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"A joy to read" - Roger Protz
"Very authoritative" - Tim Webb.
"One of the top beer writers in the UK" - Mark Dredge.
"A beer guru" - Popbitch.
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London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
East London: Around the Olympic Park
 Tap East, London E20. Pic: Tap East Brewpub, bar, specialist (Utobeer)
The Great Eastern Market, Westfield Stratford City E20 1ET
T (020) 8555 4467 W www.tapeast.co.uk f Tap-East tw TapEast
Open 1100 (1200 Sun)-2300 (2200 Sun). Children welcome until early evening.
Cask beers 6 (Tap East, Thornbridge, unusual guests), Other beers 9 keg, 130 bottles, gift boxes to take away, Also 2 ciders.
Food Sandwiches, ploughmans, cold sharing platters, Outdoor Tables on square, Wifi. Disabled toilet.
Tastings, Meet the Brewer events.
In their quest to offer a retail experience for everyone, big shopping malls these days tend to sprinkle in the occasional enclave of independent specialists among the globalised megastores, and in Westfield Stratford City, this function is partially fufilled by the Great Eastern Market, a cluster of smallish shops and stalls selling Eastern European artisanal breads, Japanese snacks, Turkish and Indian sweets and posh chocolates. Rather hearteningly, Westfield decided with a few weeks to go before opening that a craft beer brewpub would complete the offer, and invited the people behind Utobeer and the Rake in Borough Market to come up with one, so long as it was ready by official opening date in mid-September. So when Tap East first launched, it was with a temporary bar and no brewery, and the paint literally still wet. The effort was heroic, but the haste showed. A few months on, things are more settled, the bar is properly equipped, a gleaming copper brewhouse stands proudly behind glass, and the place is growing into one of London’s essential beer destinations.
There are still challenges. The bar is right opposite Stratford International station, but this end of the complex has much less footfall than the section nearer the domestic station, although during the Olympic and Paralympic Games it will be the arrival point for passengers on the fast Javelin service from St Pancras. The box shaped space, with one glass wall and another open onto the mall, doesn’t encourage intimacy. A combination of high stools and sofas, designer lampshades and an attractive two-tone polished wood bar back doesn’t quite make it look like a place where you might install yourself for an evening, though the polite, friendly, helpful and well informed staff might well persuade you otherwise.
If they don’t, the beer list should — although it’s slightly more populist than you might find at the Rake, there’s still plenty of great beer to be had. Six handpumps usually dispense three home brewed beers — usually decent pale ales and stouts and exclusive to the venue — and guests from breweries like Black Isle, Dark Star, Freeminer, Oakham, Otley and Thornbridge. The keg range changes — Brooklyn Lager, Sierra Nevada pale and the like make regular appearances but others might come from British brewers like Lovibonds or Thornbridge, or from Germans like Köstritzer and Schlenkerla.
Bottled beers slant towards the USA and Belgium: beers from Ommegang, Rochefort, Saranac, Senne and Sudwerk join London’s own Kernel, real lambics from Boon and Cantillon, craft cans from Caldera in Oregon, big bottles from Dutch eccentric De Molen and classic Bavarians from Augustiner and Schneider. All the beers are also available to take away and there are gift packs too. There’s no hot food, but the sandwiches, meat and cheese boards, pork pies and Scotch eggs look tempting indeed, and there are plenty of other places to eat nearby.
With the density of the transport network that now converges on Stratford this must be one of London’s best connected fine beer haunts, a brave venture that deserves to succeed and a great opportunity to convert a new audience to craft beer. It’s well worth dodging the hordes of branded bag-clutching shoppers to make a special trip, and you certainly shouldn’t miss the opportunity if you’re passing through. For more about Stratford City, see the entry for the Cow.
Insider tip. In fine weather the outdoor tables on the public space between shopping mall and station are the best seats in the house.
National Rail/DLR Stratford International, Stratford Overground/Underground Stratford Cycling Link to NCN1, LCN+ 16 155 156 Walking Link to Capital Ring
London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
Central London: Paddington and Marylebone
 Victoria, London W2. Pic: Fuller's. Traditional pub (Fuller’s) National Heritage Pub
10a Strathearn Place W2 2NH
T (020) 7724 1191 W www.fullers.co.uk
Open 1100 (1200 Sun)-2300 (2230 Sun). Children welcome.
