BITE user comments - alecider29
Comments by alecider29
Changed hands back in early-ish 2012.
Best bit: well-presented Harveys-serving pub.
Worst-bit: replaced one of the best pubs in London (I won't go into details).
A 'luncher's' pub more than a 'drinker's pub' - the landlord is trying to capture the eating trade and the pub reflects this. Very prim decorations - lots of old photos of Lewes, fancy tables and chairs, snazzy wallpaper. Clientele of well-dressed lunchers from the neighbouring luxury flats (leave your 'Slayer' T-shirt at home - or go in it to annoy the lunchers!).
This is somewhere to take people for a meal (the landlord is really trying hard and I reckon the food's good), and it's one of the few Harveys' owned pubs in London if you really like their ales.
Some, rather overlooked ('em flats) seating out the back.
Worth a visit, for lunch.
23 Jun 2013 11:59
Mmmm.
Best bit. Bizarre place which I find quite entertaining (my friends didn't).
Worst bit. I've been in 3 times in the last year and everytime the place was stunk out by their toilets (didn't try the food).
Last visit - music night advertised and I was in the mood to see a good bit of fiddlin'. Went in and 'Stand by your Man' was coming out of the speakers - my English friends thought this hilarious. So don't go if you're expecting traditional (live or Irish) music. All the punters were English.
Great lady running the place, with fine Guinness. Someone had usurped the pool table and she threw them off saying 'ah! be decent! That's an hour now they've been waiting'.
Nice dog still zooming about.
It's better than that GJ's just beside it but I'd probably head for The Old Sergeant before here (unless I was feeling a bit odd). Will watch a GAA match here and see how it goes.
23 Jun 2013 11:50
Best bit - cider pub in London (that I've found in 5 years). Sneaky people tho' - have them hidden in flagons low down behind the bar. Always changing but they have included: Janet's Jungle Juice (great, sweet); Gwatkins; Biddendens; varieties of ol' Mole Black Rat; Welsh Farmhouse. Good selection of sweet & dry and staff know which is which; good selection of perries too.
Worst bit - has become more and more popular (CAMRA awards galore) and is a very small pub. Nearly always bursting out onto the pavement full (there is more unknown seating upstairs so there's always a shot - don't know why people cling to the bar downstairs).
Wonderful selection of ales: lovely Dark Star; Harveys; Sambrooks and Twickenham Ales - all well-kept.
Fantastic barmaids - helpful, friendly, great control at the anarchy of the bar.
Very tasty food (basically hot-dogs but with great sausages), great for when you realise that leaving has become a geometrical problem (aka pissed from all the lovely stuff), cost unknown (always too drunk to know or care).
No muzak.
If it were bigger, less-crowded and had a garden, it'd simply be the best pub in London. Go now.
23 Jun 2013 11:37
Have occasionally (a few times a month) popped in over the last 2 years. Best pub in the immediate area (that means Garratt Lane, Merton Road, Southfields tube vicinity, Wandsworth High Street) - if you want something better, then go to Putney, Clapham Junction or N. of Armoury Way.
They have: Symonds Cider (£4.05 I think); Wadsworth 6X; occasionally a 'Walk in the Park' ale and then a guest (nothing too exotic). Well-kept. Has a website (for lager listings).
Best bit of the pub is the large rear beer garden. Gets the early afternoon sun (depending on time of year) and I've always got a seat there. More outdoor seating at the front of the pub by the busy Merton Road.
Only eaten a pizza here and it was fine and reasonably priced (that means a margerita for £6-something). About half the indoors looks like it's primarily for eating but they don't seem to be too worried about 'eating only' (I'm thinking of The Falcon at C.J.). Interior relatively tarted up (but not absurdly so)with leather sofas, flagged floors and wainscot. Somewhere for family or (most) friends.
Staff fine (but impervious to subtle banter). Good quiz night on Wednesday. I think they have special meal deal days.
Not primarily a sports pub but they do show some events (Six Nations at least).
Doesn't get annoying busy on Friday/Saturday nights.
Overall - good pub for a few pints.
23 Jun 2013 11:23
The Kings Arms, Oxford
I was going to say vastly over-rated but I see the reviews already.
Best bit: interesting set of interlocking rooms (which usefully fill up with people who would otherwise fill up the surrounding good pubs).
Worst bit: always rammed.
Food unimpressive. Drink is Young's standard offering with their standard guests. Both too costly by Oxford standards.
Beware the treacherously long stairs to the toilets.
A student pub (most in the centre are - try The Crown or The Wheatsheaf if you want to avoid these) with well-dressed interlopers in for weekend lunches.
Nigh impossible to get a bench out the front - if you do then it's great for people watching. Front bar is just a room now, they've closed off a room (you can rent it out for functions); back bar is a series of 3 interconnected rooms, of which 2 are good to sit in (not the middle one).
But with The Turf and The White Horse within 2 minutes walk - go to one of those infinitely better pubs.
23 Jun 2013 12:14