A Proper Pub Once More

Years ago, we used to visit a pub at the far end of the Minories, fairly near our flat.  And I mean years ago - probably fifteen or so since we last went in. Then the Three Lords was a Young's pub and I recall it being fairly traditional and selling cask beer. Over time though it was pulled apart inside and instead of a mixed clientele it became a place with a few posing tables and a mostly young after the office kind of vibe. It offered unbearable music, shoulder to shoulder standing drinkers braying at top volume, and became just the sort of place that we actively avoid. So we actively avoided it. For years and years. Though we passed it by many times, the Three Lords was dead to us. A few months ago we noticed it was closed and kind of assumed that after Covid office workers were thin on the ground and its time had passed.

Enter Will Hawkes, whose London Newsletter I subscribe to - and worthwhile it is too - who advised that the pub was undergoing renovation and would be leased (I think) to London Brewing Company. That sounded promising and a few weeks ago, we passed it, still closed but with evidence of being worked on. We kept an eye on it and I understand it opened a week or two ago, so last night we called in. I am glad to say we immediately liked it.

Now Ye Three Lords, the place is a pub again. Entry is through a kind of foyer and, depending on your point of view, it has rather subdued lighting or is a bit gloomy. To the right is a long bar festooned by many taps dispensing London Brewing's keg offerings and others. In the middle is a set of wickets with, on this visit, four cask beers on offer.  On the left are sets of comfortable banquette type seating set to face each other, with some room dividers nicely breaking up the space.  Walls are painted black, dark grey or dark blue. In the circumstances, it was hard to tell.  Ceiling lights and bar lights are fabulous and look as though they cost a bob or two. The bar back sports spirits and is mirrored and looks good.  The pub was warm on a cold evening, and the staff - obviously new - easily outnumbered the customers. We counted six behind the bar at one point. With a boss hovering about and two chefs in the kitchen, more customers are certainly needed to make that equation add up, but let's assume this was for training purposes.  It is early days.

As I surveyed the beers, I was offered tasters.   Naturally, I tried the "best" bitter first, which wasn't to my taste at all. Slightly spicy with woody Fuggles dominating, it was, shall we say, typically Southern in profile.  I had a taste of the Ruby Mild and settled for a pint. At 3.4% it was fine, but no more. Clean with berry notes, but unremarkable. Without tasting, I ordered a pint of 100 Oysters a 4.6% stout which was, seemingly, Champion Beer of London in 2023. It was pretty black and like the mild, clean, which I like, but was undistinguished. Even with better conditioning and a tight sparkler, I doubt if its game could be raised much higher. Its champion status may well tell you more about the competition than the beer itself.

In summary, the cask beers were clean, but hardly raised the spirits. This was just ordinary. They lacked that peak of conditioning that sets things apart, but frankly you'll never do great things from these beers. They do sell Budvar, which E had, so who knows, that may have to be my tipple there and maybe the keg stuff is worthwhile? We shall see.  The tables all had menus and beer and price lists on them. A big tick there. All prices, including the beers were clearly listed, and I'd say were fair for the area.* 

I think there was no more than six or seven customers in and lacked atmosphere, but clearly on a busier night, it may have felt better. I’m told the downstairs area is rather swanky, but we didn't go there or to the toilets, so no comment on those.   

So, will we come back again? Yes. Overall, we liked it. It was comfortable, we enjoyed the background music which had actual words in it, the layout, the bar and the lovely lights. Was the welcome warm? Initially yes, but the person who served me hadn't passed his warmth on to his many colleagues, but, as I said, early days. 

To give you an idea of prices, a half of Budvar and a pint of beer - same price for both - was £8.55. To compare, a pint of Mallinsons Bitter and a half of Bitburger in the nearby Aldgate Tap was £7.80. Both were way better in the latter.

We noted the bar in Fullers Chamberlain Hotel, more or less opposite was rammed. Usually dead when we go.

Parking Tanks on Wetherspoon's Lawn

Pubs are thought in many quarters to be pretty much unmitigated doom and gloom at the moment and although there are some chinks of light, with Covid-19 still on the go -  and around for the foreseeable future - you don't expect to see many major pub openings, but there are still some.

