Derbyshire, United Kingdom

The Cow

Price per night from$147.31

Price information

If you haven’t entered any dates, the rate shown is provided directly by the hotel and represents the cheapest double room (including tax) available in the next 60 days.

Prices have been converted from the hotel’s local currency (GBP116.67), via openexchangerates.org, using today’s exchange rate.

Style

Bucolic bovine beauty

Setting

Green and pleasant land

If we had hooves, we’d clap them together in joyful appreciation of The Cow: a friendly pub with rooms near Derby. Reasons to gather your herd and come here include: the best-of-British restaurant (which dishes up devilishly good flatbreads and small plates); the 12 romantic rooms (each with winsome views of the green and verdant countryside), and the snug-as-a-bug bar, where gin-lovers can get their fix – and then some. Farmyard-fabulous flourishes come courtesy of cow-themed artworks, striking lighting and statement furniture, including a hefty butcher’s block that's been reimagined as a table.

Smith Extra

Get this when you book through us:

A bottle of wine in your room on arrival

Facilities

Photos The Cow facilities

Need to know

Rooms

Twelve.

Check–Out

11am, but flexible, subject to availability. Earliest check-in, 3pm.

Prices

Double rooms from £140.00, including tax at 20 per cent.

More details

Rates usually include breakfast; pick from Continental and Full English options.

At the hotel

Kitchen garden, free WiFi, on-site parking. In rooms: Nespresso machine, TV, WiFi, desk, minibar, free bottled water, tea- and coffee-making kit. Ground-floor rooms also have French doors leading to a private patio.

Our favourite rooms

Room 10 is in the eaves, with a huge bed and a bright and airy feel. We also fell for Room 3, which feels quiet and private, thanks to its tucked-away perch at the back of the inn.

Packing tips

No need to lug your GHDs along – hair straighteners are provided.

Pet‐friendly

The six ground-floor rooms are all doggy-friendly. Fido will cost you £20 a stay; beds and food bowls are provided. See more pet-friendly hotels in Derbyshire.

Children

Leave the little 'uns at home.

Food and Drink

Photos The Cow food and drink

Top Table

The obvious rules apply here: sit by the crackling fire when it’s chilly; out on the sun-kissed terrace when it’s not.

Dress Code

Walking boots and Barbour by day, and not much more formal by night. The locals don't dress up.

Hotel restaurant

The seafood-centric menu may look to Cornwall's sunny coast, but its ingredients and produce are firmly northern. Ninety per cent of what goes on The Catch's plate is sourced fresh each morning from Cornish ports – Newlyn, Looe, Mevagissey, for example – with the remaining ten per cent made up of prime Derbyshire beef. Highlights from our visit include the creamy, cider chowder with hasselback potatoes and sweet pea purée, the soft shell crab with Asian slaw and jalapeño mayo and the flawless treacle tart (we’ll wager it’s the best you’ll ever have).

Hotel bar

You’d expect a pub with rooms to know a thing or two about drinking, and the Cow doesn’t disappoint. Gin-lovers will be wooed by the stirling gin selection – no limp lemon slices, flat Schweppes or bottles of Gordon’s here. Be adventurous: try unfamiliar gins paired with flavour-matched garnishes and tonics. A stout selection of real ales and snuggle-inducing wood-burners keep things proudly British; the striking copper-topped bar is worthy of a toast alone.

Last orders

Breakfast is served until 10.30am; dinner is dished up until 9pm.

Location

Photos The Cow location
Address
The Cow
The Green
Dalbury Lees
DE6 5BE
United Kingdom

This boutique beasty is sitting pretty in a quiet country village, half an hour’s drive from the city of Derby.

Planes

Nottingham East Midlands airport is a 30-minute drive away. Let Smith24 sort your flights.

Trains

Derby station is just eight miles from the hotel, with services run by East Midlands Trains.

Automobiles

If you’re driving to the hotel via Derby city centre, follow the signs for Ashbourne A52. At the Markeaton island, take the A52, and follow this road for two miles; go straight through at the traffic lights. Take a left turn into Brun Lane, follow this to the T-junction and head right. After about 250 yards, turn left into Long Lane. Keep going for about a mile and a half, passing a number of right turns before Dalbury Lees is signposted left. Take this left turn and follow the road through the village: you’ll find the hotel on the left, alongside the village green; the Cow’s car park is adjacent to the hotel.

Worth getting out of bed for

Sip your way (semi-sensibly, at least) through the Cow’s impressive gin selection, snuggle up by the fire with a book and taste-test the hotel’s tempting array of flatbreads and small plates. Further afield, explore National Trust treasure in the shape of Kedleston Hall, catch an alfresco flick courtesy of Markeaton Park’s seasonal outdoor cinema, and go for a ramble around charming Chatsworth House and the surrounding Peak District National Park. Derby city isn't quite as good looking as its country surrounds, but it has charms of its own: wander the lively Cathedral Quarter, browse the paintings of lauded native son Joseph Wright at the Derby Museum & Art Gallery, then see what's happening at culture hub Quad or performance space Déda.

Local restaurants

Pub grub gets a fine-dining rethink at The Horseshoes on Long Lane in Ashbourne; where ambitious young chef Gareth Ward continues to woo an appreciative audience. Likewise, at the more casual spot The Bluebell, pub classics are made with organic ingredients in an indoor/outdoor garden setting. Have a leisurely brunch or lunch at the snug and friendly Deli Cafe at 11 Main Road in Brailsford. Dress smartly in honour of the dazzling dishes plated up at the Lighthouse Restaurant in Ashbourne, which has a Michelin star-toting chef as its not-so-secret weapon.

Local bars

The Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) believe Derby to have the most diverse selection of real ales and they've handily mapped out a trail of pubs to try them in. Assign a designated driver (or book a cab to and from the city) and down a few local brews at welcoming pit stops, such as the Brunswick, the Exeter Arms, Five Lamps and the Flowerpot on King Street, where there's live music, too. The Cow's bar also has a fine selection if you'd prefer a stationary drinking session.

Reviews

Photos The Cow reviews

Anonymous review

Every hotel featured is visited personally by members of our team, given the Smith seal of approval, and then anonymously reviewed. As soon as our reviewers have returned from this cosy hotel in Dalbury Lees and unpacked their walking boots and shortbread, a full account of their British-countryside break will be with you. In the meantime, to whet your wanderlust, here's a quick peek inside the Cow in Derby…

Derbyshire’s rugged rural landscapes – all rolling hills, rocky outcrops and glowering skies – call for something sublimely cosy: the architectural equivalent of a hot cup of tea and a delicious fruit cake. Somewhere that will warm feet, bellies and souls alike… somewhere exactly like the Cow, in fact: a former pub turned boutique inn, which woos with view-toting rooms, a clever chef and a formidable gin selection. You don’t need to be a cagoule-clad walker to appreciate the Cow’s blissfully comfy beds and crackling fires (though it certainly doesn’t hurt). This cow has character, too: walls are decorated with beastly good artworks by a local artist, there’s a butcher’s block table in the bar and plenty of eye-candy flourishes, such as striking lighting and artfully mismatched furniture.

 
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Price per night from $147.31