Cask beers 5 (Fuller’s) Cask marque, Other beers 2 keg, 7 bottles, Also 20 wines.
Food Upmarket pub grub/gastro, Outdoor A few tables on street, Wifi.
Tue quiz, occasional live music, occasional big screen sport, annual beer festival.
Occupying an unusually rotund corner building deep in elegant Bayswater, only a short step from Hyde Park, the Victoria is a lively and welcoming place that retains the feel of a characterful local while also boasting one of the most interesting heritage pub interiors in London. Most historic survivals among the capital’s pub stock were heavily refurbished in late Victorian times — the 1890s and early 1900s. In contrast, much of what you see in the Victoria — the handsome wooden bar with its elegant mirrored bar back, a regency-style fireplace, an extraordinary side wall with tiling and decorated and gilded mirrors — dates from much earlier in the eponymous queen’s reign, quite likely from 1864, the date shown on the clock that still commands the angle of the bar. There are more recent additions — the two upstairs rooms include the charming library, well worth grabbing if you can, and the Theatre Bar decked out with fittings reclaimed from the Gaeity Theatre in the late 1950s. The pub plays up to its name with numerous portraits of the unamused monarch and her family, and there’s now a single J-shaped drinking area which formerly would have been partitioned.
This is now a Fuller’s pub, and a very good one. Five cask beers always include Chiswick, Discovery, ESB, London Pride and a seasonal or special in top form. Honeydew and Blue Moon are on keg, while among the bottles are such Fuller’s treasures as Vintage Ale, Brewers Reserve and 1845 as well as Duvel and Budvar. Food might include poached haddock, chorizo stuffed chicken breast, sausage and mash, roast butternut squash and gourmet sandwiches, at slightly high prices as you’d expect in this area. Staff on my visit were remarkably friendly, cheerful and well-informed, helping bring this vintage treasure to vibrant life.
Insider tip. It’s worth ordering a whisky and water purely for the privilege of having your tipple diluted by a still functioning Victorian brass tap.
National Rail Paddington Underground Lancaster Gate Cycling LCN+ links to 0 5 45 and Hyde Park paths Walking Link to Jubilee Greenway
London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
West London: Other locations — Harefield
Contemporary pub, gastropub (Brunning & Price)
Park Lane, Harefield, Uxbridge UB9 6HJ
T (01895) 822631 W www.oldorchard-harefield.co.uk
Open 1130 (1200 Sun)-2300 (2230 Sun). Children welcome, children’s portions served.
Cask beers 6 (Fuller’s, Phoenix, 4 unusual often local guests), Other beers 2 keg, 2 bottles, Also Over 100 whiskies, some rums, 50+ wines.
Food Enhanced pub grub/gastro menu, Outdoor Front terrace, large beer garden, Wifi. Disabled toilet.
Summer weekend barbecues, beer and food events, board games.
 Old Orchard, Harefield UB9 (London) “We could be in the Lake District”, sighs deputy manager Damien, admiring the view from the Old Orchard on Greater London’s far flung northwestern edge. And while this is perhaps overstating the case just a little, the surroundings here are among the most picturesque and rural of any pub in the capital. The handsome white building, hidden down a narrow lane on the outskirts of the village of Harefield, is perched atop the Colne valley, surrounded by a vast and verdant garden, with a view that sweeps down to the Grand Union Canal and placid boating lakes, in fact former gravel pits, in Colne Valley Regional Park. There are no craggy fells to be seen across the rolling fields visible from the top of the lane but you may well spot the outliers of the Chilterns.
Formerly a private house, a hotel and most recently a high end restaurant, the Old Orchard was reopened in September 2010 as a food-led pub that welcomes drinkers as well as diners. Inside it’s spacious, comfortable and rustic in a country house kind of way, with open fires and framed vintage maps. Six excellently kept cask beers in this Good Beer Guide listed venue always include a house ale supplied to the pubco by Phoenix in Manchester, London Pride and Tring Side Pocket for a Toad, a rare but welcome sight as a regular beer. Guests might come from Chiltern, Dark Star, Itchen Valley, Marston Moor, Purple Moose, Vale or White Horse. Staropramen and botttled Budvar are better than usual lager options. Food is hearty stuff at moderate prices and might include pheasant and venison terrine, posh sausages, roasts, grilled trout or sweet potato and parmesan gnocchi. Also worth perusing is a large collection of whiskies and other specialist spirits including rare rums. Well placed for walkers and cyclists exploring the Green Belt countryside and only a short climb from the canal, this is a friendly and welcome newcomer.