Rochdale Town Centre is on the up. The River Roch, culverted and hidden for many years is now open again and providing a fine focal point for a revamped centre which includes a new shopping mall, complete with a cinema and eateries bang in the middle of town. OK, it leaves one, or maybe two, shopping centres rather exposed to chillier times, as footfall returns to the area around the river and the wonderful Victorian Town Hall and the tram stop.  This is a town that couldn't maintain a McDonald's in the centre and with it gone, tougher times have also seen the closure of the Royal Bank of Scotland. In the fine - grand even - building thus vacated, we now have a new pub. This hasn't appeared by some kind of surprise. Clearly this million pound plus conversion has been planned for quite some time, but equally, what exactly would appear remained a bit of an educated guess. We had heard it would be entirely wet-led. That is there would be no food, which could be considered a bit of a gambol in these times. Well, maybe, but maybe not. Either way, a substantial new public house certainly had many wondering if there is room for one more?

So what's the competition? The Greater Manchester CAMRA Pub of the Year (and narrowly beaten in the National competition) is the Flying Horse.  This as you can imagine is a hard act to follow, with its traditional beer offering, combined with real ciders, craft beer and excellent food  is clearly the one to - if not beat, that will be hard - but at least emulate.  Former National Pub of the Year, the Baum, is now under new management, but still offers a great pub experience, excellent beers of both cask and craft variety, along with great food. In the former General Post Office building, we have the Medicine Tap, selling locally brewed beers and guests together with imaginative food in a very fine conversion of yet another grand building. Bombay Brew offers a well-chosen range of craft and traditional beer, as well as Indian food of the tapas variety. It is the Bundobust of Rochdale. With the Regal Moon run by an experienced real ale loving manager who frequently tops JDWs best seller of cask ale list,  there is certainly plenty to go at. In short, for the drinker and the hungry, Rochdale, with a pretty supportive council, already offers a lot.  What can the new pub add?

It opened yesterday and your intrepid reporter, for once, not also ran, went along with the lovely E to see what was what.  The building is impressive. The outside has been cleaned up by  Amber Taverns, who operate it as part of their Hogarth's chain. The building itself was used as a house by the Rawson family from 1819, who conducted their banking business from the small adjoining building.  It was rebuilt in 1879 and redesigned in 1913 to create the distinctive porticoed frontage it has today.

Inside, once you have navigated the Covid-19 formalities and hand sanitising, you first notice the long bar to your left. Ceilings are high and ornate and original features and covings have been retained. To your right is a seating area with windows looking out onto the Butts. Behind this area, the bank’s vaults have been turned into a separate seating area. To the rear, toilets - thankfully on the ground level - are modern and appealing, as is the large beer garden to the rear.  Carpets are thick and seating a mixture of low and high. All in all, rather handsome.

All well and good, but what of the beer I hear you ask? As you might expect from Amber Taverns, the usual suspects are all here. Fosters, Carling, Heineken, Kronenbourg, Morretti and John Smith's are to the fore. For the real ale lover we have Tetley Bitter and Hobgoblin. Gin menus are everywhere and a fiver will bag you a double of some rather decent gins, as well as the tonic to go with it. Beers are very keenly priced with Tetley at a mere £2.15 a pop and Carling at £2.60. Others a tad less.  The pub was, as I'd expected, quite busy with the curious. Service was good and cheerful, aided no doubt by the Covid queuing system precluding any stress from a baying thirsty mob.

So who is it aimed at? Prices, being of an ilk, clearly indicate its next door neighbour the Regal Moon is the target. I imagine it will attract a few others too, depending on how its clientele develops.  The real ale drinker though is likely to give it a fairly wide berth, but those in need of decent gin in rather more comfortable surrounding than Spoons, might well be tempted too.

Like all new pubs, this will be a work in progress, but it will find a niche and will take business from elsewhere. New customers for the Rochdale "offer" will very much depend on the success of the whole town centre redevelopment, but Rochdale is heading in the right direction.

The Tetley Bitter retains little of its previous flavour.  As someone who drank a lot of it in my time, it isn't the same at all. Condition was average, as nobody else seemed to be drinking it.  I can also confirm there is no food offering. I didn't see as much as a bag of crisps.

There is a good recent piece on the redevelopment of Rochdale Centre here.    This gives more detail which I recommend you having a look at.

The building you can just see in the top photo, is the Regal Moon.

The Thirties Revisited

There's always something new and unexpected in the pub game, no matter how long you have been involved in it. Having said that, you don't really expect the unexpected in a Sam Smith's pub. OK, there may be a set of bizarre promulgations adorning the walls, advising you in polite but specific terms as to what you can or can't do and what will or will not be tolerated. Trust me though, in Sam's that's a norm - scarcely to be remarked upon at all, but rather, to be embraced as part of the ambiance - a kind of par for the course and an odd but somehow comforting enhancement to the overall experience.  What is not expected though, especially in Milnrow suburban Rochdale, which, and I'm being kind here, just isn't that sort of place, is to be accosted with, as you walk through the door and into the pub, "Table for two is it?".

