House Style

Back in the day when there were many large regional and local pub owning breweries, in Liverpool  where I lived throughout the 80s, you often used to be able to tell at a glance, without entering the pub, whose beer was on sale. Then, when there was a pub on every corner and plenty in between, you didn't particularly need to have eyes like a shithouse rat to ascertain with a sweeping glance, whose ale you were going to encounter, or indeed where the nearest pub was. In that fine city they were everywhere. It wasn't just the corporate signage, though obviously that provided a major clue, but how the building itself looked.  Back in the days when we played darts all over the city, that was a handy skill to acquire. We all cared "whose ale" it was.

If you saw a pale, yellow-tiled, flat fronted building, then you knew for sure it was a Whitbread pub, Whitbread having inherited that particular house style from Threlfalls, who they had taken over in the 1960s. Bass houses were broadly speaking distinguished by their distinct corporate black signage, built as a canopy around the entrance. A relic of the Bass Charrington days, the included red triangle was very easy to spot from afar. Higsons pubs were identifiable by the splash of red and black and the little square, lighted box that you could spot a mile away and which, as you got closer had the re-assuring words "Higsons" emblazoned thereon.

Tetley pubs were often bigger, though there was a mixed bag. Most were inherited from Walkers of Warrington and were brick built and imposing. Signage varied from the corporate "Allied Breweries" yellow and white to those that has a makeover and plainer gold lettering with, on the wall by the door, the Huntsman logo and "One of Tetley's Houses" increasingly visible as you approached. John Smith's pubs - fewer and further between - were invariably painted green and when Walkers pubs were brought back from the dead, their distinct shield like hanging sign was a beacon for the thirsty.

It wasn't just the outside that had a corporate touch that was subtle but definable. If you had been beamed down into most pubs, without looking at the bar, you'd have been able to order your drink and be sure which brewery's beer would be placed in your sticky mitt.  Higsons pubs were predominantly red inside. Usually too they were well-worn looking and comfortable. They were often, though not always, small. Whitbread pubs on the other hand always had big tables and lots of heavy chairs and a sort of wallpapered look that gave the game away.  Rarely did they have the standard round cast iron tables that were typical nearly everywhere. They were often multi roomed - and big rooms at that - and rarely had much of the standard bench seating. They did, in fairness look more cared for than some rivals. Bass pubs were often remarkably comfortable inside and well-thought-out. This belied their rather dull exterior. They probably hid their light under a bushel better than most.

Tetley pubs invariably - unless very small - were multi-roomed and often divided by screens and sometimes still had little snugs, which, if you got in first, you could hide in. They had the neatest and grandest pubs of all the breweries. Lots of leather seating and a lot of brass was a feature in many. They tended towards the ornate and plush, even in small pubs. Some bigger pubs had public and lounge bars, the public bar usually a bit more Spartan, but clean and the lounge well appointed. It was there you took your lass (or someone else's) for a quiet Saturday night drink. And there was Greenall Whitley. These were often, old-fashioned, with best rooms and differential pricing, but varying from plush suburban style boozers, comfortable and well appointed, to small intimate and rather bare looking locals.  The white and red pub sign, of a Greek Goddess blowing her horn, was easily visible from afar, but the beer could split opinions.

Pubs then as now - varied immensely - but were usually well run and sometimes even welcoming. There was a degree of "corporate" but they weren't samey and soulless.

Looking at the bar of course gave the game away. (Mostly) plastic boxes for Whitbread, John Smiths and (sometimes) Bass. Electric pumps for Greenalls. Vinyl covered Dalex handpumps for Higsons and the Tetley Huntsman and handpumps for their pubs. Confusingly the coloured plastic boxes often dispensed real ale.

As you travelled the country, you noticed the same kind of things. I suppose pub design followed a kind of template and pattern and still does. I doubt if a newly refurbished JW Lees Cheshire pub, if taken over immediately after refurbishment by say, Holts or Robinsons, would need much of an overhaul to instantly fit into their estates.  Or vice versa.

Area Managers in the 1960s

Many breweries have Area Managers. They look after a number of the brewery's tied houses in various ways.  The role has developed over the years, but was different once. In the late 50s and early 60s, when brewery takeovers were rife, the Area Manager became a kind of enforcer for the brewery and someone who encouraged the bad habits of the former company to be renounced for the different bad habits of the new company.

This extract gives you an idea of how this might be applied - well, in the case of Allied Breweries:

Area managers, control and information

One key aspect of the merger movement was the opportunity that it gave for learning within the new companies. This was important in an industry which had traditionally been relatively closed to influences from outside. The trade press tended to focus on issues of trade defence, understandable in an industry under constant public scrutiny, but not an approach likely to encourage the development and sharing of new managerial practice. However, the corollary of this learning was that it was heavily conditioned by existing traditions, traditions which, as we will see, were heavily influenced by the policing orientation of area management. 

It is interesting to note that this constellation was decided on following visits to the new component parts of the merged company. One of the key visits was to Ansells in Birmingham where supervisors controlled both managed and tenanted houses, each supervising on average 68 managed houses and 19 tenancies. What can be seen from these examples is the large numbers of houses, which suggests that supervision rested on a policing base, rather than on a detailed engagement with activities at house level.  

An indication of this style can be obtained from this account, given by a former Birmingham supervisor from the 1960s: "One of the first things you did and this is in the mid-sixties, you took the manager into the cellar and I’ve literally, I have actually copped hold of a manager by his lapels and decked him. You would also say to the manager you can take six pence in the pound out of the till. If you take seven pence out of the till I shall have you in this cellar and I shall thump the living day lights out of you. If you take five pence out you are just as big an idiot as I take you for, because I’m telling you I shall look the other way" 

Well hopefully things will have changed a bit since then, but clearly mergers needed a bit of shall we say, finessing on the ground.

I stumbled across this when looking for something else. 

