Romantic pub-crawl for two
Feb. 15th, 2006 07:09 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
purpletigronG & I made the train journey to Birmingham yesterday, to celebrate Valentine's Day in style.
We started in The Anchor in Digbeth at noon. We were pleased to have a non-smoking section to ourselves, as the main bar was smoky and noisy.
G started with a pint of Hobson's Mild (the classic working man's lunchtime drink), and I had Thatcher's Cheddar Gorge draught cider - a half, as it's 6% ABV which is a lot on an empty stomach. But happily, the Anchor does curry lunches, so G had a madras and I had a veggie balti, to line our stomachs (I must shamefacedly admit to a shared bowl of chips also, but at least they weren't on the same plate and thus, not 'half-and-half'. :-) For afters, G had a pint of Hampshire Not Tonight Josephine and I had a half of the confusingly named Perry's Farmhouse Cider, also 6% ABV on draught.
Then we had a grocery shopping break at the One Earth Shop, a short sunny walk away. Those supplies safely tucked away for later collection, it was back to the beer trail :-)
Next up, The Lamp Tavern - which feels like a converted terraced house. No non-smoking sections, and the only other customer was smoking, but we sat at the far end of the long, thin main bar. Eddie passed the time of day with us :-) G had a pint of Stanney bitter, and (feeling the cider), I had a half of one of the guest beers.
In a gap in the rain, we moved on to The Old Fox Theatre Bar. We found a seat to the side of the island bar, away from the smokers but in the full light of the huge decorated window. I wanted some Bath Ales Barnstormer, but it went off as the barman pulled it, so I had a half of Everard's Gold. Can't recall the name of G's pint here :-)
We then took a brief break to confirm for ourselves that Andromeda Books is no more :-(
And so, to the Old Joint Stock in search of a pint of Fullers ESB on draught for G. The former bank is very reminiscent of another flagship Ale and Pie pub, the Fullers in the Old Bank of England in London. The ESB was in great condition, but I lucked into something even more remarkable: Beowulf's Strawberry Kiss, a light bitter flavoured with a few drops French Organic strawberry essence. It was like hot sun on English strawberry fields! It went beautifuly with peach and champagne tart, too :-)
We rounded off our pub crawl at the outstanding Wellington, the current Birmingham CAMRA pub of the year. I counted 15 hand-pumps, and chose a pint of Beer 11 for myself: City of Cambridge New Model Ale. G had a pint of Pig in the Hole.
I would happily go back to any of these pubs, and drink any of these beers and ciders again. It'll be interesting to repeat this crawl once the smoking ban comes into force in summer 2007. Although smoke-free pubs will be a great boon to me, I deplore the failure of the 'smoking carriage' option.
Then we had an accident in Waterstones, and came home to eat home-made chickpea curry and watch Crusade on DVD :-)
(All done from memory :-)
We started in The Anchor in Digbeth at noon. We were pleased to have a non-smoking section to ourselves, as the main bar was smoky and noisy.
G started with a pint of Hobson's Mild (the classic working man's lunchtime drink), and I had Thatcher's Cheddar Gorge draught cider - a half, as it's 6% ABV which is a lot on an empty stomach. But happily, the Anchor does curry lunches, so G had a madras and I had a veggie balti, to line our stomachs (I must shamefacedly admit to a shared bowl of chips also, but at least they weren't on the same plate and thus, not 'half-and-half'. :-) For afters, G had a pint of Hampshire Not Tonight Josephine and I had a half of the confusingly named Perry's Farmhouse Cider, also 6% ABV on draught.
Then we had a grocery shopping break at the One Earth Shop, a short sunny walk away. Those supplies safely tucked away for later collection, it was back to the beer trail :-)
Next up, The Lamp Tavern - which feels like a converted terraced house. No non-smoking sections, and the only other customer was smoking, but we sat at the far end of the long, thin main bar. Eddie passed the time of day with us :-) G had a pint of Stanney bitter, and (feeling the cider), I had a half of one of the guest beers.
In a gap in the rain, we moved on to The Old Fox Theatre Bar. We found a seat to the side of the island bar, away from the smokers but in the full light of the huge decorated window. I wanted some Bath Ales Barnstormer, but it went off as the barman pulled it, so I had a half of Everard's Gold. Can't recall the name of G's pint here :-)
We then took a brief break to confirm for ourselves that Andromeda Books is no more :-(
And so, to the Old Joint Stock in search of a pint of Fullers ESB on draught for G. The former bank is very reminiscent of another flagship Ale and Pie pub, the Fullers in the Old Bank of England in London. The ESB was in great condition, but I lucked into something even more remarkable: Beowulf's Strawberry Kiss, a light bitter flavoured with a few drops French Organic strawberry essence. It was like hot sun on English strawberry fields! It went beautifuly with peach and champagne tart, too :-)
We rounded off our pub crawl at the outstanding Wellington, the current Birmingham CAMRA pub of the year. I counted 15 hand-pumps, and chose a pint of Beer 11 for myself: City of Cambridge New Model Ale. G had a pint of Pig in the Hole.
I would happily go back to any of these pubs, and drink any of these beers and ciders again. It'll be interesting to repeat this crawl once the smoking ban comes into force in summer 2007. Although smoke-free pubs will be a great boon to me, I deplore the failure of the 'smoking carriage' option.
Then we had an accident in Waterstones, and came home to eat home-made chickpea curry and watch Crusade on DVD :-)
(All done from memory :-)
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no subject
Date: 2006-02-15 11:16 am (UTC)The Lamp used to be a very fine establishment. For a while in the 80's it was the watering-hole of Birmingham fan group the MiSFiTs.
no subject
Date: 2006-02-15 11:22 am (UTC)I didn't know that about the MiSFiTs :-)
no subject
Date: 2006-02-15 11:38 am (UTC)Good idea, but these days I don't drink in pubs enough or drink enough in pubs to make it worth while.
I didn't know that about the MiSFiTs
Well it was a long time ago.
Very glad
Date: 2006-02-15 06:02 pm (UTC)Re: Very glad
Date: 2006-02-15 06:08 pm (UTC)I was very amused by this:
http://cleanskies.livejournal.com/300431.html
true romances of half term
"... my favourite valentine story is of a day-long real-ale pub crawl for two ..."
:-)))))))))))))