The Kingsway Hotel is a very imposing building, more or less isolated on its own off a main road with an industrial estate behind it and little housing around it. It does though have a Hungry Horse more or less opposite it, so at least there is passing trade and the potential to attract it, though judging by the emptiness of the Kingsway, too much of it is doing passing and not enough doing stopping. I took the lovely E with me my for this bank holiday outing, in what can best and accurately be described, as pissing rain.  The car park is pretty big and was more or less empty as we emerged, dripping onto the parquet floor, into a rather fetching, but decidedly bare 1930's room, with a bar to left - which most unSamslike - was illuminated by only two keg fonts, one dispensing Old Brewery Bitter and the other Taddy Lager. There is a well appointed dining room straight ahead, with, on this visit, one table silently occupied by three people. The owner of the enquiring voice turned out to be the landlady, a rather charming Scots lass from South Glasgow, who seemed rather taken aback by me being taken aback by her greeting.  The confusion was sorted out when I explained we only wanted a drink. Chattily she explained that the emphasis was now on food, hence the paucity of the draught offering.  I expressed my surprise at this as it seemed at odds with Humphrey Smith's usual policy and was advised in turn that it was his idea and her partner , a chef of 17 years standing had been encouraged to up the food offering which is all cooked on the premises. Well I never.

I observed that the place was, shall we say, empty other than the disconsolate lone diners who were quite possibly enjoying Brown Windsor soup followed by Woolton Pie or some such. Our chatty host explained that it was Humph's policy to open on Bank Holidays, so open they were - until six. Looking around the pub interior and building are superb. Built in 1938, it is a fantastic example of inter war pub design. Totally unspoilt, it has a plethora of original features, such as the aforementioned parquet floor, a working revolving door, panelled walls, proper fireplaces, as as well as the rather grand lamps of the time. A bit of a worm hole to the past in fact. An overspill dining room was again tastefully decorated in the same comfortable 1930s manner. Local photos enhanced the experience, but the eerie quiet must have made dining a rather soulless experience and one which I was glad I hadn't signed up to.

As I looked around and E chatted to the boss woman, the chef, bored shitless no doubt, joined us for a chat while I perused the rather unambitious menu. Oddly given the ambition, it was mostly standard British pub grub, though E approvingly noted the inclusion of liver and onions.  In addition to the two keg offerings, there was a full range of Sam's bottles available at under a fiver each and even the revered Yorkshire Stingo was on sale at a modest - for this beer - £9 a pop. 

You know, somehow I liked this place a lot. The landlady was a delight, the building was superb, but I can't help but thinking they'd be better off trying to attract drinkers, re-open the closed vault and if dining really is the game, up the offering a bit.  I'd love to be here when it is going like a fair, but I've an idea a time machine might well be needed to achieve this.

I usually poke a bit of gentle fun at the Sam's pubs I review, but this time it just seems right to wish it well, as to lose such an architectural gem would be a great shame.

Apparently the pub only opens Wednesday to Sunday, bank holidays excepted.  

The landlady was a big fan of Humph who she thought rather a hard working and nice fellow. You can only speak as you find I suppose.

Underneath the Arches

There are quite a few London Breweries that are located in railway arches.  In fact that day, we'd visited two, but this time we were heading for a new arch and not a new brewery, but a new craft beer outlet. Or is it a pub? Well, we'll see.

The area around Cannon St station is suit territory, so the new Pelt Trader, a Euston Tap offshoot I believe, should have a ready audience during the week, but on a Saturday it was fair to say that the place was pretty empty.  To be fair though, it was the first week of trading.  Now I don't know why it is called the Pelt Trader as I suspect, even digging into the dim and distant, that there hasn't been that much pelt trading on this spot, though maybe some historian will point out I'm wrong and that woad covered precursor Londoners did indeed trade pelts from here, before catching the tube home.  It is a big arch is this.  Not small at all in fact, with a sort of grown up version of the Euston Tap's bar, complete with American style taps at the back, a few seats and high tables and a lot of brickwork.  It felt cavernous, but all the same, I reckon when a bit more full, it will have quite a decent atmosphere.  As an observation, it could probably do with some posters or other such artwork on the walls too, to break up the expanse of brick a bit.