Source: Allied Breweries and the development of the area manager in British brewing, 1950-1984 Dr Alistair Mutch Professor of Information and Learning, Nottingham Trent University 

One Reason Why CAMRA Hated Whitbread

When I was interviewed recently by Laura Hadland, who is researching and writing the official biography of CAMRA, ready for their 50th anniversary in 2021, she asked me the question - and I paraphrase - "Why does CAMRA hate Whitbread?"  I sort of stumbled through an answer, pointing out its record of taking over and closing breweries, its poor commitment to real ale and a general feeling that they didn't really give a monkey's chuff about beer and pubs, just about making money - which while fair enough - was generally perceived as being done in a more than somewhat uncaring and contemptuous manner.

Whitbread was founded in 1742 and was once the largest brewery company in the world. It was a very acquisitive brewery and among others, it took over and closed leading regional breweries such as Lacons, Rhymney, Threlfalls Chesters, Strong, Brickwood, Higsons and Boddingtons.  Quite the record.  There were plenty others besides, but these were the big ones. The ones with lots of lovely tied houses.  CAMRA once sold a T Shirt with the names of the deceased breweries listed. It was entitled "Whitbread Tour of Destruction" I remember having one.

When it came to Merseyside, Whitbread weren't thought of highly. They had many pubs, often large, acquired from the Threlfalls takeover. Threllies was much loved and I believe that this sentimental regard for them didn't stand Whitbread in good stead to say the least. They closed the Truman St Brewery in Liverpool in my time there (1982). This was the old Threlfalls Brewery and while it rarely produced real ale, it was a well esteemed link with the past. As we shall see, Liverpudlians don't like to lose their breweries.

Now, one of the things I've been doing in lockdown, is to publish a piece of breweriana each day on Twitter, chosen from my modest collection of papers and artefacts.  I have plenty stuff from my Liverpool days, so I had this particular subject in mind, but felt it needed a bit more than a Twitter post. This piece is it.

One of the many unseen and unwanted outcomes  of the Beer Orders saw the Higsons Brewery in Liverpool, fall into the clutches of Whitbread.  It didn't survive that experience for long, but CAMRA in Liverpool had plenty to say about it. Scathing would be an understated and piffling description of their feelings.

(As a major aside, the Beer Orders had many unexpected consequences for the British brewing industry, many of which reverberate through time to this very day.  If you want a prime example of the law of unintended consequences, look no further than what happened next and is still happening.)

The closure of Higsons was just after I left Liverpool for Manchester. Many of those listed in the Mersey Drinker attached (1990 but undated dammit) were my colleagues in Liverpool CAMRA. The magazine excoriates Whitbread in no uncertain terms and is a paean of contempt for the company and all it stood for. The whole issue is devoted to putting into action the words of the editor with a massive call to arms. Boycott them! Don't drink fake Higsons brewed in Sheffield! Avoid their pubs and beers (including Boddingtons and the Boddington Pub Company too, who owned the former Higson's pubs) and much more.  Thousands signed an anti Whitbread petition. It was campaigning in the old-fashioned way and maybe the last hurrah for such direct action

All to no avail of course. History doesn't work that way, but when you need to know why CAMRA hate Whitbread, start by asking in Liverpool. They'll tell you.

Higsons was briefly brewed in Sheffield. I recall it was blended with Liverpool brewed beer, then the Liverpool content removed. A shadow of its former self, it ended up in Castle Eden in Durham, where all pretence was abandoned. It was now  just a beer called Higsons. It wasn't Higsons at all. 


In the same issue it was noted that Whitbread would also close The Fremlins Brewery in Faversham. Whitbread exited brewing in 2001 and are still going.

Click images to read in full.

Lost Beers

There are plenty of good beers out there. Something for everyone, but for us older types there is always that nagging feeling of loss when you think back to the beers that you used to drink and that are no more. Some of them maybe weren't  classics; some in fact might be considered downright bad if you had them to savour now, but each has a place, not only in beery history, but in the hearts and minds of those that drank and enjoyed them.

It is common, I believe - well it is a point of view that many people somewhat mistakenly hold - to think, that before the micro brewing explosion, we were all bored shitless by samey milds and bitter. Boring old brown beer if you will. But actually, those of us who were devotees of the old neck oil were back then, actually very discerning in what and where we supped. If you drank draught beer - and did so in the mid seventies to the early nineties - then you may not have realised it, but you were more likely than not to be drinking cask conditioned bitter or mild. Trad beer as the trade called it.  When the big breweries ruled the roost, backed up by large regional breweries and some local ones - certainly in large chunks of the country - though less so in London - traditional beer was the norm.

When I lived in Liverpool, my first local sold cask Greenall Whitley Bitter and Mild, via electric slider pumps dispensed into oversize glasses. You could see the beer  as it slid through the mechanism.  It was cask and I quite liked it, though it had its detractors.  When I moved home, it was next door but three to a Tetley House, but here it was handpumps and Warrington brewed Tetley Bitter and later, when they converted it, Walker's Bitter.  All cask beer.

All around were other breweries pubs. My beloved Higsons; Bass pubs selling Brew Ten, Worthington and Draught Bass, Burtonwood from St Helens and more. It was rare not to have cask, but of course into each life a little rain must fall. And fall it did with Whitbread, that old bête noire of CAMRA, who, with their start/stop real ale policy and a general disdain for cask were to be avoided.  People cared about beer alright. When you suggested meeting someone in a pub they didn't know, or a pint after work was proposed, the first thing asked was usually "Whose ale is it?"

Believe it or not though, I grew up on keg beer in the West of Scotland - a bit like most people there still do.  They just have better keg now, by and large. So back to where I started. This lockdown has got me thinking about beers I have had, loved and which, as they aren't brewed any more, I can in all probability never have again. Some maybe me seeing the past through rose-tinted spectacles. Well maybe so, but nothing wrong with that. Defunct beers are like former girlfriends. Every one was a stunner in retrospect.

So here is my top five "lost" beers in time order:

McEwan's Pale Ale

Always in pint screwtop bottles. I used to drink this in Dumbarton when in certain pubs.  McEwans Pale Ale was also the first beer I ever tasted. Darkish, not too sweet and hardly strong at all. A great thirst quencher. And I liked pints bottles. Sometimes it was a Belhaven Screwtop or if flush Whitbread Pale Ale.

