Citizen Smith SW15

London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
Southwest London: Other locations – Putney

Mural at Citizen Smith, London SW15

Bar (Lost Society)
160 Putney High Street SW15 1RS
T 020 8780 2235 w http://citizensmithbar.co.uk f citizensmithbar tw citizensmithSW
Open 1200 (1700 Mon)-2300 (2400 Thu, 0200 FS, 2230 Sn). Children welcome until 1800.
Cask beer 2 (Windsor & Eton, 1 unusual guest), Other beer 7 keg, 35 bottles, Also Cocktails, champagne, wines, specialist spirits.
Food Pizzas, hot dogs, salads, Wifi.
Tue pizza promotion, Wed, Sun live acoustic music, Thu mojito night, Fri-Sat DJs, TV for major sporting events.

One of a cluster of southwest London venues under the same ownership as Powder Keg Diplomacy in Battersea, Citizen Smith has actually been around a few years longer than its stablemate but has only recently evolved its beer range sufficiently to catch my notice, thanks in part to new manager Juan, formerly of the Draft House Tower Bridge (p55). Conveniently situated right opposite Putney station, it’s a late arriving product of London’s 1990s fashionable flirtation with cocktail bar culture, but was always intended as a dressed down, shoes off sort of place rather than a glitzy temple of mixology – probably a wise policy in Putney. It’s a single big room bedecked with pop culture murals (Grace Jones figures prominently), dining tables, slobby sofas and an 8-track cartridge collection. They still shake, strain and perform elaborate procedures with exotic spirits, fresh mint and citrus fruits here, but in a sure sign of the changing place of beer in the capital’s drinking culture, they increasingly pump real ale and pour good bottles too.

Two different and regularly changing beers from Windsor & Eton feature on the handpumps, with a guest that might come from Arbor, Dark Star or Thornbridge. Among the familiar US names on the keg taps you’ll also find more unusual beers from Kernel and a house-branded Belgian lager, plus a changing craft porter or stout (Odell when I called). There’s more Kernel in the fridges, alongside BrewDog, Flying Dog, Goose Island, Orval and Redchurch. Pizzas with imaginative toppings emerge from a wood fired oven – tweet about the place and they promise 10% off your food bill. The music policy tens towards retro and rock’n’roll.

Pub trivia. The name recalls a 1970s sitcom featuring Robert Lindsay as a would-be suburban revolutionary – except that someone seems to have forgotten his rallying cry was “Freedom for Tooting!”, which for some reason is marginally more amusing than “Freedom for Putney!”

National Rail Putney Underground East Putney River Putney Cycling NCN 4, LCN+ 3 37, links to NCN 20, CS8 Walking Thames Path