Second set of owners in 18 months

The south Devon pub and restaurant made famous by TV chef Keith Floyd has been sold for the second time in 18 months.

Quentin and Denise Thwaites took over the Maltsters Arms at Tuckenhay, on the River Dart near Dartmouth, yesterday. The restaurant was on the market for around £400,000.

The couple, who have been managing the White Cross pub at Richmond, south-west London, for the past eight years, said they intend to serve "very good pub food with waitress service".

Added Mrs Thwaites: "Pub food is so much better these days, we feel we can now compete with restaurants for custom."

Andrew Mogford, who bought the waterside inn from the receivers less than two years ago, decided to concentrate on his other pub, the Sea Trout, in Totnes, Devon.

Floyd took over the Maltsters in the late 1980s and turned part of it into an expensive, upmarket restaurant, which became known as Floyd's Inn (Sometimes).