Ind Coope Alloa Brewery Diamond Heavy

I loved this. I can still taste its crystal malt flavour and its slightly sweet finish. I used to have one pint - well sometimes more - each night at five'clock after work, entering the pub just as the bolt was drawn back.  I quite liked Diamond Export too, which was I believe, Double Diamond brewed in Alloa. You can see the original fonts in this advert. They changed after I left Scotland

 

Higsons Bitter

It is my favourite beer of all time. I loved this beer. Bitter, hoppy and once you got the hang of it, the finest beer to drink. I miss it very much. Higsons pubs were also great; never too big and always welcoming. My blog has many references to them.

Tetley Walker Tetley Bitter

 Brewed in Dallam, Warrington,  this always seemed to me to be lighter and more complex in taste than the Leeds version, which was always to my mind, served that bit flatter too. I drank many, many gallons of this all over Liverpool and would recognise a pint of it even now. That slightly sourish finish was so appealing. I mention it here in the context of the Leeds Brewery closure.

Ind Coope Draught Burton Ale

Mostly I drank that in Leeds when I worked there. Floral, aromatic, hoppy and deadly. Always drank a bit above its strength. A former Champion Beer of Britain and deservedly so. Criminal that this beer was allowed to die. I wrote about it here.

So there you have it. I'm not claiming each was the best, but for me it was at the time. Beers that I wish were still around today and if they were, I'd drink them in a heartbeat. 

Do let me know your favourite lost beers.

Another one that just missed the list was Boddington brewed Oldham Bitter. Tasted nothing like the original, but had a lovely lactic finish and great mouthfeel.

  
My list contains three beers from what was Allied Breweries. They were by far the best of the Nationals in my view.

A Daft Idea but a Serious Problem

Do you notice when reading the press, that we often tend to get people who know nothing about pubs, writing about pubs, reporting about pubs and offering opinions about pubs?  I mentioned one piece here recently and now I've read another. I bet there are more if I look hard enough.

This one, from the Mail Online is a beauty - though in fairness even the DM seems doubtful - and well it might be.  Professor Eyal Winter of Lancaster University, a lockdown adviser to the Government, has suggested that some restrictions will still be needed when pubs re-open. Well hardly a surprise. What he suggests is though somewhat left field. In order to ensure pubs aren't too full of the thirsty and pub starved, and to aid social distancing, he proposes that after two or three pints you should be asked to leave. If you don't comply he anticipates those flouting the rules should be fined. Seems there are rumbling fears that some people would behave unacceptably as soon as lockdown measures cease and pubs are likely candidates for such behaviour.  In that of course, he may just have a point - though actually most drinkers behave absolutely reasonably - but isn't it axiomatic that the cure must be better than the illness?  Impractical and potentially unfair rules, may precipitate  the very behaviour that is being worried about.

Now drinking under whatever new restrictions are imposed - and I'll come back to this - is hardly likely to be overly conducive to good cheer, but this is a rather odd one. Would there be a time limit imposed? Who would monitor and police this rather optimistic policy? If another pub is open won't these rascally drinkers just decant and start again elsewhere?  Will you have a card stamped with a time as you go in and a burly operative come and hoy you out onto the pavement when your time is up? Fines? How exactly? Can't see the Police fancying enforcing this one. It appears to be pretty unworkable to anyone who knows how pubs and drinking actually work in practice.

Actually, in places, the prof isn't entirely off beam in what he says.  He also said  "One of the most important things is to have a programme to say 'in two weeks we will do such and such' You need to make the rules crystal clear and explain the rationale behind each one of them." That is sensible enough. Apply it to his own proposal and you might just kick it into some very long grass.

Moving on, it is beyond doubt there much thinking yet to be done in this area. Pubs are tricky places to deal with, unlike, say, shops, or Garden Centres. Social distancing is counterintuitive for pubgoers and you usually want to go to the pub for some undefined time. You can't have a one in one out policy very easily - or a time limit for individuals - and even if  some unpalatable proposals are probable, they have to have the benefit of clarity, fairness and practicality. Not an easy problem to solve.

Clearly social distancing won't go away but it really is hard to see how it could operate in pubs, especially smaller ones.  There are other considerations too.  It seems highly improbable that opening pubs in vastly reduced circumstances would be likely to solve the financial difficulties of most of these businesses.  On the other hand, putting aside whether it is financially a goer, would a highly restrictive policy of operation be attractive to customers if they couldn't, for example, mix with friends? Would there any longer be a point to pub going, where social intercourse and mingling with others in the very nature of the beast?

These are complex issues and I for one feel rather uneasy about what might happen next. 

I kind of get the worrying feeling that re-opening pubs is an all or nothing thing. A halfway house is very hard to achieve.

 Having written this, I hope there is a good solution. I'm sorry I can't suggest one.

Drinking on the Home Front

Most of my readers (if I've still got any) and Twitter followers - I have plenty of them -  know that I don't really drink at home. I like to drink in the pub. Any pub really, but of course I do have favourites - my locals.  Places where I go quite often.  I've always been that way inclined and in fact wrote about it here, a long time ago. In these local pubs, I know enough people to be recognised by and to speak to. People who call me by my name, shake my hand when I come in and who I know by name in return. It makes me feel part of something. On the other hand drinking at home seems rather furtive somehow. Something I somewhat unreasonably feel you do not because you want to, but for reasons of finance, domestic arrangements or whatever, though of course, I freely admit, many must do so simply because they like it. It is how they drink. But it isn't really me.

Friday saw five weeks since the pubs were told to close.  Have I missed going out to the pub? You bet. I miss the simple fact of deciding to "go for a pint".  I miss my Sunday sessions in the Tavern with my pals, the banter and just being there. And I miss cask conditioned beer of course.  But I don't believe in wearing a hair shirt.  I've been drinking beer at home. Given that on the whole weather has been fantastic, I've enjoyed a different kind of beer o'clock. Around five in the evening E and me have had a beer or two in the sunshine in our garden. Not every evening, but certainly most if the sun is still shining.  We have had to wear fleeces on the odd occasion and once, given the rather spiky wind that generally accompanies sunshine in the Grim North, we reinforced our outer apparel with blankets.  We have remarked, like everyone else, about the perfect blue skies, the absence of vapour trails and aircraft and enjoyed the birds singing. Not so much though the whirring sound of  wood pigeons, but you can't have everything, can you?

