A RESTAURANT owner whose business was the first North-East pub to be featured in the Good Food Guide has died.

Audrey Pagendam and her late husband, George, bought the Black Bull, in Moulton, near Richmond, North Yorkshire, in 1963.

They turned the one-room hostelry into a renowned restaurant and won an array of awards and national recognition, particularly for their fish dishes.

The couple also added the pub's most distinctive feature - a Thirties Pullman coach, which they bought in 1974 and incorporated into the dining space.

Mrs Pagendam, who was 76, sold the business in 2006 and moved to Middleton Tyas, near Scotch Corner.

She was born in Chepstow, on the Welsh border, and was a teacher until she moved to Guernsey. She then travelled abroad while working for Shell Oil. She met her husband, an oil rig engineer with the same company, while they both were working in Libya.

The couple had four children, all born in different countries, before the family returned to England, and Mr and Mrs Pagendam began looking for a pub or restaurant to run.

"My father had a keen interest in food and they decided to come back to England and open a restaurant," said daughter, Sarah Pagendam. "They liked Yorkshire and looked around, eventually finding the Black Bull.

"My mother did all the cooking and my father ran the bar. They were in the Good Food Guide for 38 years consecutively. They had a particularly good name for seafood and we always said that my mother brought the avocado north of Watford Gap."

The restaurant originally seated about 20 and sold a five-course meal for under a guinea, or £1.05, but the couple extended the business into a row of adjacent cottages and opened a fish bar and a conservatory.

In 1974, after adding the Pullman coach, which is named Hazel, they appointed a chef.

Mrs Pagenham, who died in the early hours of Sunday, leaves four children and three grandchildren. A funeral service will be held at St Michael and All Angels' Church, Middleton Tyas, on Tuesday.