With only four Guide entries left in Essex for the year, and the rest of the country impassable due to a half inch of snow, Maldon was the only option for our Saturday by the sea. Mrs RM kindly agreed to join me for beer and chip tasting duties. Maldon is a favourite of… Continue reading MORE MALDON MICROS a.k.a. “THE PUBTICKERS FEAR OF THE TASTING DAY”
CHRISTMAS IN CHAPELTOWN
Look. A visit to a pub so new it’s not in the Beer Guide. Let’s hope it gets in next year, eh ? More towns that Southerners have never heard of. Mind you some of them have never even heard of Stockport, Mudgie. Actually, Chapeltown is an authentic suburb of Sheffield, and at least gets… Continue reading CHRISTMAS IN CHAPELTOWN
AN URMSTON UTOPIA
While everyone else bleats on about Huddersfield and Wigan and Thanet, the real pub action is going on in Nuneaton and Dulwich and Carlisle. And Urmston. A third trip to the outer reaches of Trafford (definitely not Salford, oh no) in a year, after successful forays into Flixton and Cadishead (which is in Salford). With… Continue reading AN URMSTON UTOPIA
HUDDERSFIELD – FROM BASS BARREL TO MAGIC ROCK TAP
I had a 16.30 train from Huddersfield to Piccadilly to catch. My other Guide entry opened at 16.00 and Google Maps said it would take 13 minutes to walk, plus a couple to get through the inevitable ticket barrier hold-up. Which meant I’d got a maximum of 15 minutes at the Magic Rock Tap,… Continue reading HUDDERSFIELD – FROM BASS BARREL TO MAGIC ROCK TAP
TURN A DIFFERENT CORNER
I feel a bit “beery” writing about Huddersfield; wall-to-wall Chinook and Gose and Sorachi blah blah. As you know I don’t do “beer“, but Hudders, as we like to call it, had two new GBG ticks and the cheapest B&B for my latest midweek visit to the Etihad. That B&B is the Ivy Green,… Continue reading TURN A DIFFERENT CORNER
SQUEEZING OUT SPOONS
Five points for the musical reference. Despite responding positively to complaints from CAMRA members about being too cheap and ubiquitous by putting their prices up and closing more pubs than they open, arguments about Wetherspoons continue to be the source of much joy in the blogging world. Or on CAMRA Discourse, anyway. I haven’t… Continue reading SQUEEZING OUT SPOONS
ASTERIX IN WHELPLEY HILL
A last trip to my least favourite county in the Guide, but at least now it’s over ’till next September. BRAPA is taking an alphabetical approach to the Beer Guide, which means the poor sod has to finish off the whole of Bucks before he moves on to the, er, glories of rural Cambridgeshire. Perhaps… Continue reading ASTERIX IN WHELPLEY HILL
“PROPER PUB” BINGO IN BRENTWOOD
I really shouldn’t take the mick out of the beleagured Mrs RM on this blog, especially now her response site is in production. And she’s been great company on my trips to some fairly basic pubs of late. Brentwood ought to have some upmarket craft bar by now, you feel, but the High Street looks… Continue reading “PROPER PUB” BINGO IN BRENTWOOD
HOME FIRES STILL BURN IN WEST HANNINGFIELD
PARENTAL ADVISORY – CONTAINS NON-COMPLIANT PLOUGHAMANS Mrs RM and I have just completed the Beer Guide entries for Essex. Yesterday the pubs were all heaving with Christmas bookings, which gave us a chance to moan about the once-a-year pub goers that keep our pubs going till February. But at the end of November in wildest… Continue reading HOME FIRES STILL BURN IN WEST HANNINGFIELD
SUDS IN SALE
More of a question than a post – why is Sale so poor for pubs ? (or isn’t it ?). On the tram back from Altrincham to Deansgate we had to make what I’ll call a “Comfort Break” i.e. a pub. Where better than a Spoons in the Beer Guide. Even though I’d had my… Continue reading SUDS IN SALE
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