Underground Northwood, Uxbridge (then bus) Bus Harefield Green (331 Northwood), Dunster Close (U9 Uxbridge) Cycling NCN 61 Walking London Loop, Hillingdon Trail, Colne Valley Trail
London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
West London: Other — Hanwell
 Fox, London W7 Traditional pub (Independent)
Green Lane W7 2PJ
T (020) 8567 3912 W thefoxpub.co.uk
Open 1100-2300 (2230 Sun). Children very welcome until 2100.
Cask beers 5 (Fuller’s, Sharp’s, Taylor, 2 guests), Other beers 1 keg, 1 bottle, Also 8 wines, a few malts.
Food Imaginative pub grub and mediterranean-style food, Outdoor Beer garden, Wifi.
Th quiz, monthly markets (last S), occasional weekend live music, beer festivals, darts.
The next village west of Ealing on the Uxbridge Road where it crosses the river Brent, Hanwell dates back at least to the 5th century but developed thanks to its transport links: coaching inns flourished in the 18th century, while the next century brought the Grand Union Canal and then the Great Western Railway. In 1901 the arrival of a tram connection to central London spurred its growth as an affordable suburb. The first purpose built lunatic asylum in Britain was founded just outside the village in 1831 — the site is now part of the massive general hospital, Ealing Hospital, built in the late 1970s. In the 1850s the Central London District School for poor boys moved here from Norwood in south London, later counting Charles Chaplin among its students.
The canal, having first followed the Brent from Brentford, parts company with the river here to climb 18m through a flight of five locks. Operating these is still thirsty work and many of today’s boaters, like their predecessors, must be glad of the proximity of the Fox, a handsome and well-preserved pub dating from 1848 that sits just back from the waterway. As its name suggests, it was once a meeting point for the local hunt and still preserves a rural quality, among allotments at the end of quiet Green Lane, a former drove route. Though signs on the exterior doors recall former division into different bars, the interior is now a single space wrapped around a horseshoe bar, comfortably and traditionally furnished with benches tucked into pretty bay windows. The extensive outside yard is home once a month to a popular food and craft market, and there’s a family friendly feel to the place.
A serial winner of the local CAMRA branch’s Pub of the Year, the Fox usually offers five cask beers. The three regulars are standard fare — London Pride, Doom Bar and Landlord — but the guests are likely to come from small and often local-ish breweries, with Itchen Valley, Rebellion and Red Squirrel particularly popular. Fuller’s Honey Dew in keg and bottle is another choice. Home cooked food has a healthy Mediterranean flourish with plenty of salads and veggie options as well as traditional pub grub, at reasonable prices. A pleasant, welcoming and well looked after gem that’s ideal for walkers, cyclists and boaters exploring the canal, this could only be improved by a few more guest beers.
National Rail Hanwell Underground Ealing Broadway (then bus) Bus Half Acre Road (numerous Ealing Broadway) Cycling Grand Union Canal towpath, link to LCN+ 41 Walking Capital Ring, Grand Union Canal Walk
London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
North London: Camden Town and Primrose Hill
 BrewDog Camden, London NW1 Bar, specialist (BrewDog)
113 Bayham Street NW1 0AG
T (020) 7284 0453 W www.brewdog.com/bars/camden f BrewDog-Bar-Camden tw BrewDogCamden
Open 1200-2330 (2400 Fri-Sat, 2230 Sun).
Cask beers None, Other beers 16-26 keg (BrewDog, imports), 140 bottles
Food Gourmet burgers, pizzas, cheese and meat boards, Wifi. Disabled toilet.
Tastings, Meet the Brewer events, beer launches.
