BITE user comments - rayray67
Comments by rayray67
Expensive, but a great place to go if you want to taste a range of well-kept beers, rather than get bladdered. German wheat beers, and a choice thereof; Belgian fruit beer; and several tasty ales. Well worth a visit.
17 Feb 2006 15:20
The Jack Horner, Tottenham Court Road
Good beer, but slightly odd atmosphere: alternately heavingly busy, and slightly deserted, depending on whether the crowd for the nearby Queen musical "We Will Rock You" are coming or going.
17 Feb 2006 15:11
A wonderful pub, but with too few seats. A full range of Young's beers makes it worth standing up, though.
17 Feb 2006 12:14
Variable, but nice enough, and open late on Fridays. The food is nothing special. Two or three good ales.
17 Feb 2006 12:11
The The Old Monk Exchange, Westminster
A bit plastic, but spacious, not too smoky and with a fairly good range of beer. There's usually an interesting guest ale, too. Reminds me a little of being in Central Europe - it's in a cellar, and on the gloomy, cosy side.
17 Feb 2006 12:07
Sam Smiths beer, on the whole, is not bad. The Hefe Weisse, despite being brewed in the UK, is pretty authentic tasting; the Oatmeal Stoute, Pale Ale and Porter in bottles are incredibly good, and the new Pure Brewed Lager is an excellent, crisp-tasting lager served in tall glasses. The Fitzroy is probably my favourite Sam Smiths pub, although it's sometimes too busy.
16 Feb 2006 15:16
The Porterhouse, Covent Garden
Great range of beer, although the more obscure stuff is often out of stock. Suffers from being too popular, as it takes an age to get served. Still, if you can get in when it's quiet, or you like a crowd, worth a look.
16 Feb 2006 15:06
The White Horse and Bower, Westminster
Extremely friendly barman/manager, wonderful range of nicely kept Shepherd Neame beers. Highly recommended.
16 Feb 2006 14:56
The Greenwich Union, Greenwich
This is probably my favourite pub in London. It's not as pretentious as it looks, has friendly bar staff, a huge no smoking area, and, of course, a range of fantastic beers. Although the imported stuff is expensive, their own brews, of which there are usually 9 or 10, are pretty much standard pub prices. All have recently been overhauled, too, so that their previously mediocre wheat beer is now as good as anything I've tried in Bavaria, and the very bitter, hoppy Pilsner was an unexpected treat. What's more, if you don't like it, there's a more traditional Young's pub right next door, so it won't be a wasted journey.
16 Feb 2006 14:53
An amazing range of beer from Belgium. Expensive, but a great place to try something new. Food is excellent too, by pub standards.
16 Feb 2006 14:50
A nice pub with a really excellent range of beer, all nicely kept. Hoegaarden, Leffe, a range of Fuller's ales on tap and in bottles, and even some Erdinger wheat beer stashed in the fridge. Sadly lacking in atmosphere, though - it's a bit too big, and doesn't have enough customers, basically. Support the Plough! It is a good pub.
16 Feb 2006 14:47
Not my type of pub at all - too loud and crowded - but I did have an excellent (and very cheap) pint of London Pride here. Better than it looks.
16 Feb 2006 14:45
The beer is usually a bit grotty, the bar staff are grumpy, and the locals tend to stare, but despite all that, quite cosy.
16 Feb 2006 14:43
Better than it used to be. In 2003, I had the worst pint of my life here, but since the Nag's Head opened, things have improved (competition?). There are regularly rotated guest ales, and the place is definitely a proper pub (i.e. brown and cosy). I've also had stuff thrown at me here, and the bar staff can range from friendly and chatty, to extremely surly.
16 Feb 2006 14:42
I don't normally like pubs with pretensions, but the Nag's is friendly and has a fairly good atmosphere. It's nice to see a landlord and landlady, rather than a "bar manager". Having said that, the beer is often flat, and sometimes warm. If nothing else, however, it has made the nearby Village up its game.
16 Feb 2006 14:38
Quinn's, Camden
Wowsers, this is a good pub. It's a proper pub - cosy, brown, no chrome or pine in sight - with a range of friendly bar-staff and, most importantly, the biggest range of German beer I've seen in a pub in the UK. Hacker Pschorr Helles, Bock and Wheat; Diebels Alt; Paulaner Salvator; and a lot more. There's an equally huge list of Belgian beer, but I didn't get that far. German beers were about �3.30, which I think is reasonable.
1 Mar 2006 10:26