It has been good to sit in our unusually tidy garden and I have enjoyed the togetherness. It's just us, with the odd word here and there with a neighbour, but what do we drink? Well, for me, predominantly, it has been bottles of St Austell Proper Job.  Bottle conditioned, but with the tiniest of sediments, it has been ideal. At 5.5% it is a tad hefty, but it isn't over gassed and after two of them, I find that will do. E has been drinking German lager. Warsteiner for its bitterness, but sometimes Krombacher. Both well-made and easily available.

Normally if I'm in a supermarket, I pay little notice to the beer aisle. Naturally, from time to time, I do have a nose at what's around, but I don't study it in detail.  Now it is different and the first thing that strikes me, is how bloody cheap it is. My Proper Job is currently £1.49 for half a litre in Aldi, while I have discovered too, that 660ml bottles of decent German lager are now a thing. Who knew?  Not me for sure and at 3 for a fiver, it is certainly priced to go. Even with an accompanying bag of crisps-  or whatever - it is as cheap as chips to drink at home if you buy it from the supermarket and mostly, for most people, why on earth wouldn't you?

Now I know that it is good to support local breweries - and I do by buying my weekly treat of a 5 litre bag in the box of re-racked cask beer from Pictish Brewery in Rochdale. The lion's share of that gets supped every Friday afternoon and evening, with two or three pints for the next day. Served by handpump, there is a little wastage from the line, but it is worth it to support a local brewery and to get a cask conditioned pint. That, next to the people is what I miss most.

Reflecting on all this, one of the things that worries me, is that perhaps even more people than already do, will realise that there are huge savings to be made in drinking in the ease and comfort of their own homes.  I worry that drinkers will get used to it and used to the savings. The longer this goes on, the more the pub drinking habit is compromised, particularly if the return to pubs opening brings with it restrictive practices that make pub going a far different experience to that which they formerly enjoyed. Added to that is the cumulative effect on disposable income as the lockdown continues.

Habits once broken are difficult to re-establish.  Pub going as we know it will certainly be different for a time at least and maybe forever for some.

There are many other aspects of this to be explored. Hopefully I'll do that soon in future posts.

Other beers I have enjoyed at home are BrewDog Lost Lager, Thornbridge Jaipur (despite the daft little cans) and Sierra Nevada Summer Ale left over from last year. I've still got some interesting stash stuff to tackle too.

Three Weeks Needed?

From today's Twitter I note the somewhat startling information that pubs will need three weeks notice (ideally four) before they are able to open after lockdown. You can read it yourself in the good old Morning Advertiser. The source is the British Beer and Pub Association, (who I for one don't rate particularly highly.) You can read what is said here.

Of course there is a fair point about breweries needing to scale up operations again to get beer delivered to pubs and yes, pub operators will need to give furloughed staff notice that they will be required once more. But in the latter case any employer worth their salt will be in constant contact with furloughed staff anyway, as they have I assume, still got an ongoing duty of care. It follows that this in itself shouldn't pose a particular problem as much can be anticipated before opening is allowed again.

 The point about breweries is well-made though. Larger breweries have arrangements with tenants, managers and free trade clients that will have to be re-introduced over a period of time, but the argument that pubs need four weeks notice to me seems unduly pessimistic.  My best guess is that most will open readily with whatever they can get their hands on and with whatever restrictions are applied, just to get back in the game. There will though undoubtedly be a need for imagination here and a bit of leeway from suppliers and customers alike is most probably needed.

Going back to breweries, I'm again guessing that the hospitality sector will be near the back of the queue when it comes to opening up for business once more. That would imply by its very nature, that they will have a fair bit of notice.  Either way both sides of the bar should be thinking now about how they will handle that day when it comes.

Sadly, though we can't expect that day or any sort of timetable for that day, anytime soon.

The photo above by my good friend Michael, shows the notice on the THT door.  He walks his dogs that way, though I think I'd find it too traumatic myself.

Maybe some breweries might find a temporary loosening of the tie will be helpful in getting cash and beer flowing again. I'm not exactly hopeful of that though. It would set too many hares running.

Not Well-Versed but a Point Remains

Vice Magazine - no me neither - has been yakking on about why men stand at the bar. Why they should be interested in this is a moot point, but they nonetheless come up with a theory - based on no evidence at all of course - that it is men behaving badly. Their theory is summed up in their own words "they (men) all turn into prats trying their best to-out prat each other. One of their favourite ways to do this is by getting in the way of everything. In this case, by standing up in a seated establishment. 

Written by Gina Tonic - see what she did there - the article goes on to consult various behavioural gurus about this phenomenon, at the same time contradicting the theory above that pubs and bars are "seated establishments" in a sentence that correctly identifies that "Both traditional and modern drinking establishments........ are environments designed to drink and stand." More odd references follow, all supposing there are male domination factors at play. Allegations such as "Men love standing in pubs because it’s masculine. Men love showing off and peacocking, and sitting down would limit this." 

Now I do recognise that all this is somewhat tongue in cheek, but there is a serious point. Bar blockers are a bloody nuisance and are off-putting - not so much to women - my experience is they are well capable of looking after themselves - but to the casual visitor to whom a wall of backs is anything but welcoming. Now if you are a local you just shout over the blockers, or tell them to get out of the fecking way, but that isn't quite so wise if you aren't au fait with those afflicting you thusly.

Nowadays, being somewhat older, by and large I only remain at the bar when I'm on my own. It just seems more friendly, especially in some pubs where (nod to Mudgie) the lack of bench seating limits the possibility of a natter with a neighbour and discourages the joining of a table where other are already sitting. I don't sit on a bar stool though. I stand. That allows me to move sideways if someone wants to get in to buy a drink. To my mind at least, standing at the bar, providing the niceties are observed, isn't a great problem. It becomes an issue when bar stools allow a number of people to camp out for the duration, oblivious and indifferent to those behind them doing their best to get even a glimpse of a barperson to attract attention to the fact that they would actually like to purchase a libation.

