Telephone: 01884 855237
Address: Bickleigh, Tiverton, Devon
Rating: 2/20

It may come as something of a surprise, but a lot of work goes into choosing the restaurants that I review each week. On the whole, I think people want to know where to go, rather than where not to go, which suits me because I'd much rather eat tolerably well than intolerably badly. And if I find something amiss, I will say so, though more in sorrow than in anger.

Not everyone has the luxury of careful selection. One day I was bowling along the A396 from Exeter to Tiverton, when suddenly it was lunchtime, and the rumbling in my tum would not be denied, so when I spotted the Fisherman's Cot I took pot luck. It's a large establishment stretching down a bank of the River Exe - it would be a pleasant spot in any weather, and close to sublime in summer, I'd wager. The smell of boiled vegetables and Dettol, so sweetly familiar from my schooldays, fell upon my nostrils as I went in. In a trice I was transported back through the years. What was to be on the menu? Prawn cocktail with sauce Marie Rose? Pork medallions in a creamy sauce? Spotted dick and custard? Ah me.

Well, the prawn cocktail was there, billed as "classic", as were the medallions of pork, "fried and finished in a rich Diane sauce". There were a few other throwbacks from the restaurant Iron Age: garlic mushrooms with melted brie; "warm, crispy camembert presented with red wine marmalade"; scampi tails; and black peppered steak. There was even the odd nod to contemporary cooking in the form of seared tuna steak, oriental king prawns in filo pastry, and "warm Mediterranean goat's cheese tartlet". It was like stumbling across an archive of public eating of the past 50 years, and there's nothing wrong with that in itself.

The first setback came when I was told that the Wadworth's 6X was off, and was offered Tetley's Smoothflow by way of compensation. I would prefer disembowelment than force a pint of that ersatz liquid past my lips, so I said I'd have a glass of rioja instead. It's not often that I regret a glass of red wine: this one managed to be warm, thin and acidic enough to cause my throat to constrict. At the same time, I ordered the prawn cocktail and chicken Napoleon from the blackboard menu, and gave my table number. The table number idea was the tip of a very efficient production system. Dishes came with crisp dispatch, delivered with nanny-ish dash.

If only the Fisherman's Cot paid as much attention to its food as to its systems. The prawn cocktail was, indeed, a classic, but not in quite the way that the poet behind the menu meant - there was a large plate with a lot of lettuce leaves and a substantial pile of shrimp-effect, woolly extrusions that had expired beneath a sea of sweet pink goo. Ah, Marie Rose, had you been living at this hour, you would have risen up and struck the hand that traduced your good name in this way. And I love prawn cocktail, for heaven's sake.

The chicken came hard on the heels of the prawn cock-up, a potentially passable combo of chicken, cheese and bacon. To be fair, the breast was beautifully cooked: it was tender, succulent and devoid of any discernible flavour. The cheese formed a slimy deposit on its surface, and the bacon had the texture of puppies' tongues. I felt it all solidifying in my stomach, creating a clot of protein that I knew would be with me for days.

What's depressing about all this is not so much the dispiriting awfulness of the food, but the placid, nay cheery, acceptance of it by the people of all ages who were tucking into it that lunchtime. You will have a hard time persuading me that Britain is in the middle of a food revolution while we wolf down this kind of stuff with every sign of enjoyment.

In part, it's down to the appearance of value for money: the cheapest dish, soup, was £3.50, and the most expensive, fillet steak with Stilton and cream, was £11.50 - though that made me question where the fillet had come from. Most first courses were around £4-£5, and mains, with lashings of lukewarm vegetables, £8-£9. Even so, my bill came to £15.95 for precisely what I have described: two dishes and a glass of wine.

I'm afraid I couldn't face pudding after all this. I am a foot soldier in the gastro-wars, God knows, but you have to draw a line somewhere.

· Open All day, 12 noon-10pm. Wheelchair access and WC.