At the end of a year that’s seen the launch of a number of new London beer specialists, the delayed opening in mid-December 2011 of controversy courting Aberdeenshire brewery BrewDog’s fourth pub, and its first outside Scotland, was arguably one of the most eagerly anticipated among the capital’s beer connoisseurs. Heralded by brewery founders Martin Dickie and James Watt posing on a tank outside the former Laurel Tree pub in Camden Town’s Bayham Street, the first announcement of being open for business went out over Twitter and rapidly attracted a crowd. When I visited quite late on the first night of official ordinary trading after all the launches, the place was packed with a largely youthful crowd, including a good few brewers and competitor licensees who’d come to see what all the fuss was about.
The old pub has been slickly and stylishly done out. A single moderately sized bar upstairs has remnants of old pub pillars visible but is otherwise new bare brick, walls clad in gym-style wooden parquet tiles and bar top and drinking shelves made of slabs of grey stone — which might just be a suggestion of “granite” Aberdeen, the brewery’s nearest city. Downstairs there’s a more loungey space with its own bar, used for tutored tastings. Staff seem knowledgeable, enthusiastic, friendly and welcoming — these last qualities perhaps contrary to expectation given BrewDog’s cultivatedly pugnacious image and the bar’s location in one of London’s most painfully trendy haunts. Even more surprisingly, prices are remarkably keen — gourmet burgers devised by TV’s MasterChef winner Tim Anderson are no more than £7.
 BrewDog's Martin Dickie (left) and James Watt getting tanked up in Camden Town. Pic: BrewDog. But inevitably most people are here for the beer, and if they’re not they’ll still be encouraged to try it. There’s a small stock of wines and a few carefully chosen and unusual spirits, but customers who ask for these are prompted to consider trying a beer first. The choice is impressive, starting with up to 26 keg lines, although only 17 were in use when I called. BrewDog beers are understandably well represented, with 5AM Saint, Hardcore and Punk IPA always on, and numerous guests and specials, on my visit ranging from tasty 2.8% reduced duty beer Blitz! to 18.2% Tokyo*, taking in the latest in the Abstrakt series and a Christmas porter. Other draught options come from US and global craft brewers — Evil Twin, Lagunitas, Mikkeller, Port or Stone, for example: a collaboration between BrewDog and Port/Lost Abbey’s Tomme Arthur was on last week. “Tasting floats” of four third pint measures are available for experimenters. The rarities will multiply if plans to install an experimental picobrewery on site come to fruition.
The bottled range pursues a similar theme, with BrewDog’s own beers, including rare specials, lining up alongside US, Scandinavian and Japanese entries. Alesmith, Baird, Ballast Point, Bear Republic, Cigar City, Green Flash, Hitachino Nest, Nøgne-Ø and Southern Tier are names to set beer geeks’ mouths watering, though there’s a notable absence of the handful of British brewers in the same general class — the only nod to Thornbridge is the version of their stout produced by Epic in New Zealand — or of the German and Belgian stalwarts usually spotted on bottled beer lists. Even the “lambic” comes from Mikkeller. It’s a brave and interesting list, testament to the BrewDog team’s close connections to international craft brewing.
It has to be said — the deliberate absence of cask beer leaves a notable gap in an otherwise impressive offer. BrewDog themselves brew some excellent cask beer and I’ve no doubt the staff here would conscientiously ensure it was served at its best. Far from underlining its position on the cutting edge, the lack of cask makes BrewDog seem parochial, persisting in the not overchallenging task of noising up a tiny handful of CAMRA purists while the new, young drinkers frequenting London’s beer bars happilly drink cask alongside craft keg, and US brewers that BrewDog idolise, like Stone, are ramping up their cask production. Charming assistant manager Lucy is clearly primed for the question, and sidesteps it by saying, “There’s nothing wrong with cask, but we prefer our beers this way,” before adding rather intriguingly, “That’s not to say we won’t ever have cask beer.” If they do, I will unhesitatingly recommend BrewDog Camden as one of the very best beer bars in London.
Overground Camden Road Underground Camden Town Cycling LCN+ 6 6A, Regents Canal towpath Walking Jubilee Greenway
London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
West London: Twickenham and Hampton Hill
 Basket weaving for bikers at the Roebuck, Hampton Hill TW12 (London) Traditional pub (Independent)
72 Hampton Road, Hampton Hill, Hampton TW12 1JN
T (020) 8255 8133
Open 1100 (1200 Sun)-2300 (2330 Fri-Sat, 2230 Sun, closed 1600-1900 Sun).