So what's the answer? Assuming it is actually more than a slight bugbear, to me, it is to limit the number and position of bar stools to allow free passage to the bar and thus to the amber nectar.

Down to the pub bosses then to sort out? Yup. No bar stools equals a much smaller problem.

Of course, it is often the largest spending locals who are barflies and that's an issue too. As a landlord/landlady you don't want to piss off your regulars.

Should simple pub etiquette eliminate this problem? Probably. 

I note our friend Gina Tonic also explores some other bothersome subjects in earlier articles. read them here.

Treading the Grapes

There are two Sam's pubs in Heywood, so one Saturday, long before lockdown was even thought of, I felt like resuming my Sam's Odyssey and Heywood, being ten minutes away, fitted the bill nicely. Now Heywood is known as Monkey Town for reasons somewhat unknown, but speculated on. I turn to Heywood's History site for enlightenment and two explanations are offered.  I rather like the one with a pub connotation of course, whereby folklore had it that Heywood men used to have tails, and so the stools and benches in the town's pubs had holes in them for the tails to fit through. The reality, the article concludes, is that the holes were there for carrying the stools. Hmm. I'll reluctantly rule that one out then, but the same piece surmises that the nickname ‘Monkey Town’ is derived from the pronunciation of Heap Bridge - a local area - as ‘Ape’ Bridge, and probably dates from the 1840s-50s. Not quite so much fun, but let's go with that.

My first port of call was an old haunt of sorts. I used to go to the Engineers Arms quite often when I first moved to this area and liked it a lot. It is one of the few Sam's pubs in my area that sells cask beer and is a neat little pub of considerable appeal. Alas, it didn't appeal quite so much on this visit, as it was firmly closed. Not tinned up or boarded up, just looking like it hadn't got round to opening that day. No signs to indicate why.  So one down, one to go.

The other pub, the Grapes isn't far away, but with the vagaries of the roads and my uncertainty about exactly where it was, it took me longer than the four minutes my Satnav suggested.  The pub sits in a kind of island with a large car park and is surrounded by housing, so a good prospect? The pub is red brick built - like a scaled up outside lavvy - and there is a light over the door and it appears to be open - so in I go.  Inside a spartan looking bar counter faces me. There is one guy standing at the bar and a couple sitting on stools facing the bar. Behind the bar a woman looks at me uncertainly. There is a sort of question mark in the air. Is the stranger here for directions perhaps? I scotch that idea by ordering a pint of Taddy Bitter. The barmaid is pleasant and my bar companion gives me an uncertain nod. They all resume what they had been doing, which seems to be nothing at all.

I observe the pub. It looks like it hasn't changed since the thirties. It has an odd little entrance and the gents, facing the bar, also has, well an odd little entrance. To my left is a partition and I can hear the thud of darts and some mild effing and jeffing. There is another room to the front with nobody in it. The whole place is clean enough, but it looks shabby and sorry for itself. You could have filmed a 1930s period piece here without changing a thing.  (Well, you'd have had to take the Sam's notices forbidding more or less everything down, but otherwise, not a lot to change). It was devoid of any decoration or ornaments, which gave it a rather sad and dejected feel.

For want of something to do, I look in the room with the darts players and two middle-aged lads are happily throwing arrows and doing their best to put each other off.  Returning to the bar - two steps away - I sip my pint. There is only Taddy Lager on draught as well as my beer, which is both cheap and pleasant. Then, from an unknown area behind the bar comes the unmistakeable sound of someone whistling, bizarrely and somewhat astonishingly, "Scotland the Brave".  The whistler (the landlord it seems), nods to the landlady, who swaps places and disappears. He sets up his stall by rearranging the sole decoration on the otherwise bare gantry. That is, he adjusts the packets of crisps to his better satisfaction.

Things hot up. The sitting couple have a conversation about the inadvisability of wearing gumboots when you have flat feet. The guy at the bar is consulted who agrees. It all gets really going after that. I've become a part of the furniture and nobody bats an eyelid when I order a second pint. The barman warns the darts players about swearing, which is met with the sort of derision you might expect. Two more people enter, then a third, who defying the strictures of no mobiles, consults his phone silently before suddenly rushing out and disappearing for a good fifteen minutes. Everyone knows everyone else as you'd expect and the next few minutes are spent as they enquire of each other and the whereabouts of this one and that one. They conclude that their absence is because everyone is skint. Then Rochdale people are given short shrift in very pejorative terms, joined in by shouted agreement from the darts player beyond the partition. The third man returns and resumes his lager. Nobody talks to him, but suddenly a few minutes later it is clear he is a local as well, as the discussion moves on, and he chips in.

My bar companion eventually turns and looks at me and I ask him about the closure of the Engineers Arms.  Been closed since before Christmas it seems. I consult the landlady who has silently reappeared and swapped places with the landlord. "The curse of Humphrey?" I offer.  Shrugs all round, but I'm guessing it is. There is one final surprise. From the other side of the pub in a room I didn't nose in, comes a woman.  She greets her fellow denizens and then with a silently ordered half pint of lager in hand, disappears back into her lair. Was she alone? Who knows?

You know, I kind of liked this place. The people were enjoying their own company in their own way. If they resented my intrusion into their world, they didn't show it.  And it is their little world and none the worse for that. I'd love to see it in full swing, but then again, maybe I had.

I do worry that this pub may suffer a bit with the current closure of pubs and the Engineers will no doubt still be looking for a new manager.

And yes, it was gumboots, specifically that was talked about. Not wellingtons, but gumboots.