I said "we" in the first paragraph and the we in this case was Tyson the Beerhound with a small but devoted bunch of his acolytes.  Down from the grim North to part with their brass in exchange for exotic Southern beers, they had a cheery determination about their day out in Smokely.  They had seen off Kernel and Partizan and the day was still young.  We filled the place up a bit, but oddly there was two different stag parties that wandered in.  Why two such sets of  hedonistic adventurers should choose to wander around a deserted Cannon Street is a mystery, but there they were all the same.  Some were even choosing from the beer list, no doubt having a well earned break from Kopperberg with shooter chasers.

Ah yes beer.  Pretty similar in line up to the Euston Tap, with Bristol Brewing leading the cask offerings and around a dozen keg beers also available.  Quality, as you'd expect from the ET mob, was universally high.  Proper conditioning and temperature to the fore - that's what I like to see.  I had Moor Nor’ Hop which wasn't that cloudy and tasted pretty damn good and a drop of Adnam's Fat Sprat, also very good.  At least I think it was Fat Sprat.  Must take notes. E pronounced her Jever to be up to snuff too. Unlike the ET, there are rather substantial toilets on the same level, so that's all good, though I do hope they are kept clean when it is busier.  A bit of general tidying up and the odd mopping would not have gone amiss, but early days.

Overall?  More a bar than a pub, but it still gave a great first impression even when very quiet.  You can't say fairer than that.

I understand the food offering when it comes will be pizza forward.    Pelt Trader, Arch 3 Cannon Street, The City, London, EC4N 6AP

Seething? No. Just One Grumble

Seething Lane.  There's a name to conjure with. Samuel Pepys, he of the diary lived there and worshipped in the tiny St Olave's Church which is still there and well worth a look as it is rather old, though reconstructed after partial destruction by German bombing in 1941. Pepys is buried there.  The area is a typical London mix of new and old and it is in the new that the latest Draft House incarnation, Seething Lane has appeared.

Now readers of this blog will know that Draft House Tower Bridge is quite near my London flat. Well a fifteen minute walk away and it is a place that impresses in every way except for this writer at least, the quality of its cask beer.  I still go there on occasion and always ask for a taste of whatever is on -  sadly, that doesn't work out - the triumph of hope over experience rarely does - so I drink something from Camden or the like. You see, I do like the place, so I accept it for what it is. A lovely place, but not one I like to drink cask in.  The new Seething Lane is even nearer to my gaff and is in an area I know well.  It has a few decent but uninspiring pubs, some better than others and we spend a bit of time there.  It needs a new and brash neighbour to help up some games. So is the new Draft House man enough for the job?  Well, yes and no, but mostly yes.

Firstly from an unprepossessing exterior - it is under a modern glass building - you step into an American Brewpub style interior of considerable size and with an immediate "wow" factor.  It is a big space with a long impressive bar on your right, an open kitchen at the back and various booth and table seatings.  It has brash neon, stainless steel, wood, leather, exposed pipework and more and it works brilliantly. Someone with flair, panache and a great eye for design has conjured a contemporary, modern, but comfortable eating and drinking space out of what was I understand, an old Post Office.  So top marks for that.  The food, typical Draft House Fare, looked tasty and appealing, though we didn't eat and service was attentive, but it was a quiet Monday evening.  It would be good to see how that all stacks up on a heaving Friday.  One small niggle. The music is described by the Draft House itself as "background."  On a very quiet Monday night it was anything but, causing a need for raised voices.  Is that a tactic to create atmosphere? 

But Dear Reader, I was there for the beer, so what can be said about it?  Beer wise there is something for everyone.  Around fifteen tall fonts dispense a pleasing selection of local and foreign craft keg beers and there are four handpumps too, plus an extensive bottle list.  The barman couldn't have been more helpful and pleasant and tasters were offered.  E stuck to keg and I had tasters of two cask beers (tasters often tell you little) before deciding to play safe with a pint of Dark Star Hophead, which was, sadly, more than a bit warm and flabby.  I switched promptly to a couple of halves of keg which were fine, though to be honest, E's Camden Seven Hop could have been colder too - it seems to be a company trend - but maybe it is just teething troubles as it is after all, early days.  I do hope so. I can't see why a new venue such as this would have anything but the most modern of cooling systems.

Overall?  I liked it a lot.  We both did in fact.  I am looking forward to seeing it at full tilt, with loads more people and the beer turning over quickly. Either way, I'm sure it will be a roaring success and handy as it is, we'll certainly be back for drinks and next time, eats.  I will though be approaching the cask beer with a certain amount of wariness, but, as always, with hope.

We came directly from the Holborn Whippet. Great chat and service from Kirsty and excellent cellar temperature cask beer.