September 2023. Leeds.
Of course, you can’t take a train to Leeds and just have the one beer, though I used to do that after meetings at Quarry House (aka the Kremlin) often enough in the early 2000s.
That was when Tetley was often as good as it got, whether by the markets or up in Headingley.
But as I walked the half hour back to town along Burley Road, past the cat art,
and enduring Bielsa obsession,
and the philosophy,
it struck me that I couldn’t immediately think of a classic Leeds pub I had to do. OK, the Templar and the Scarbs and Whitelocks, but I’d done all of those recently.
Where was the classic, year in year out Guide entry I needed to revisit now ?
Town Hall Tavern ? Tim Taylor flagship in the big city? Dull, but smart enough, and surely my best bet of a rare decent Tim pint.
Why not ?
They’d even got that Landlord Dark.
But afternoon boozing is dead in the cities, outside the Spoons anyway.
Simply, there were no other takers for the cask at 3.30pm in a major city centre, and a cool but thin NBSS 2.5 pint is somehow the worst of all worlds. Not good, but not bad enough to use to water the plants.
And as for the soundtrack, a tepid cover of “Sex on fire”. Oh.
Next time in Leeds I’ll stick to the new Stick or Twist. You can rely on Spoons.
retiredmartin 
The only pubs left that are anywhere busy afternoon weekdays are the rough ‘uns, and the rougher the better, though of course they don’t always serve cask.
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No longer matters though, does it. Yes, the Duncan would have been busy.
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It’s holding up better in the big cities, but also in comfortable retirement villages, if you don’t mind drinking in those. You can always cause a frisson, by answering “Well, French if possible” when asked whether you want New Zealand or Chilean sauvignon blanc.
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But yes, and as we become ever more American and ever less European, with these US-style employment contracts, where alcohol at any time during the working day is a sacking matter, there’s no immediate prospect of a change.
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TTT, by the business district. Busy at lunch and after work. You may have been unlucky with your timing.
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I was a regular visitor to Leeds too in the early noughties, as a union rep in the DWP. The cask beer in the station Spoons was always reliable, and sometimes very good indeed. I’m sure turnover was a big part of that, being in a busy railway station with lots of customers passing through at all times of the day – wasn’t it one of the first pubs in the country to be granted a twenty-four hour licence?
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“Town Hall Tavern ? Tim Taylor flagship in the big city?”
Taylors on the Green, as the brewery tap, should be their flagship pub but I was disappointed.
The Fleece in Haworth was much nicer, except for the upstairs toilets.
Are you related ?
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Probably. Be too big a coincidence otherwise.
Tim has also got a flagship of sorts in central Harrogate, again disappointing.
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Yes, the less said about my morning Old Peculiar in the Winter Gardens last June the better.
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I fear you are right! Halcyon days at the turn of the century when I enjoyed a regular lunchtime pint seem a long time ago…checks notes …era most 25 years ago!!!
Boltmaker is always the best
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