It's Been a While

Well here I am back blogging. Well a bit. Why did I stop? Mostly I was just completely knackered after the Manchester Beer and Cider Festival and from my ongoing duties as Chairman of Rochdale, Oldham and Bury Branch. Basically after a long - well very long - period of  commitment to beer, CAMRA and my own beer blog, I was just burned out.  I simply couldn't be bothered and spent my on line beer time on Twitter instead. Simple, nothing much to think about, but keeping up involvement.  Actually the cessation of all official CAMRA stuff couldn't have come at a better time for me and, maybe though I hate it, the closure of pubs has likely done me no harm either in terms of having a break. I am on holiday really, though certainly the lack of pubs and its concomitant lockdown isn't much fun.

But of course I do miss pubs. I miss my locals and by extension my friends.  It's where I met and meet most of them and where I am invariably at ease. I am lucky enough to be known by name in four pubs I can call my locals - well more really, but these others aren't my locals. Each appeals to me and accordingly is missed by me in a different way, but it is what it is and I don't think I have to worry too much about those four opening again, as they are all owned by my local family brewer (which is on the good guys list).  I do fear for many pubs when this is all over though. I also fear for at least some brewers and while I always felt a shake out in the micro brewer sector was coming, I didn't imagine it would come in this format. Sadly, as always in these things, it won't be just the bad brewers and bad guys that will go to the wall.

I have been following closely the efforts made by many brewers big and small, to keep beer coming the customer's way. This is a good thing and I have availed myself of the services of Pictish Brewery, a local Rochdale one, whose excellent cask beer - re-racked but you can't have everything - to keep me going at weekends - well Friday only so far. I've put it on handpump and it has been excellent and much better than bottles, though I have had a little success in that respect with Proper Job, which is almost as good in bottle as it is in cask. It has been expertly conditioned in the bottle and is highly recommended.

As I write it looks to me as if we will have a few publess weeks yet. I read some dire predictions with increasing weariness, much as I read some dreadful stuff from armchair experts about Covid-19. Who knew so many people study epidemiology to expert level from the comfort of their own homes? Like many things in life I just don't know, but in the meantime, I'm just staying at home wherever possible. It's all I can do to usefully contribute.

I do look forward to getting back to normal, so to follow this, tomorrow hopefully, I'll publish a held over blog as part of my ongoing series of Sam Smith's pubs. And I hope you have been reading and enjoying my breweriana tweets.

There has been some funny and uplifting stuff on Twitter. That's been fun. Not so much fun is to read about some pub companies who have been a bit less than supportive. We shall remember them.

I've lost a bit of weight too, which is also fun, but I have a wish to eat chocolate and crisps which I didn't really have before. Must stop buying them I suppose, but you need some fun. Oh and my shed is painted. More soon.

Win Some - Lose Some

I'm going to tell you a little story. It could in theory be my entry into next year's British Guild of Beer Writers Awards in the Beer and Travel Section. Somehow though I suspect it is not exactly the sort of thing they have in mind - even if it does exactly what it says on the tin - it is all about beer and travel. Anyway here we go.

The lovely thing about Munich is that unlike a lot of German cities, there is an abundance of pubs and other drinking establishments. That - and you can trust me on this one - is kind of rare for many German cities. If you don't believe me, try walking about Augsburg for a few hours, dragging your thirst behind you. You will be disappointed and footsore. But I digress.

On a recent Munich visit, after the usual Christmas market stuff two or three weeks ago the lovely E and I decided that  a quick visit to Tegernsee am Tal was in order. Now a couple of points are worth mentioning here. The first is that I have been in this pub a few times before despite the fact that it hasn't been in its current location for too many years. The second that I've been to the brewery itself and the third is that for years I have sold Tegernsee Spezial - one of my favourite beers - on the German Bar at the Great British Beer Festival.  I know the beer. This is a relevant fact.

So in a quiet spell around 4 p.m. the pub is pretty empty. In the front a couple of locals have pole position for people watching and inside there is another pair near us. In the restaurant area, three Americans eat salad, drink dark beer and chat. Not quite the Mary Celeste, but fairly close. I order a Spezial and a Helles. We sit in the semi circular booth seat overlooking the bar. I can see, despite the brass or copper frontage, the beer being poured. It is fine. Poured straight from the tap it is golden, clean tasting and clear as a child's eye. Nothing much happens as we observe languidly and chat. My beer, the first of the day, disappears without a protest. It is good. Very good. I order a second. Again I can see what is going on under the beer taps. This time there is a bit of juggling with beer glasses. My beer when presented has a more tired looking head and isn't so sparking. Not cloudy, but a tad hazy. Certainly no longer zingingly clear. Hmm. It is flatter too. Seems I've had some older beer poured into my half litre and topped up with fresh. Damn.

Now I have a customary rule of avoiding arguing with Germans. One hates to generalise, but I find the German capacity for admitting being wrong, is, shall we say, limited. (Just try asking for a top up of short measure to see what I mean). But I felt a bit pissed off, so I enquired of my waiter in the most gentle of terms, about the clarity of my beer. He looked at it and went back to the pourer, who came to talk to me.  "Ah" he said. "It's Spezial. That's always a bit like that." "Umm, no" I demurred in the softest of tones. "It never is.". He smiled knowingly. "OK" I said thinking foolishly I was playing a trump card. "Pour a little fresh beer into a glass and show me." He did and the beer was as clear as the clearest of bells. I could have took his photo through it. The beers were totally different. He smiled again. "There you are" he purred. "It's just the same."  I couldn't help grinning back. He had me. I knew in that instant he would have climbed a snowy Zugspitze dressed only in his underpants rather than admit he was wrong. He wasn't the owner. He didn't really have any skin in the game, but he was taking the view, for whatever reason of; "Look Mate, I'd rather tear my own heart out of my chest with my bare hands and dance on it, than change your beer for you. So just give up".

So smilingly, I left him and my unfinished beer to it. Somehow and somewhat oddly though I had enjoyed the encounter. Maybe it played to a feeling that I had just had an unexpected insight into the German physche. Or that a stereotype had been confirmed. I fought the urge to extrapolate that too far and simply went for a beer elsewhere.

I should mention that as soon as I called the waiter over, E buggered off and left me to it. Window shopping beats arguing in E's view.

