INSIDE SHEFFIELD’S FUSTIEST SPOONS

September 2026. Sheffield.

With the new Good Beer Guide about to drop (ugh), and a big trip this weekend I didn’t want to go chasing lone GBG 26 entries these last few days.

But as you’ll know my brain doesn’t respond well to being denied daily stimulation, or my legs exercise, so I trotted down to Sheffield Station and stared at the Departures board*.

And stared…

And then gave up and walked from Platform 1b into the Sheffield Tap.

Well, I said I ought to compare the Taps.

I guess it’s hard to be objective about your local pubs, and I don’t visit the Sheffield Tap often, despite staring at that departure board two or three times a week, and thinking the back room one of the UK’s great pub places.

It’s just, I’ve already done it, and there’s little new to say, and I’m bound to be required to pop in whenever we host (ugh) visitors to our little city.

Still, the cask here (their own Untappd Aurora, VERY GOOD) is only a half point below the very best Sheffield has to offer, and if you can find a spare table at 6pm you’re doing well.

Frustrated by the lack of new blog material experiences, I briefly considered joining the search for Kiwi,

but instead stumbled into the big Spoonies**.

Traditionally I’d have said that CAMRA members disparage Wetherspoons, I’ve seen “lowest common denominator” used to describe their clientele.

Which has always been really unfair, as Spoons attracts a wider range of custom than your pokey lager-hating micro.

But the Bankers Draft has always had a deserved reputation for being a bit “fusty”, the Wellington (Brum) of The North. And James and his housemates always had stories of lively behaviour.

Well, without having the multi-million pound renovation of Spoons elsewhere it doesn’t need, I’ll just say the Bankers isn’t that bad, and the bargain Jaipur beautifully served in its own glass is a cracking 4.5 (Campaign to Bring Back Half Points).

That pint comes with the Thursday Curry Club Katsu Grilled Chicken with apologetic looking side serving of bhajis and samosa.

And that pic reminds me, never, EVER, have the grilled chicken option with Katsu chicken.

*Options seemed to be Scunthorpe, Swinton and Shireoaks, of which more when the GBG embargo is over

**Blame Lana for “Spoonies”. I know their real name is Timbo’s

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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.

32 thoughts on “INSIDE SHEFFIELD’S FUSTIEST SPOONS”

  5. The Graystone Unity in Halifax doesn’t seem to be “lager-hating”, Martin, at least not on the night that Bastille were playing at the Piece Hall. We weren’t there to see them, goodness no, but for dinner at Yang next door (you only get an “oo” wi’ Thai food…)

    It could perhaps be more spacious and reassuringly furnished, however.

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      1. Did you visit before or after they upped sticks and moved house across town, Martin?

        I only wish more of them would open in places without a pub at all, rather than in already well-served ones.

        I agree that GU is less the Herne Bay ex-butcher’s shop and more 1970s sixth form common room though.

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  6. I had a few pints of bargain Jaipur the other night while attending a CAMRA branch meeting at the Gateway in East Didsbury (£3 with a Wetherspoons voucher). We had a guest speaker from Thornbridge who talked about how the brewery came to the decision to supply it to Wetherspoons below its normal price, because of the huge volume they ordered and the opportunity for national distribution, including to areas it had never been seen before.

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    1. Matthew, I was there as a member in 1975 :
      “A coach trip, again 60p, took many Stafford and Stone Branch members from the Railway at 7pm on Thursday 6th March to a Games Night against South Manchester Branch. This was at the Gateway ( now a Wetherspoons ) beside the A34 in Didsbury with “Hydes Ales. Darts, Crib, Dominoes, Tiddlywinks”. The coach stopped on the return journey in Heaton Mersey for Boddingtons at the Dog and Partridge and Holts at the Griffin”.
      It was hardly the pub I remember on going back there forty-nine years later.

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    2. Well, it’s achieved that brand recognition in a way that Cloud water never has, and will probably overtake Doom Bar in the cask league table if Doom continues to disappear from “reluctant” cask outlets.

      With Bass resurgent we could see a very different Top 10 in a few year’s time.

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  7. That line up in the Sheffield Tap is the same as when I was there around 5pm on Friday, on my way to see the Rhinos lose (again!) at Headingley. I went for the Hop On Board, a 4.7% West Coast IPA, which – like your Jaipur at the Bankers – was also NBSS 4.5. I rounded it up to Excellent – because it was.

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    1. I think we need to focus on the places with genuinely excellent beer. There’s definitely more in Sheffield than any other city.

      My pint of Kent Pale in the Clem Atlee (CRAFT co) at Limehouse last night was a straight 5, and under £5 a pint.

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      1. There are possibly one or two reasons for having a second pint of Jaipur. Finding one in Excellent condition would be a good reason; acting like a beer nerd and making price/quality comparisons not so much.

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  8. You haven’t lived until you’ve supped Jaipur at Burp Castle in midtown Manhattan being shushed if you talk to loudly while they listen to Gregorian chants on loop.
    Fwiw, I think Jaipur is the most overrated beer in Britain just slightly ahead of Landlord.
    Prof.

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      3. I know you like to say you know nothing about beer, but you quite clearly do.

        Hugely popular cask beers (promoted by influencers or revivalists , or sold too cheap to influential pub chain owners) are often a) treated badly in transit, b) put on the bar too soon, and (or perhaps or) c) poured by bar staff who are not very well trained.

        The three you mention – plus Bass, maybe – can be fantastic, but too often are not.

        (“Hugely” is relative, of course.)

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      5. I follow the Facebook group “all Bass is lovely” and there’s a resistance to apply even the most modest critical assessment of Bass in the pub.

        I was a bit disappointed with the Bass in Coventry, but the quality of the pubs made up for it. You need to go to Bath or Stockport or Burton to understand Bass.

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  9. Hey Martin, I’m surprised they let you in the Tap what with your gammy leg. Mabel says hi and wonders why you’ve started wearing yoru underpants back to front?

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