Cask beers 5 (Sambrook’s, St Austell, Wells & Young’s, unusual guests), Other beers 2 keg, 14 bottles
Food Pub grub Mon-Fri lunch, Outdoor Beer garden.
Sun informal quiz.
Eccentric collections have become something of a pub cliché — chain pubs seem to buy in random self-consciously quirky junk by the 25kg sack in an attempt to add character that can easily backfire into exposing the lack of it. The best pub collections are those that are clearly stamped by a particular personality or interest. Exploring them can be a bit like reading a story — or a poem. I’m not quite sure what the extraordinary exhibition on display at the Roebuck says about landlord Terry Himpfen, but it’s certainly one of the most distinctive, intriguing and entertaining pub collections in London. You’ll spot transport signs and memorabilia including traffic lights, old gaming and vending machines, tobacconists’ Indian mascots, scores of fishing rods on the ceiling, banknotes sealed under glass tabletops, musical instruments, a signed Henry Cooper boxing glove and, to top it all, a full size motorbike made of wicker basketwork. I was given a glimpse of a side room in which further junk, including a Vespa scooter, awaits display.
The place would be worth a visit for the collection alone but happily there’s also some great beer to be had while perusing. Junction, Tribute and Young’s Bitter are the regular casks, joined by guests from local-ish brewers like Hammerpot, Hopback and Itchen Valley. Then there’s quality lagers from Budvar and Rothaus on keg, and a bottled offering that’s mainly from better known British brewers like Hall & Woodhouse, Shepherd Neame and Wells & Young’s. The Masons Arms in nearby Twickenham, which boasts a more beer-themed collection, is now under the same ownership.
National Rail Fullwell Bus Kings Road (285 Feltham, Kingston, R68 Hampton Court, Kingston) Cycling Links to LCN+ 37 and Bushy Park paths Walking London Loop
London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
West London: Twickenham and Hampton Hill
 Rifleman, Twickenham TW2 (London) Traditional pub (Enterprise)
7 Fourth Cross Road, Twickenham TW2 5EL
T (020) 8893 3836
Open 1200-2300 (2230 Sun). Children welcome until 2000.
Cask beers 4+ (Twickenham, Wells & Young’s, unusual/local guests) Cask Marque, Other beers 1-2 bottles, Also Bottled/occasional cask real cider
Food Sausages and other pub grub, Outdoor Front terrace, beer garden, Wifi.
Monthly beer festivals with up to 4 extra casks, M quiz, free chilli nights, big screen sport, fortnightly poker.
Following up a Good Beer Guide listing, I first visited the Rifleman during the initial research for the Guide late in 2010. I found a small but pleasant and very traditional corner local with a pretty beer garden, tucked away in residential streets between Twickenham Green and Fulwell. The landlord, however, regaled me with tales of woe, and I wasn’t surprised to hear a few weeks later that the pub had closed. Thankfully I’d also found the Prince of Wales (p232) round the corner as a recommended local outlet for the nearby Twickenham brewery.
New, young and ambitious tenants Luke and Cloé took over and reopened the Rifleman in March with even more of a beer focus. A Twickenham beer is always on, while a second pump rotates through Wells & Young’s brands like Courage Best (this is a former Courage house) and Young’s Bitter. Two additional pumps dispense changing guests from small and usually local breweries — Marlow, Nelson, Sambrook’s, Westerham and Windsor & Eton are all supported. One weekend a month the range expands further with three or four additional casks on stillage at the bar, often including a cider, while Leffe Blond provides a little extra interest to the keg taps. The pub interior has been stripped back in more contemporary fashion and isn’t quite as cosy as previously but the single space around a three-sided bar offers an open fire and some pleasant corners in which to enjoy great cask ales.