Bonus. In the next pub, we arrived just in time for Ayinger Brau Helles vom Bayerische Anstich being freshly tapped - as happens at five every day. It was rather lovely.

The Mechanics of Beer

It isn't often I venture to a brewery I've never heard of which is nonetheless within walking distance of our London flat. Oh there are plenty of breweries I have never heard of that are within walking distance of the flat, but normally I can't be bothered looking for them. You know the drill. A squashed railway arch with a few rag, tag and bobtails of scraped together vessels; a hardly heated, cramped bar with German style benches, lookalike, barely drinkable, overpriced beer and that "What the fuck am I doing here when I could be in a nice pub?" feeling.

But last Friday, gripped by the news in London Drinker that Mechanic Brewery - no me neither - had introduced cask beer got me thinking that the mile and a half walk might be worthwhile.  Easy peasy from here. Get up to Whitechapel Road, turn left after the Blind Beggar and you are nearly there.  Now Whitechapel Road is a bit like Karachi in places with its street food stalls, clothing shops, Asian sweet and kebab shops and more. It is a polyglot place which I kind of like. Something for most people and interesting.  We walk along there quite often and while no fan of Asian sweet shops, the kebabs and pakora always attract me.

Turn left, past Sainsburys and keep going. Council flats are the order of the day and the place gives off an atmosphere almost of a small town, though you are only a few hundred yards from the bustle and the buses. There is nobody much about. A railway line looms ahead and we turn right. Suddenly, abandoned old London taxis are everywhere. Old as in will never move again. Like a dinosaur cemetery, they lay as if awaiting discovery by some future explorer. Here and there lights in arches show people hard at work, dismembering carcases and applying them to bust up taxis. This is where London cabs come mostly to die and for some, a Frankenstein like afterlife as spare parts.

Under another bridge, the underside of which was littered with more of the dead, we see a row of lights. "That'll be the brewery" I thought. It was. An open metal gate, an arch with that heavy plastic drop down sheeting that you struggle to find a way through, but we did. Inside it was just as already described, but empty apart from the barperson. It was warm though and good sounds emanated from speaker above the bog - unisex - or is it gender neutral now - of course.

The beer list was fine. I tried three thirds. A mild, a curiously appealing lime stout and a more standard pale beer. E had a creditable can of Kolsch.  I chatted to the operative. They don't have cask in the Tap and only do it for festivals, but he admitted many people ask for it, so a handpump will be installed. We agreed the mild would much better suited to it than keg dispense.  As we drank up our host mentioned there is three other breweries round the corner. Thanking him,we left  and went round in the direction indicated by the jerk of his thumb. More defunct taxis littered the streets. We saw no signs of a further brewery, just an old and derelict pub, with a single electric bulb, creepily lighting some upstairs room through tattered Addams Family like curtains.  This looked like a fine place to get murdered, so we made our way by a different route, back to Whitechapel Road.

Mechanic Brewery is fine. You can see why it is named as it is. Quite good in many ways. We'll call back in daylight and maybe manage that elusive brewery crawl.


Still not been in the Blind Beggar. Must remedy that. It looked busy.

Sadly no spicy food for me.That was vetoed. Well no spicy Asian food anyway. My usual  Vesuvio pizza from Pizza Union in Leman St was unlike them, sadly a bit overdone.

Sloppy Behaviour

When I was young it was common custom in many pubs to "recycle" back to the customer, overspill from poured beer in the drip tray,  Usually a tell tale pint glass with a few inches of beer stood by the drip tray and unless you watched like a hawk, a small amount of this was put in your glass first and then topped up with fresh beer.  If you were unaware of this bad practice, or just not near the offending pump and thus oblivious - then that's what happened. Nearly everywhere. Breweries and landlords then, as now, make use of what they can to preserve stocks and gain margin.  I was told once - though the truth of it may be different - that the reason tall founts, keg or cask were used in Scotland, was to make the visibility of the beer and therefore its freshness obvious to the customer. Attempted "slopping" the consumer became something of a game, where you'd fix the barperson with a gaze that said "Don't try it with me Pal"  while he or she looked for ways to do it without you noticing.

I know this as I was both an avid watcher outer for such happenings and, in my years behind the bar, a reluctant exponent of it, though only when the Boss was there. When he wasn't, the drip trays were tipped down the sink and we also took great care  to avoid wastage in pouring. I too, way in the past,  have been warned by an intended sloppee - in no uncertain terms - not to try and do it with him. And rightly so.

This still goes on,but perhaps much less nowadays. I get the impression that in these times of Health and Safety and much better hygiene awareness, that most in the trade refrain from it, if not always, at least in most cases.  I for one always try and look to ensure I see my glass filled freshly. Over the years I have though, pulled various people up for it and refused the pint.  (A small amount of freshly spilled beer from a pressurised keg is unlikely to show much sign of itself. Not so in cask beer, where even a relatively small amount of flat beer can take the edge off the liveliest pint.)

Now sadly this meander down memory lane has a point other than me thinking fondly back to unsullied pints of Diamond Heavy or Tennents Lager.  On Thursday I was shown in the most blatant of ways, that in some places, this malodourous practise flourishes, though fortunately I was the witness in this case, not the victim.

In London and in increasingly heavy rain, we took a stroll round Covent Garden buying Christmas cards and watching the world go by.  In time we had a couple of pints of excellent stout in the Porterhouse Brewery in Maiden Lane and then in even wetter weather, headed somewhere that I could try a half of Sam Smith's Yorkshire Stingo,  rarely if ever, seen on cask.  A bit of drama ensued first of all as we entered though. A old lady was lying sparked out on the tiles, with anxious folks around her. In a booth overlooking the bar, we were asked to watch belongings as they fettled the woman in distress. I ordered a warm up pint of Old Brewery Bitter which had that distinct bottom of the barrel feeling about it.  Not quite bad enough to call for a replacement, but which was half heartedly, half supped without enjoyment.

