Off to Huddersfield today to laugh at Terriers fans still distraught at Sunday’s late loss, and to visit the Taps of up-and-coming breweries Magic Rock and Mallinsons. If they’re any good I’ll let you know.
But first, Worksop. On market day.
What a joy it is, one of the cheapest places in England to buy artisan bread and plastic toys.
And beer. I reviewed the Unicorn a year ago and it’s just as bustling today. Cask for about £2.50.
Of course, nothing undercuts Spoons.
Half the town (i.e. all the OAPs) are in here, though only I seemed desperate to use my Spoons vouchers for Q4 before they expire tomorrow and the amateur drinkers take over.
It’s a pleasing cask line-up, lacking the local microbrews from Dukeries and Welbeck but gaining a solid Thornbridge pale. I score it NBSS 3; would be higher but the glass was caked in muck at the rim and it had to be decanted into a clean glass.
Apart from that, I can’t fault the Liquorice Gardens, bustling and cheery and clean. A great place to observe Midlands life. And hats. If not cask being pulled.
Pleasingly, my Stilton and broccoli soup (£2.25 via the app) was served with a knife, as a little nod to the sword accompanying ErlangerNick on his tour of the UK.
Worksop has lost it’s trad pubs from the Beer Guide in the last decade, Unicorn apart, and with places called Fuggles and Brewery Tap and Opening Soon that’s unlikely to change.
But if Sam Smiths does fancy owning a pub here, this beauty would be ideal…
retiredmartin 
What’s with the CAMRA pumpclip? Not seen one of those before.
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Surprised it’s not being discussed on Discourse !
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There has been a massive discussion on Discourse about Wetherspoon’s pumpclips misleadingly claiming “We’re in the Good Beer Guide”.
Also there’s a thread actually entitled “Discourse – discord” 😉
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CAMRA have started brewing their own beer didn’t you know? The branch that covers Worksop is particularly strong. They have put an offer in on the pub featured in Martin’s image. I’m not meant to disclose this until the deal has gone through, but it will be called ‘POTY’ and will have ten zillion hand pumps on to ensure that it will perpetually be the local Pub Of The Year and in GBG. The ex landlord of a pub in Wetherby told me that he was told this by a bloke in cunning disguise who once came in fifteen years ago saying he was Roger Protz and the head of the GBG. Apparently he was loaded and had made a lot of money from the brewers for telling pubs that they had to have more hand pulls than customers. I don’t know how true this all is but they seem to have taken it on board in Leicester which, like many other midland towns was apparently once the home of the one pub, one beer, one brewer theory!
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He’s not joking !
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Phew,I’m just glad RM has made it out of Dante’s Inferno with all his faculties intact.
It’s comforting to be back in familiar territory of boarded-up pubs and ripples on wheels.
You should be sponsored by Motability.
Wahaay !
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I believe pubs actually buy those scooters as a job lot and stick them outside to prove their authenticity.
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I quite liked that reply,Richard.
When i went in the French Horn it had Bass and GK IPA on the bar,at the time Worksops Wetherspoons was housed in an old pub that was away from the middle,try and get the name of that pub anyone when Wetherspoons were running it.
I have since done the new Spoons,not a patch on the old one,oh i did those pubs back on the 12th June 1999.
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Is there anywhere in the UK or any item that is not classed as artisan anymore? Artisan bread, cheese, coffee in arguably one of Britain’s most artisan and culutural melting pots…Worksop!
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Artisan chips’n’curry
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I remember the original Worksop artisan. Lovely lass was Ann and her Arty thought the world of her.
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Are we related ?
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I sometimes worry about the adjective formed from “artisan”, namely “artisanal”. Wonder what Ann & Arty would make of that.
Sorry.
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If I knew how to ban you I’d ban you, Bill 😱
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I had to read Bill’s reply twice before I got Martin’s attempted ban. 😳😊
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Artisan is a French word.
Why anyone thinks the French way of doing stuff is better than the way we do it is a nincompoop.
Anyone who knows France well knows they’re lazy sods who work about three hours a day then shut up shop to spend the afternoon tupping a bird and smoking Gauloises.
Last time I was on a French train there were four ticket inspectors doing the same job a single feller in Britain does – and that’s because the unions call the tune,60% of the people work for the state and the rest are off shagging a mistress after lunch.
They think a ropey bit of chicken with a few chips and a basket of stale crusty bread is ‘effing haute cuisine.
I mean,why is an artisanal baker any better than than an ordinary baker ? The baguette ( bastard French word for an elongated crusty roll ) I eat from my local Greggs is just as good as any poncey roll I’ve ever eaten in France and about a third of the price.
And their beer is shite.Absolute dishwater.All most places stock is Pelforth – an absolute bastard of a weak continental fizz that they pay you to take away from a Calais hypermarket and even throw in half a dozen Syrian migrants for the journey home.
I purposely avoid anything with the word artisanal in its title.Not just because it’s derived from a French word but that is reason enough in itself but because whatever it is I know some beardy cretin with an attractive squeeze behind the counter working with him will look down his nose at me and charge three times the price it should be sold at.
My ” artisanal ” lunch today was fair trade coffee made with a blend of Arabaca and Robusta coffee beans and seasoned sausage meat wrapped in layers of crisp, golden puff pastry.
Or a cup of house coffee and a sausage roll from Greggs to you and me.
Bastard French.
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You’re my new hero, Syd.
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Going by all the talk about artisanal I’d have to say the last word of the French Horn I’d missing a “y”. 😉
Cheers
PS – “only I seem to desperate”
And a word above missing an “o” at the end. 😎
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As ever, thanks for error detection Russ. I did that in 25 minutes in Spoons – quick fire 😉
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That French Horn being closed is truly sad; such a lovely building. Hope Sam Smiths– or anyone wanting to keep it as a pub– will do as you say.
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Probably not Sams, but you never know, Mark. Worksop always seems to me to have potential.
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Sadly Sam Smith’s don’t seem to be particularly interested in acquiring new pubs, although they did buy a job lot of rather dodgy ones from Oakwell Brewery a few years back when they (Oakwell) went out of business. Presumably at a knock-down price.
I can think of plenty of places where a Sam’s pub would do good business. I wish they’d buy my local and kick out the TV football and piped music 😦
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