Rob Miller flees the tourist hordes to sample a fry-up without chips: First, a confession. When it comes to this particular Oxford pub, I am a bit biased. If, feeling brave on a Saturday, I've bazooka'd (if only) my way through the hordes in Cornmarket Street, and feeling a little frazzled, it is to this pub where I have been known to administer a pint or two of, as I believe it is officially known, self-medication.

As its name suggests, it is a bit of an oasis of quiet away from the chaos of George Street and its environs. Far From the Madding Crowd, as those who have found it tucked away down (and no sniggering at the back there) Friars Entry, will no doubt attest, does make something of a change from the typical pubs elsewhere in town.

Happily, you get a good mix of people. It is not full of shaven-headed yobs with love-and-hate tattooed knuckles banging against the threshhold as they walk in, but then neither is it crammed full of braying hoorays shrilly declaiming the Eton Boating Song; instead, rather, a happy mix.

Actually, I always think a good test of a pub is whether you can read a book without attracting strange looks or getting your head stoved in with a stool.

Here, they have a selection of newspapers, which I always think is a civilised touch, although I wish people would put them back when they'd finished with them, instead of just leaving them on the table while they chat to their mates. (At which point I start looking for a handy bar stool). The music is usually unobtrusive too.

It offers a good choice of drink, from bottled lagers through cider and wine to real ale, usually offering three 'house' beers and three guest ales, almost always in excellent condition.

The menu, too, offers a fairly wide range of pub-type dishes, with usually two or three specials. Interestingly, perhaps, the pub doesn't do chips, which must make it unique.

SO WHAT DID YOU CHOOSE?

Being up ridiculously early on a day off (about 1pm), I decided on a all-day breakfast, which often seems a way of check an eaterie's standards. My meal arrived in about 10 minutes and looked tasty. The whole thing was to prove, however, a slightly arid affair.

WHAT DID YOU THINK?

The sausages, thank goodness, weren't some ghastly tube of pink emulsified sludge forced into a skin made of god-knows-what, but proper butchers' ones, from, I think, the Covered Market.

Never let it be said I've got a prejudiced attitude to processed meat, providing the process consists of cutting off a bit of animal and holding it in front of something hot, and not much else. They were, though, rather dry and crumbly. I suspect this is because of the fact that they were proper sausages without quite enough fat, rather than due to overcooking.

The egg was fine, and the bacon good too again, proper bacon, and not flecked in that white foam which results from, I think, being injected with water to bulk up both the bacon and supermarkets' profits.

The grilled tomato wasn't quite grilled enough for my taste. Whether the Tuscany-holidaying classes these days are eating grilled tomato al dente with their hearty fry-ups, I don't know. I just think they should be so cooked as to be thoroughly if you'll excuse the technical terminology squishy all the way through.

Accompanying them was, alas, brown toast. White would have been nice. After all, if one is intent on clogging up one's arteries with congealing fat, white bread will probably not be the item that knocks that final nail into your coffin.

VERDICT: For £4.95 it's not too bad a deal. Plus the ideal excuse for having a pint of beer with breakfast if you need an excuse.

Far From the Madding Crowd, 10-12 Friars Entry, Oxford, 01865 240900