From the vantage point of the booth, I had a good view of the set of pumps (both cask and keg) at the bottom of the bar. The pub was rammed and the barstaff busy. One lad stood out. He fussed over a new member of staff, showing her how to pour, though to me he made a pig's ear of it more than she did. I first noticed that Sam's Nitro Stout was virtually headless  though a bit of judicious swirling produced a slight one. Gas gone? Almost certainly. But he carried on regardless.  After a few more pints the bitter went off. This would be interesting. With the sparkler still on (Just makes the operation less speedy and slick) two or three pints of froth were pulled into a jug, then poured into a couple of glasses, which along with the half pint or so from when the beer went off, they were put to one side. The customer waiting for his pint was further up the bar. His half pint of cask bottoms was then topped up with the new beer. Urgh.

The horror show increased in intensity. Next the jug was shared into pint glasses and the beer topped up again with fresh. Now much of this beer would have been in the beer line and thus bottom of the barrel.  I shudder to think what it tasted like.  Wheat beer was then taken directly from its drip tray, poured into a beer glass and the beer topped up with fresh. All such spillages were, in varying amounts, given direct to customers, but not to these that could see what was going on.  Shocking stuff.

Now was this the rogue behaviour of one barman? Was he under instruction? Did he simply not know better than to do this?  I couldn't say, but the pressure on Sam's landlords to deliver the maximum volume from containers is well known.

By this time, the old lady's relatives had come back. She was fine and was apparently in the habit of conking out. Her daughter took her off in cab, while the rest of he family returned to drinking.  We didn't have another drink given what we'd both witnessed and went off elsewhere.

It was still pouring down.

So I didn't have my Stingo, a mere £7.40 a pint, but  I will do before I go back North again. Just not in a very ornate pub in Holborn.

We nipped into the Citte of Yorke after, but it was rammed. Oh and in the other pub in Holborn we paid by card - as everyone else seemed to be doing. If Humph stops that in London, he'll have no business left. 

Last word. I have a witness. E watched all of the horror show with me.

As You Were - More or Less

My old friend RedNev reported that the Dispensary, one of Liverpool's finest real ale pubs, would no longer stock real ale following the retirement of the previous landlord who had ruled that particular roost for some years - and in his own very strict way.  It is a favourite Liverpool haunt of mine whenever I am there, so the news, later corrected by Nev, was not welcome.

Now I hadn't read Nev's correction, so when I was back in Liverpool last week, I nipped in to find out what was what and it seems that apart from some music being played over the speakers, nothing has changed.  Most important of all, my beloved White Rat was in its normal place and was in exemplary condition.  A brief chat with the barman confirmed that those who had taken it over intended to keep it just as is, which is excellent news, as it is the kind of traditional boozer you just don't see enough of these days.

Looking through the window to the pub next door though things certainly had changed. The Roscoe Arms has now become the Butterfly and Grasshopper which was a bit of an odd one to me, but seemingly has a Roscoe connection.  According to the Liverpool Echo, the new name is inspired by William Roscoe’s poem The Butterfly’s Ball and the Grasshopper’s Feast which I must say I have never heard of. Here's a little taste of it for you:

Come take up your Hats, and away let us haste
To the Butterfly's Ball, and the Grasshopper's Feast.
The Trumpeter, Gad-fly, has summon'd the Crew,
And the Revels are now only waiting for you.

We didn't notice if the newly refurbished pub was open or not, but with excellent beer on hand and the promise of more, we didn't care to find out.  

I thank the Echo again for revealing that the £750,00 transformation of the Roscoe Arms is by a division of Star Inns aka Heineken. I sort of regard them much as I did Whitbread in the old days, which isn't highly at all.

The poem can be found here and is a nice little nonsense poem if you like that kind of thing. Which I do. 

If you see Rat Brewery White Rat - order it.

Just Say Hello and Smile

One of the things that is often overlooked when it comes to pub appeal is what is sometimes called "Engagement with customers" or in old fashioned terms, the welcome.

One of the first things I was taught when I became a part time barman back in the early 70s was how to welcome customers.  The Boss, an old school landlord and  stickler for such stuff, was very keen that things should be "done right".  First lesson. Rule number one. When a customer comes in and approaches the bar, no matter what you are doing, you look up and say "Hello" or "I'll be right with you" or some such other nicety.  He explained it as putting the customer at his ease; setting the tone. That kind of thing.  The second was to let people waiting at the bar know they had been seen.  You would preferably say "you're next", or second or whatever. And yes, you were expected to know whose turn it was and if you ever said "Who's next?" you'd be rewarded by a growl in your ear and the Boss saying "It's your job to know who's next".

Now back in those days there were many more pubs and indeed, many more customers.  The Boss reckoned that good service would often make a difference in the customer's mind. (Likewise he always said that if anyone complained about a pint, you should exchange it without hesitation. His argument was that the goodwill thus generated through word of mouth was worth more than the occasional drainpoured pint.) Returning to customer welcome, in that respect I'll venture nothing much has changed about the fact that it works.  Good service, a smile and a word can make a big difference. Far too often these days barstaff  will rarely even look at you if they can avoid doing so and as for knowing who is next - well - not going to happen. I have often been served a pint with no eye contact and no words being exchanged. How poor is that? And don't get me started on the now ubiquitous "You alright there?".

I was reminded of this when I was in Liverpool a few weeks ago. In every pub we went in, we were engaged in some kind of conversation - even in the busy JDW at the station where we met to discuss our drinking plans for the rest of day.  OK, it was lunchtime to mid afternoon and the pubs ranged from busy to moderately quiet, but in each you felt that you were actually important, where as in many these days you do well to be even noticed.

Too often what is missing from the hospitality business is hospitality.  In the days of pubs struggling, that should be an easy win, but one that is so often noticeable by its absence.

Another thing we had to do was say goodbye and thanks to customers. When did that last happen to you?  And then by the way, we had to clean the entire pub including the toilets, before we went home. We were paid buttons and supped it all when we finished. And we loved it.  It is likely where my enduring love affair with pubs was forged.

I wrote about this kind of thing a few years ago. Well 8 years ago. Here  it is. Time flies.

The Thomas Usher ashtray came from that pub. It is the only physical thing I have from there.