JIMMY RIDDLESDEN

If you’re stuck for which photo to lead with on your blog post, ALWAYS go with the pub cate.

I assume this is the house cat for Riddlesden’s Willow Tree, she certainly seemed at home (pub cats are always girls, aren’t they ?).

I’d phoned ahead, breaking one of my main rules of pubbing, to ask whether they’d be open, and again the message was “Aye, long as it isn’t raining”.

It was a tense drive to reach the edge of Keighley before the weather turned.

Actually, that wasn’t the route. Instead Google Maps took me back past the Junction and through the rush hours of Saltaire. Why, Google, why ? The trek across Bingley Moor looks lovely, and quicker.

Anyhow, stop moaning Taylor. Riddlesden was enticing in a way that Keighley never could be despite the proximity of a brewery whose name I always forget, and the Willow Tree perches next to a secret cave housing a future micropub called The Riddle of the Cask Den (hours : closed) with tables outside.

The locals all stare from the comfort of their cover, possibly more at my parking than Simon waving his green pen in the air.

Then they return to their lager, but there’s no “Hullo stranger” here.

It feels very Lancashire, perhaps it was like those nice towns the Yorkies stole back in the day, all robustness and unfussy decor.

Oh, I spoke too soon, posh handwash.

The beer is a letdown. “Hmmm, honey & thin?  On a bit too long?” I muse, because that’s the insight Beer Twitter expects of us professional bloggers. The word I was reaching for was diacetyl, Si.

But to be honest, it scarcely mattered as the setting by the bubbling brook with feline company was majestic. Obviously the running water meant BRAPA had to pop back to the Gents a 3rd time, but it comes to us all.

Published by retiredmartin

Retired NHS, doing long walks around UK and the world to record the great bits. Focused on Good Beer Guide pubs and live music.

7 thoughts on “JIMMY RIDDLESDEN”

  2. Arty in the Olde Cottage in Chester is definitely male >^..^< (well, a eunuch anyway).

    The blog title is spelt wrong, btw, or are you just doing it to annoy me?

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    1. I think you can assume it’s done to wind you up, though on this occasion it may be useful in ensuring the locals are put off the scent.

      Have a look at BRAPAs post and spot the error!

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    2. As far as I am concerned ,all cats I encounter are male -never owned a female creature.We have a garden visitor who turned out to be female -I was slightly disappointed

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  3. If you go across Bingley Moor you will pass Dick Hudson’s, which is a famous landmark pub. It looks as though it has now fallen into the hands of Vintage Inns, but I remember visiting it in the late 80s when it was independently-run and served proper beef dripping chips 😀

    Not sure if it’s ever been in the GBG.

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  4. Ah yes, the Brains Bitter – no idea who brews it these days – which I’ve just had at the Romilly in Pontcanna had a note of honey, I thought, but it wasn’t bad at all.

    However, in a plastic glass, and after twenty minutes of Mrs. E tapping her ‘phone to set up the needed app to order, never mind the signing in and having our temperatures taken, I did begin to wonder whether it was worth it.

    It was all made OK again though, by a young lady whose mum was apparently still in Africa, and who was a natural entertainer, making mere props of a table of half-a-dozen men whom she had joined. And it was free.

    It’s why we go to pubs.

    All the same, Brains could have learnt rather a lot from The Cricketers I reckon, but it’s probably too late now.

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  5. “ALWAYS go with the pub cate.”

    The cat’s name is cate?

    ” (pub cats are always girls, aren’t they ?).”

    Unless they’re named Tom. 😉

    “Why, Google, why ?”

    It knows you prefer Bing.

    “and the Willow Tree perches next to a secret cave housing a future micropub called The Riddle of the Cask Den (hours : closed) with tables outside.”

    I’m sure it will be Tree-mendous when they finally do open!

    “possibly more at my parking than Simon waving his green pen in the air.”

    Nonsense. It was both!

    “It feels very Lancashire,”

    It’s only 10 miles from the border I think. 😉

    “The word I was reaching for was diacetyl, Si.”

    Blimey. Wasn’t that a prehistoric bird?

    “as the setting by the bubbling brook with feline company was majestic. ”

    Si’s a cat?

    “Obviously the running water meant BRAPA had to pop back to the Gents a 3rd time, but it comes to us all.”

    (slow golf clap)

    Cheers

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