The public house, one of the great British institutions. A place to meet your friends, have a chat and a laugh and get a good pint. For tourists, a visit to a ‘real old English pub’ is a necessity. But how many of them will ever see the inside of a ‘real’ pub? Most of the places they will have recommended to them have been mocked up to meet the Hollywood image, sawdust on the floor, false wooden beams and the words ‘Ye Olde’ in front of the name. Nowhere is safe. Even a pub called ‘The Supercomputer’ would emerge after a refit as ‘Ye Olde Supercomputer’ if deemed worthy of ‘antiquating’. Years ago, I heard of a perfect example of this treatment. Despite the exterior of a 1960s concrete shoe-box, it was duly refurbished with a bizarre mixture of wood veneer, copper-topped tables and a very strange blue flock wallpaper which seemed to breathe due to the fake gas-lights installed ‘for effect’. Eventually it closed down, a tear was not shed upon its passing. If looking for a drink in southern England (I specify the south as by and large the rest of England, Scotland and Wales tend to avoid destroying their pubs) here are some hints and tips on what to look out for and avoid, along with some ideas on the type of drinking house to be cultivated and encouraged. First, things to beware and despise. Sawdust on the floor should be treated with suspicion, especially if drinking in the West End of London as it almost certainly means ‘tourist-trap’ or to put it another way, massively hiked prices. There are exceptions to this rule. Get into the suburbs and there are pubs that have had sawdust on the floor for years. Wine bars are also an exception to the rule, sawdust being used as wine stains are much harder than beer stains to extract from a carpet. Coach lamps should also be viewed with utmost concern. Unless the pub in question was a 17th century roadside inn, coach lamps usually indicate that the house was owned in the 1970’s by a certain major brewery and will serve some of the worst beer it could be your misfortune to taste. Steak houses are also a cause for concern. Things are getting better, but for many years a steak house meant a pub which had been taken over by a catering chain and turned into a plastic replica of the pub it once was (as shown so brilliantly in ‘Men Behaving Badly’. Gary and Tony’s local was taken over and had the insides ripped out. The plan for the refurbished pub? To bring it back to how it used to look when it first opened, based on an old photograph of the pub on the wall. The photograph was only about two years old and had both Gary and Tony in it!) The steak house will often contain a ‘themed’ restaurant area, with some cutesy concept like placing all the tables under Swiss style rooftops. If you do drink in one, be prepared for the occasional scream of horror. This will be the pub drunk waking up from his booze-sodden slumbers and thinking someone has shipped him to the Alps! Likewise all ‘theme’ pubs should be razed to the ground without a moment’s hesitation. Treat with caution all pubs selling bitter in eighteen varieties from around the globe, ‘guest’ beers excepted. Bitter does not travel well and so unless the cellarman is a master of his trade the beer may well be i) watered down, ii) taste like slops or iii) both. As a rule of thumb, about six bitters can be maintained, but only in a large house with plenty of room in the cellar to care for them. The alehouse that prides itself on having one bitter, one lager and one stout should provide excellent quality, after all they only have to know how to care for three beers! Never, ever drink in any establishment with badly chalked signs saying ‘Try the (insert name of beer in question), Eric says "It’s Great"!’ This translates as "please drink this beer as we have massively over-ordered and the contents of the barrel are akin to pipe-cleaner". One of the common fallacies put to travellers in need of refreshment is that a pub is only worth drinking in if it has a heritage dating back to the Domesday Book. Not entirely true. But older buildings do seem to have cellars better suited to the storage of ale. A vital sign of a good pub is a clean toilet. It does not have to have state of the art facilities, but as a rule of thumb, poor loo, poor pub. The two go hand in hand. My own opinion of a good pub comes from Peter Tinniswood’s I didn’t know you cared – ‘Cobwebs in’t corners, splinters on’t seats, stale Unsworth’s pork pies and a barmaid of foreboding nature. Bloody magic!’ Dismal, run-down looking establishments are a discovery of great joy to the seasoned drinker and should have an immediate preservation order slapped on them. These places will often have at least one beer worthy of canonisation and surly bar staff who look like they have lost a fight with a rotweiler. Gruff, surly and ugly barstaff are a blessing from Heaven. They take your order, serve your drink and hand over the change. They never try to engage in conversation which leaves them free to dispense more drinks when you need them. Stunning barstaff, whilst pleasing to the eye, will want to jabber to the punters (read ‘jabber to the punters they fancy’) and view the idea of pulling a pint with disgust. If you have ever been to a pub where all the barmaids look like Vogue models it is a fair bet that your tongue was not lolling by your feet just because of lust, more likely dehydration from waiting an eternity to get served. To conclude I hope the above will help you to find a decent drinking hole. Please do not take it as absolute gospel but a guide, otherwise we will all end up in the same pubs and it will get extremely crowded! Back to Bob's index... |
© 1998 Bob Pickett