after a lull of several years, and a rotating selection of five cask ales on the bar.

The food will be centred mainly in The Hangar, the upstairs restaurant area, although there is also a dining room called The Officers' Mess, available for private hire and people can eat in the main bar area if they prefer.

Chef Mitch Knapp "came for an interview three months ago and never went home” says Amanda, and the focus will be on freshly-prepared traditional meals, using locally sourced ingredients.

There are no permanent ales on the bar, with all five handpulls up for rotation at any time. The initial line-up will include Thwaites Wainwright, York Guzzler and Fuller's London Pride. The lagers will include Carling, Coors Light and Estrella, and Thatcher's Cider and Guinness will also be available at all times.

Punch say there will also be an extended wine list, a range of malt whiskies and a menu of specialist gins.

Jim Owthwaite, Punch's new business development manager, said: “It’s always rewarding to work with experienced publicans. Andy and Amanda have been Punch Taverns Partners for seven years now and previously ran The Black Lion in Snaith.

“It’s been exciting to work with them to create a great food and drink offer. This is going to be a community pub for the locals of Elvington to be proud of, and a pub people will travel to, because of the food.”

The decor owes a lot to the Air Museum, who have provided copies of old photographs and helped with some air-themed pieces of memorabilia for display.

"They have helped us enormously," says Andy. "The theme is mostly in the restaurant upstairs but it does continue downstairs quite a bit."

It spreads also to the two B&B rooms, which are named after the Halifax and Buccaneer aircraft - the former having flown from Elvington, and examples of the latter being held at the museum.

Away from the food, Andy and Amanda hope to promote standard pub events. There is a weekly quiz on Thursday nights, they have darts teams playing on Monday nights and they host poker on Tuesday nights.