The French Horn in East Hampshire

The French Horn is the best pub in Alton. Lovely family run the pub and waiters/waitresses are always excellent. Good food offering including polish dishes which are great ! Timothy Taylor Landlord real ale always in good condition and served in lovely tankard style glass.Happy to have this pub as my local.

We booked this room without reading any reviews!!! Should've looked at the room before booking , it was tired and grubby looking , the shower and loo a pokey cupboard, all in a outside outbuilding, I return later to collect belongings and didn't stay, and a smell of smoke was there, it had come through from customers sitting outside I think? 🤔 but that put me off even more ... shame as photos looked so inviting 😞 needs good clean and updating, sorry

Wow where do I start. I have noted the other reviews so am aware we may have caught them on an off day, chef may not have been in / I chose the wrong dish. My wife and I go out nearly every Wednesday evening and have done so since the reponening of the last lockdown. Needless to say we have been to many local pubs many times and realised that we hadn't given the French Horn a go. I had pushed to visit a few times as I liked the look of the menu especially the polish slant. Before I detail, I would just like to say that the staff were amazingly friendly. Two items were not on the menu, the soup and the butternut squash curry which limited my wife's choice dramatically. She had two starters as her main meal which she enjoyed but it was average at best. I had a prawn starter which was again nice but average and then out came the polish dumplings. Well I have no words. OK so I have never had polish dumplings before but have had dumplings via other cuisines and countries before. The dumpling itself tasted like uncooked pancake and the meat was just tasteless. It was all swimming in what seamed to be cooking oil, covered with very greasy and fatty pancetta and the pickles and other accompaniments frankly looked and tasted like they were out of a jar. I note an earlier review stating the same thoughts with a reply from the French Horn saying that everything was fresh. I assume this does not include these pickles etc.. I simply could not eat this meal. Anyway my gist is this. You go out to hopefully have a meal that would be on a par with other places, that you could probably not cook yourself either at all or as well as the place you chose to eat at and so on. Our meal cost £63.00 which included a bottle of wine and 2 pints. When we go out to other pub restaurants our bill is usually between £60.00 to £80.00. We recently ate at a Thai. The food there is awesome and often have to take a doggy bag home. Including wine and pints the meal cost £65.00. Again recently at another localish pub restaurant, the bill was £73.00 with the same alcohol content but we both chose specials that were a little more expensive than main menu stuff. The meal was off the charts good. I could rattle on about other pubs and their good points and as important is how consistently good they each time we visit but this isn't the reason really for my review. As a independent business owner I need to know how I am doing so any review good or bad is welcome and needed. I do hope that I just made a bad choice on the day and that the quality issue was a one off / me being crazy fussy. We will go back to the French Horn to give the benefit of the doubt and would be pleased to report back in a more positive way next time. Oh as I side note, I am not sure if the French Horn are planning on a litte refit as the restaurant area is really very dated. Many of the local pubs we are visiting have recently updated which I think is a must apres Covid to entice keep clients, attract new clients, increase recommendations and not to lose out on the competition. Watch this space.

First time at the French Horn in twenty years but its lovely, with great staff and great food. We booked late and they were very accommodating. Will be going back within the next 20 years for sure

Excellent Sunday lunch, homemade orange sorbet was delicious. Service by the whole team was excellent. They took great care in making sure we were enjoying our meal and were very friendly. Warm, friendly pub and Will definitely come again.

Second time of eating at this pub with my parents who live in Alton. Warm and friendly service from the front of house team, made to feel very welcome. Food was good and priced reasonably. We will definitely be returning again.

I stayed at The French Horn quite a bit in January (two trips of 3 or 4 days). For me it was ideal. Nice, small room, not luxury but perfectly fine and with my own front door from the car park so very easy to come and go. Breakfasts were great (Polish sausage) and the pub grub at lunch was well done too. Plus this is a functioning pub with well kept real beer and welcoming locals when I fancied a chat. Great family run business.Think its the teamwork that allows such a good price plus they even gave me a lift to the Station when I was tight for time.

Great service. Dog friendly with treats as well. The lasagna was really nice. Freshly made. I wish it was a bigger portion. I was sad when I finished it. The fruit for the crumble was a little too sour for me but the crumble does taste freshly made. Quite a selection of ice cream flavours!

We have used the French Horn Inn for meals on a regular basis and have never been disappointed. The food is good' the staff friendly and helpful and the atmosphere relaxing and convivial. We would recommend this pub anytime.

We had our works Christmas Dinner here. The food was incredible and the turkey roast was better than any I've ever had before! There were about 25 of us and the food was piping hot for each and every one of us. The staff were really lovely and no ask was too much. We had the little hut across from the main pub and it was perfect for us. They had a nice selection of gins which was good for the gin queen in me! Honestly really enjoyed our time here.