National Rail Fulwell, Strawberry Hill Bus Trafalgar Avenue / Prince of Wales (numerous Twickenham/Fulwell) Cycling Link to LCN+ 37, Hampton Wick, Brentford Walking Link to London Loop
London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
Central London: Paddington and Marylebone
 Leinster Arms, London W2 Traditional pub (Stonegate)
17 Leinster Terrace W2 3EU
T (020) 7402 4670 W www.theleinsterarmsbayswater.co.uk f The-Leinster-Arms tw TheLeinsterArms
Open 1200-2300 (2230 Sun). Children welcome until 2100.
Cask beers 5 (Fuller’s, Sharp’s, 3 often unusual guests) Cask Marque, Other beers 2 keg, 3 bottles, Also 1 real cider, a few malts and wines
Food Limited enhanced pub grub menu, Outdoor Tables on street, Wifi.
Monthly quiz (last Tue), occasional live music, big screen sport, board games.
This elegant place sits among Bayswater’s hotel land of handsome early Victorian stucco terraces just north of Kensington Gardens, but still manages to retain an identity as a local pub despite the transience of some of its customers — I spoke to several regular locals at the bar. Inside it’s bright, comfortable and well appointed, a bit like the lounges of some of those nearby hotels, with a particularly pleasant library-style area at the back. It looks a bit like a Nicholson’s — which may well be because it did indeed belong to this chain until August 2010 when Mitchells & Butlers sold several hundred pubs to the Stonegate pubco. The new owners have notably improved the beer offer, doubling the handpump count.
London Pride and Doom Bar are the regular cask beers, joined by guests from the likes of Blackwater, Daleside, Dorset Piddle, Elland, Kelham Island, Lakeland, Salopian and Thornbridge, keg Hoegaarden and Kozel, and the odd bottle of Blue Moon. A short menu offers a choice of sausages, including vegetarian, plus pies, ploughmans, salads and club sandwiches. Big screen sport is a slightly surprising feature given the elegant surroundings but there are corners where the less sport inclined can escape from it.
Insider tip. Regular cask beer drinkers can take advantage of a loyalty card scheme to earn free pints.
National Rail Paddington Underground Bayswater Cycling LCN+ 45, link to NCN6 Walking Jubilee Greenway, link to Princess Diana Memorial Walk
London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
Central London: Clerkenwell and Smithfield
 Pakenham Arms, London WC1 (Convivial)
1 Pakenham Street WC1X 0LA
T (020) 7837 6933 W www.pakenhamarms.com f The Pakenham Arms – Convivial London Pubs tw pakenhamarms
Open 1030 (1200 Sun)-2400 (0100 Fri, 0030 Sat, 2230 Sun). Children welcome until 2100.
Cask beers 12 (Sharp’s, Botanist,unusual often local guests) Cask Marque, Other beers 1 keg (Meantime), 20+ bottles , Also 3 ciders, specialist whiskies, 12 wines
Food Imaginative enhanced pub grub/gastro food, Outdoor Front terrace, Wifi.
Tue quiz, bring your own retro vinyl, occasional themed beer events, tastings and festivals.
Until August 2011, this medium-sized street corner local tucked off Farringdon Road in the network of pleasant but undistinguished streets linking Bloomsbury and Clerkenwell was an acceptable but not outstanding place managed by small London pubco Convivial, with a few solid real ales and a sporting slant, serving a steady stream of postal workers from the huge Royal Mail Mount Pleasant sorting office opposite. In September, partly in response to the success of sister pub the Botanist in Kew, it was refurbished and reopened under the stewardship of beer-friendly new manager Ken Davison, with the big screen TVs switched off, a significantly extended line of handpumps and a fridge full of craft beer goodies — further testament to the London beer renaissance.
The cask beer policy now focuses on rapid rotation of a great variety of beers, including more unusual and dark options, from small, unusual and often local producers — Ken once worked at the Market Porter (p59) and while the pace of change is a little more sedate than that celebrated microbrewery showcase, the pub will still reward novelty seekers on repeat visits. Beers from the Botanist’s house brewery usually feature, and others might come from Butts, Cottage, Hogs Back, Oxford, Purity, Rebellion or Twickenham. The link with the Botanist extends to commissioning beers on demand for groups and parties. Doom Bar and Meantime London Lager on keg are currentlly permanent fixtures. The bottles don’t include anything particularly rare but it’s all good stuff, from Anchor, Brooklyn, Cooper’s, Duvel, Innis & Gunn, Little Creatures, Sierra Nevada and the like.
