Bray for two: which of the village's celebrated rooms suits a date

A very small village with a very large reputation

Bray sits on the Thames just south east of Maidenhead: a church, a short High Street, a lane running down to the water and not a great deal else. It lent its name to the Vicar of Bray, the old satirical song about a clergyman who kept his living by changing his convictions with every new monarch, and the brick almshouses of Jesus Hospital on the road into the village have stood since the seventeenth century.

Then there is the food. Within a few minutes' walk of each other are two of the most decorated kitchens in Britain and a pub run by one of the same people, and that concentration has made Bray a destination for diners from all over the world. Most of them come to tick something off. This guide is for a different evening: two people who want a very good dinner and an easy night, and who would rather the meal served the evening than the other way round.

The Fat Duck: an evening, not a dinner

Heston Blumenthal opened the Fat Duck on the High Street in 1995 and it has been one of the most talked about restaurants in the world for most of the time since. The meal is a single long tasting menu built as a piece of theatre, with a great deal of storytelling, a few surprises and very little of what a traditional dining room would recognise as courses. It takes up most of the evening. Four hours at the table is normal and nobody should plan anything for afterwards beyond getting home.

Tables are released far ahead and go quickly, so this is a dinner you book first and build the trip around, not something you add to a stay that is already arranged. It suits a pair who both enjoy food as spectacle and have the stamina for it. It is a less natural first meeting, because the kitchen does the talking for long stretches and the evening has its own script. For a first dinner with somebody, one of the other two rooms gives the conversation more room to breathe.

The Waterside Inn: the river and the old school

The Waterside Inn was opened in 1972 by the brothers Michel and Albert Roux, and it is now run by Michel's son Alain. It stands on Ferry Road right at the water's edge, with the river going past the windows, and it has spent decades at the top of the British guides. The cooking is classical French, the service is of the old formal kind, and the room is at its best on a long summer evening when the light stays on the water until late.

For a date it is probably the strongest of the three. The dinner runs to about three hours, which leaves time for a drink before and a slow walk afterwards, and the setting gives two people something to look at together when the talk pauses. There are a small number of bedrooms as well, so the evening can end without a car at all. Book several weeks ahead for a weekday and further for a summer Saturday, and dress for a formal room.

The Hinds Head: the table that is easier to get

Close to the church on the High Street, the Hinds Head is a pub several centuries old that Heston Blumenthal took on in the 2000s. It serves serious British cooking in rooms with low beams and a fire, it books days rather than months ahead, and dinner there takes an hour and a half to two hours rather than the whole night. The building has a long history of its own, and it is said that Prince Philip held his stag party there in 1947.

It is the easy answer for a first evening in Bray and the right one for a guest who wants to say he has eaten in the village without committing a whole night to it. A table at half seven, a walk down to the river and back past the almshouses, and a nightcap at your hotel makes a complete evening that never feels squeezed.

How far ahead, and how long it runs

Put side by side, the three look like this. Exact booking arrangements change, so treat these as the shape rather than the rule, and check with the restaurant itself before you fix anything else around the table.

Fitting a Bray dinner into a booking

Bray is about ten minutes by car from Maidenhead station and fifteen from Windsor, and it has no taxi rank, so book the car home at the same time as the table. Your companion can meet you at your hotel or at the restaurant door, whichever is simpler, and nothing about her arrival marks the evening out as anything other than two people having dinner.

The dinner date is four hours at £900 with her journey out already inside it, and that fits the Hinds Head or the Waterside Inn comfortably. The Fat Duck is a harder fit once the drive at each end is counted, so tell Etta the time of your table and she will suggest the length that matches it. For a guest staying over, the overnight at £1,800 is often the simplest shape, and the guide to booking length across the SL postcodes explains why a country table usually wants more time than a town one. The fee is handed to her in person when she arrives, the figure Etta has already put in writing, and the restaurant bill is yours at the table.

Who to take to Bray

Thea is the obvious name. She is based in Maidenhead, she believes in long dinners and she will argue with a menu on principle, which at the Fat Duck is half the fun. Nancy spends her own evenings by the river at Boulters, swims outdoors in weather that stops most people and would much rather sit by the water at the Waterside Inn than in any room without a view.

Cindy likes a table with water in front of it and a dinner nobody hurries, and she drives out along the M4 herself. All three are on the blondes list, each a different shade, and Thea and Nancy also appear among the curvaceous. Send Etta the date and the restaurant and she will tell you who is free.