Ten years ago Holt's Brewery did some special stuff for their chosen charity. I remember paying a fiver to visit the brewery - by and large they don't do tours - and recall visiting the roof where hundreds of hogsheads (54 gallons) were stored. Our CAMRA lot, well some of them, visited nine Holt's pubs on 9/9/99.
Our Membership Sec recreated this yesterday on 09/09/09 and while due to other things I couldn't go on the whole crawl, I joined them for a quick burst of three pubs, two of which I hadn't been in before. The beer was good in all three and I tried both mild and bitter. It was great to see pubs busy at "tea time" and mild flying out across the bar. I haven't drunk Holt's for a little while now, but that'll be rectified. The mild at 3.2% is fairly bitter, but what a good drink. I can't recall the price, but both mild and bitter were substantially under £2 a pint.
For the rec
ord, the pubs were:The Welcome, Whitefield; The Foresters, Prestwich; The White Horse, Prestwich.
The photos were taken last night. The poster just tickled me and was a Fire Brigade warning. Likewise the name of the pub above, still tricked out in Wilson's regalia, amused me too.
I like the beer poster too. If I fancy a post-drink snack, it's usually a cheese sandwich ~ much safer & quicker.
ReplyDeleteAll three pretty much just around the corner from me, I'll have to male a point of visiting. Did any of them offer the Holt's beer of the month as well, or was it just the basic Bitter / Mild choice?
ReplyDeleteSorry Darren, I didn't notice.
ReplyDeleteI generally avoid the seasonal beers in Holts' pubs as, if I order one, it invariably seems to be the first pint pulled that day.
ReplyDeleteBut I agree that many Holts' pubs are still bastions of the old-fashioned drinking culture.
How do you rate Robinson's, Holt's and JW Lees?
ReplyDeleteFor me Robbies at the bottom, on form Lees at the top with Holts just behind. OMMV.
ReplyDeleteAh, the “Nats” as it’s known locally, is an interesting place. People often do a double take as they think it’s called the Naturist & Railway-which would be even better!
ReplyDeleteActually named after Alfred Wallace, the once famous Victorian evolutionary biologist, early environmentalist and social reformer. He was a railway surveyor in his early days. There are plans for the regeneration of Prestwich and there have been representations made to ensure that the “Nats” is retained in any new development.
I assume it sells gnat's too?
ReplyDeleteSadly, the beer choice isn't quite as interesting as the name.
ReplyDeleteJoey Holts at under £2.00 a pint. It's enough to make me want to move back to Manchester!
ReplyDeleteI grew up in N Manch and when I eventually started boozing - at the age of almost 20 - Holts was on the menu. Still love the stuff; though they now seem to gone all modern. It's time to bring back Holt's lager; Holtenbrau and, erm, Regal.
ReplyDeleteA recommendation for stopping the spam while not inconveniencing genuine contributors too much is to change the settings so that any comments on posts over, say, 14 days old require moderation.
ReplyDelete