It’s a proper pub, now with a single drinking area wrapped round a three-sided bar, mostly furnished simply but comfortably with wooden padded benches, plain chairs and solid tables on bare floorboards, though look around the back of the bar to find an attractive loungey snug. Like most Convivials it takes some care over the menu — crayfish and brie salad, halloumi and roast vegetable tart, cow pie and linguini with pancetta were on offer when I visited. Real ciders and a range of specialist whiskies complete the offer at yet another welcome new bolthole for beer lovers. And the posties still seem to like it too.
Visitor’s note. Mount Pleasant may bear an incongruous name today but once this was a grassy slope on the banks of the river Fleet, also known as Coldbath Fields after a nearby spring. Between 1794-1877 the site now occupied by the sorting office housed one of London’s major prisons. When the Royal Mail took over in 1889, workers objected to the name Coldbath Fields as it was associated with the prison, so a more attractive one was chosen. The sorting office was once thought to be the biggest of its kind in the world and is still the biggest in London.
National Rail Kings Cross, St Pancras, Farringdon Underground Russell Square, Chancery Lane, Farringdon Bus Calthorpe Street or Rosebery Avenue/Mount Pleasant (63 Kings Cross, Farringdon, Blackfriars) Cycling LCN+ 0 8
London’s Best Beer, Pubs and Bars updates
Central London: Holborn and ‘Legal London’
 Olde Cheshire Cheese, London EC4 Traditional pub (Samuel Smith)
Wine Office Court, 145 Fleet Street EC4A 2BU
T (020) 7353 6170
Open 1100 (1200 SSn)-2300 (1600 Sn). Children welcome if dining.
Cask beers 1 (Samuel Smith), Other beers 6 keg, 7 bottles (Samuel Smith)
Food Pub grub & “chop house” food.
Functions and parties.
The Cheese is one of a trio of heritage pubs around Holborn and Fleet Street now in the care of taciturn Yorkshire brewer Samuel Smith — see also Cittie of York (p81) and Princess Louise (p84). In common with them, its drinks range is all own-brand: wines and spirits as well as beers, which include Sam’s one cask ale Old Brewery Bitter, keg wheat beer and organic lager, and decent bottled offerings like Taddy Porter and Oatmeal Stout. This is one of the capital’s best known historic pubs and a well-established call on the tourist itinerary. Its greatest claim to fame as Samuel Johnson’s local is suspect as, although he lived nearby, there is no evidence the opinionated Doctor ever actually drank here, but the building is genuinely old, with parts dating from the late 17th century rebuilding of the area following the Great Fire. Literary figures whose patronage is better attested include Charles Dickens and W B Yeats.
The two oldest rooms are immediately to the left and the right as you enter. The Chop Room on the left, usually reserved for diners, does a good job of recreating the dining area of an 18th century tavern, with heavy wooden furniture and tables, some of them antique. The small room on the right is the most characterful, preserving what might be some of the original wooden panelling, with an impressive fireplace, paintings and a Victorian bar — thankfully the house rule written up over the door, ‘Gentlemen only served’, is no longer enforced. The lack of natural light resulting from the building’s siting in a narrow alley lends a characteristically gloomy aspect. The pub was extended at the back in the 1990s and there’s a warren of other rooms to explore, including upstairs function rooms and the extensive cellar bar, where some of the vaulting is said to survive from a 13th century Carmelite monastery. None of the other rooms is as authentic or cosy as the front pair but there’s some interesting stuff displayed on the walls including a 1970s CAMRA award.
Food is a modern interpretation of “chop house” — steak and kidney pudding, pot roast, pies, roast vegetable Wellington — at prices that would have likely achieved the remarkable feat of rendering Johnson speechless, but are reasonable by today’s standards, especially considering the pub’s tourist cachet.
National Rail City Thameslink, Blackfriars Underground Blackfriars River Blackfriars Cycling NCN4, LCN+7 Walking Jubilee Walkway, link to Thames Path
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London’s Best Beer  The fully updated 3rd edition of my essential award-winning guide to London’s vibrant beer scene is available now from CAMRA Books. Read more here.
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