The Best Pubs Near Sapori, by the Record
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Rank 1. The Two Pigs
Modern British
The name changed from the Red Lion to The Two Pigs in 2023, and so did pretty much everything else. It's a gastropub in a Staffordshire village, doing modern pub classics with produce from local farmers and a micro-farm next door. Weekend brunches, Sunday roasts, seasonal cocktails, and bar snacks running all day give the place an all-hours, good-time quality that most gastropubs only manage for dinner service.
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Rank 2. The Cross
Contemporary British Pub
The dining room here was once a schoolroom, and the hand bell wall lamps haven't let anyone forget it. This Michelin-starred gastropub in a restored Grade II listed inn does serious British cooking, the kind that follows the seasons closely and sources with equal care. The back room looks straight onto the kitchen pass if you want the theatre. The tasting menu is how the kitchen makes its fullest argument.
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Rank 3. The Boat
Modern British Pub
A Michelin-starred gastropub on a busy A-road outside Lichfield, which is either a strike against it or the whole point, depending on how you feel about destination dining. The kitchen runs a small on-site farm that feeds the menu, with local producers covering the rest, all handled with the kind of precision that makes a venison dish feel considered rather than merely seasonal. The chefs come out to explain what's on the plate, and somehow it doesn't feel annoying.
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A pub whose back garden is so large it hosts its own Oktoberfest, sausage toss included. Inside, The Black Pug is a warren of cosy rooms; outside, there's covered seating, an outdoor bar, and enough room for a grumble of actual pugs, which is both the collective noun and, on any given weekend, an accurate headcount. Pizza Monday, Taco Tuesday, and free kids' meals on Friday keep the locals cycling through. Star Pub of the Year at the Great British Pub Awards 2025.
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American memorabilia lines the walls of this lively bar and casual dining spot on Saltergate, where line dancing nights sit comfortably alongside quiz nights and live sport on the same weekly calendar. The vibe is broadly Americana, the crowd is local and loyal, and the programming is restless enough that there's usually something on. It took the Admiral Taverns Pub of the Year at the 2025 Great British Pub Awards.
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Rank 6. Crown Wharf
British Pub
The brewery tap for Joules, Crown Wharf sits on the original site of one of their first breweries, built almost entirely from reclaimed materials by a two-man crew that kept going through the pandemic. It's a proper pub with a theatre and heritage centre attached, which is not a sentence you write every day. The Great British Pub Awards named it Overall Great British Pub of the Year in 2025, and Stone seems to agree, judging by the crowd.
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A stream runs alongside the terrace at this rural Worcestershire gastropub, which reopened after a full refurbishment and is now drawing people out from the city. The chef came up through Carters of Moseley, and the menu sits comfortably between proper pub food and something a bit more considered: battered haddock sits beside seabass with lobster bisque, and neither feels out of place. Menus turn with the seasons, the interior is cosy, and the desserts reportedly justify the drive.
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A thatched-roof country pub on the Great River Ouse, The Sun has the kind of postcard exterior that makes you wonder if the food can possibly keep up. It does. The kitchen runs its own farm, so "local ingredients" isn't just menu copywriting here. The bar hatch turns out goat curry and fritto misto alongside pints, while the seasonal tasting menu leans into beef shin, smoked trout, and whatever the farm is doing that week.
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A 14th-century Grade I-listed manor house is the unlikely anchor of this sprawling south Staffordshire pub, where walkers and diners turn up in roughly equal numbers. Inside, art deco lighting and a Blue Room wrapped in a 360-degree mural sit comfortably beside the open kitchen and pizza oven. Outside, there are booths and a bookable teepee. It took Marston's Pub of the Year at the 2025 Great British Pub Awards.