The first time I went to the Talbot Inn, the waters of the River Teme were just receding from the front doorstep. There were sandbags piled up all along the front, and the whole landscape had a pretty bedraggled look. I was there courtesy of Radio 4's Food Programme, to interview the two sisters who run the inn, Wiz and Annie Clift, about the art of pickling. They seem to pickle everything, the Clift sisters - gooseberries, damsons, walnuts, geranium buds, radish pods, tomatoes, octopus and salmon, to name but a few of the pots I dipped into.

Anyway, come the end of a long, arduous morning at the microphone, I plonked myself down on a window seat while someone fetched a plate of braised oxtail from the kitchen. And such oxtail it was, too, fetchingly falling off the bone, the juices delicate and rich, with added pig's trotter and a couple of plump little round dumplings, as light as puff balls and musky with beef dripping, sitting comfortingly alongside. A couple of spoonfuls of the Clift's pickled damsons cut through the rum-tum-tugger of the oxtail, and a couple of pints of T'Other bitter, brewed on the premises, washed it all down and repaired the ravages of work. I warmed to the nature of the place. It had a curious, relaxed, easy-going, familial feel to it, like a well-run country house.

I should go back and take a closer look, I thought at the time; so I did, taking with me, by way of quality control officers, my daughter, Lois, and her friend, Natasha, known as Tasha. If anything, the experiences second time around were even warmer. It is not every kitchen that will invite a brace of 11-year-olds in to have a look around, nor every kitchen in which you will find the mother of the proprietors mixing Christmas pudding by hand in a plastic rubbish bin.

Nor is it, these days, every kitchen that will allow those same 11-year-olds to roll up their sleeves and get stuck in mixing the aforementioned pudding mixture. God knows what an environmental health officer would have said, had there been one about. Just in case, I should add that the girls washed their hands very thoroughly before they were allowed to muck in. You may well say, oh, it's all very well for him - they knew who he was, so of course they went out of their way to be nice. But I think not. This is just the way they are at The Talbot Inn. It's the nature of the place and the people - relaxed, kindly, hospitable in a rather old-fashioned, rather unfashionable way, and happy to tolerate two inquisitive kids.

Meanwhile, back in the equally relaxed, kindly, hospitable, old-fashioned and unfashionably comfortable bar there was a pint of T'Other and two glasses of homemade apple juice ready and waiting. The apple juice is another mark of the house style. The Clift sisters are very keen on local produce. Actually, they are gently passionate about it: they grow much of the lettuce and vegetables out back in their organic garden. What cannot be eaten in times of glut is pickled. They pick up game from local shoots, who after a day in the field are grateful for the prodigious steak and kidney puddings that await them at the Talbot. The proprietors provide handouts listing their suppliers of cheese, eggs, game, rabbit, meat, preserves and soft fruit, all of which are available locally. Like few other places I have visited, the Talbot is embedded in the area in which it is situated.

The cooking is another matter. It is rooted in a cosmopolitan English sensibility and is without pretension. It is homely in the best sense of the word. That is to say, the very best ingredients are properly cooked in the method best suited to them - dishes are a natural extension of the ingredients.

There is a menu proper, which goes with the proper dining room - a splendid, panelled room - but for the casual lunchtime trade there's a blackboard menu above the bar, running the gamut from continental European pickled octopus, cod and pesto, hake, pork loin and garlic to pluperfectly British black pudding and apple, stuffed breast of lamb and the aforementioned prodigious steak and kidney pud.

In the event, while the girls went for sausage and chips (Tasha) and pasta (Lois), followed by raspberry tart, I pigged out on crab blini, confit of goose gizzards with pesto on toast, eel stew with prunes and pasta, and a hollygog pudding. Well, I mean, really, how often do you see goose gizzards and eel on the same menu, let alone eel with prunes and pasta? Once would be too often for most people.

Do I have to tell you that the sausages were alpha-double-plus productions from the butcher down the road, that the pasta was made in the kitchen, buttercup yellow from the egg yolks, and topped with a sensational fresh tomato sauce, that the raspberries were late autumn harvest from the garden, still producing because of the mild so-called winter we had before Christmas? The crab was sweet and slightly nutty, as fresh shellfish should be, and piled on to a thin, crisp blini - a dish of serene simplicity and excellence. The gizzards were all chopped up, musky, mild and rich, lightly pepped by pesto.

But if I thought the gizzard was rich, it was but a Weight-Watchers' portion compared with the epic nature of the eel dish. Eel is a wonderful fish, but in terms of richness it makes foie gras or a pot of dripping seem airy-fairy. And my plate came piled high with eel. As for combining it with prunes and pasta, I think it may be a slight case of overkill, particularly after crab and goose gizzards. I suspect that it is a recipe from northern Italy, but I wouldn't swear to it; in its monumental, viscid, unctuous, florid, filling fashion, it was rather good. But I wouldn't describe it as moreish.

Indeed, quite how I managed even a couple of mouthfuls of hollygog pudding - a curious concoction of pastry soaked in Golden Syrup, a kind of Worcestershire version of baklava - I'm none to certain, but I did, and very British and delicious it was, too, especially with the accompaniment of proper custard.

So we parted company, the Talbot Inn and us, not a moment too soon for my tum. We could have bunked down in one of the comfortable bedrooms at the back, but home and hearth called. The bill was £43.40. We had spent £6.95 at the bar. The pasta had set us back £4.50, the sausage and chips £5, and my four courses £19.95. The other £7 was for the girls' puddings, in case you're counting. Where can you eat so much and so splendidly for so little? Hardly anywhere. We were very cheery, Lois, Tasha and I, as we sped back across country. We'd all had such a good time.