January 2026. Liverpool.
A night in Liverpool before Old Mudgie’s funeral on Friday in Widnes. He’d have been pleased with the last couple of Proper Pubs, and no doubt with the Excelsior across from my £24.99 Travelodge if I’d gone in, but I was done for the night by six.
In the morning I exchanged my worn out Rieker for the one smartish pair of black shoes I now possess, and immediately regretted it as the overnight rain seaped through the soles.
So, a rather shortened traipse around the commercial heart of Liverpool,
which is as photogenic as anywhere in the UK,
even though some folk will tell you all this new architecture is the reason they lost the World Heritage Listing.
Honestly, no one cares about your World Heritage, about as important as a pre-loved Nobel Peace Prize.
At a quarter to noon I followed some folk off the ferry to the Captain Alexander,
one of the perennial three (3) central Spoons in the Guide, though I guess the JDW stranglehold may be tested if that 1936 Pub Co keep opening new places as good as St Peters and the revitalised Vines.
My Instagram feed is full of Americans showing us what 20 bucks buys at breakfast. This is the £3.99 Spoons effort. Note the new colour plates; I could have made more compositional effort here.
And then a stroll through the Cavern Quarter. I’m sure there’s a nod to Nirvana here;
Quite how I resisted a pint of Bass in the White Star (worried about the bladder during a long funeral service) I’ll never know.
I completely forgot to buy the insoles for my increasingly sodden shoes. Let’s hope Widnes delivers.
retiredmartin 
Nice that they put the beans in a little pot so they can be removed easily. Is that a sausage I see lurking behind them? If so, that’s a just about adequate breakfast.
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Just the one. Less than 500 calories.
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i agree about the beans, Bill. I used to like them, but they no longer like me, a fact that has been the case for the last 10 years, or more.
The rest of the breakfast looks lost on that rather anaemic and washed out plate. Have Spoons breakfasts now reached the point of inevitable decline, or had that been reached several years ago.
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Or is it a case of “got your big plate Alan? I mean, Martin?”
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I agree about the plate, very wishy-washy. The blue ones were much better.
£3.99 seems a bit steep for one rasher, one sausage, one egg and one hash brown (OK, and some beans, but the less said about them the better) Unless the price includes a pint of Jaipur. 😉
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£3.99 is steep. £2.99 in Sheffield. Liverpool is big city prices.
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Preferring blue plates over pink ones is just racism, surely ?
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£2.99 in Stafford, not that I’m tempted.
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It’s a subject for academic debate, Paul. Personally I remember the high point being the introduction of the eggs benedicts, and then a decline around COVID, but I reckon the cooked breakfasts do the trick. You wouldn’t get an equivalent breakfast for twice that price elsewhere.
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My most recent pub breakfast was in Stafford’s Butler’s Bell, a venue discarded by Tim but reopened by the new Davenports nearly two years ago. It was £5-something but worth the extra with a plain white plate of more hot-not-warm, properly cooked better ingredients served on a clean uncluttered table.
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Paul, Wouldn’t it be better, and less wasteful, on ordering to say “No beans please”, like I say “No tartar sauce please” for cod and chips ?
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Who invented tartare sauce, and why?
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It was the Tartars from Northern Asia.
Oh sorry, that was the Tatars.
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“A MORNING IN LIVERPOOL”
(looks up)
How do they stay in business?
“In the morning I exchanged my worn out Rieker for the one smartish pair of black shoes I now possess, and immediately regretted it as the overnight rain seaped through the soles.”
Lesson learned! And, I have to say, with the all of the walking you do, you should have your own blog on what shoes to buy!
Also, I think you meant ‘seep’, not ‘seap’.
“even though some folk will tell you all this new architecture is the reason they lost the World Heritage Listing.”
(looks down)
Ugh, I can see why.
“about as important as a pre-loved Nobel Peace Prize.”
(slow golf clap)
“though I guess the JDW stranglehold may be tested if that 1936 Pub Co keep opening new places as good as St Peters and the revitalised Vines.”
Pub fight! 😊
“My Instagram feed is full of Americans showing us what 20 bucks buys at breakfast. This is the £3.99 Spoons effort.”
(looks down)
Ok, from a Canadian point of view, that’s not bad – for the price.
(we don’t get a huge breakfast for a cheap price like the Americans do, due to our small population)
” I’m sure there’s a nod to Nirvana here;”
(looks down)
Curmudgeon! (a nod to Peter)
(believe it or not, that was actually a song by them)
https://genius.com/Nirvana-curmudgeon-lyrics
“Quite how I resisted a pint of Bass in the White Star (worried about the bladder during a long funeral service) I’ll never know.”
Didn’t you pass a Bass the day before?
(you should see a doctor – or invest in some Depends?)
“I completely forgot to buy the insoles for my increasingly sodden shoes. Let’s hope Widnes delivers.”
Definitely see a doctor. 😉
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While you were away (and how we counted down the days, Russ) I made annual trips to the same shoe shop in Sheffield (alliteration) to buy Rieke shoes, about £65 but very comfy for urban walking.
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Commander Vimes, of Ankh-Morpork, would heartily agree with you that you get what you pay for.
Cheers
PS – (slow golf clap) on the alliteration
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Grey plates. They’re the future.
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Even for the Great Western’s grey paes ?
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The bizarrely- named “Freedom” breakfast is the one for me, usually a bargain price and missing the sausage(s) of indeterminate origin.
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I once had a breakfast in a Little Chef which included a “sausage”.
It was quite a dark grey in colour. “What’s this?” I thought.” Is it a pork sausage?” On tasting it, no. “Is it a beef sausage? – no. Is it a chicken sausage – no.”
After a moment it came to me “I know! It’s a catering sausage!”
(The English word “catering” to mean what we know it to mean has no translation into French, I gather.)
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In the business, there is a variety of sausage known as the “Booker’s sausage.
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I doubt if I’ll ever identify the boundary between Catering Sausages and Artisan Sausages.
Booker’s – NOT Prize Sausages !
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Stafford Paul is the expert on pub sausages.
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Well, being as we’re discussing sausages I must add that in Uttoxeter earlier this month I used Sargeant and Sons butchers ( established 1894, one of four businesses between the Black Swan and the Old Talbot ) and bought the best tomato sausages I’ve known in over fifty years.
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I think that’s a wise choice !
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Anonymous, I always do say “No beans please”, when ordering my breakfast, regardless of the establishment. Some ask, would I like anything in place of the beans, to which I say, “an extra hash brown, please”.
It’s long, long time since I had a Spoons breakfast – cold plates, mainly, although the atmosphere, or lack of it, plays a part. More important, is I prefer my money to go to an independent operator, even if it does mean paying more!
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Genuine question: does the Spoons app let you swerve the beans (or anything else) or do you need to go to the bar and do it the old skool way?
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I didn’t notice any ability to take off any items Bill; plenty of things you can add !
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– or let you ask for a warm plate or ask to have your table cleared and cleaned ?
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No mention of the huge safe room which was one of my lasting memories of the pub plus a decent beer selection.
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