Category: Leicester

I don’t normally write blog posts in this manner (list type ones), but since I was asked, I’ll oblige. My friend Ross and I managed to visit every Good Beer Guide pub in central Leicester this week, and I’ll eventually write about them all on my little Good Beer Guide page.

In reverse order (I like adding to the anticipation for my five readers)……

3 – The Blue Boar – A winner of CAMRA’s Leicester pub of the year in 2018, 2019 and 2020, there was a friendly and immediate welcome from the staff member behind the bar even though they were busy. A clean and comfortable environment, but it was the quality of the beer options that really stood out. Helpful staff, excellent beers and a really well curated beer list.

2 – The Real Ale Classroom – A bit of a walk outside of the city centre, but absolutely worth it. This is a micropub with quirky decoration themed around education, namely because the owners swapped a career as school teachers for running a bar. I thought that the beer options were some of the best curated that I’ve seen, I wanted to try most of the beers listed on the clearly displayed blackboard. Pro-active and enthusiastic staff, with a new beer garden to help deal with the number of customers who want to go here.

1 – The Two-Tailed Lion – This was my stand out pub of the week, another with an Untappd screen with numerous interesting and intriguing beers. A clean environment, perfectly well-kept beers and an informal atmosphere. The customer service was excellent, close to the levels that are offered by the Hop & Vine in Hull (my benchmark of the perfect pub), with the barman here being conversational and engaging. I liked his genuine welcome and farewell to every customer and also his help in explaining which he thought the best pubs in Leicester were when I asked. It transpired that the ones he mentioned as the best were also the ones that I liked the most, and I’m grateful he recommended the trip out to the Real Ale Classroom. I can forgive a pub having faults if the staff make me feel really welcome, but this one didn’t have any faults. Quite wonderful.

Our visit to every Good Beer Guide pub in Leicester this week has been inevitably rather lovely, but it has given me a backlog of posts to write. I can almost sense my five readers waiting in anticipation for each new one….. Anyway and for whatever reason, this pub delivered something very different to what I was expecting. There’s a traditional frontage and I was expecting a handful of real ale options.

But there was this, which has several interesting beers that I wanted to try. I’m always delighted to see Untappd screens, clear and easy on the eye. Someone has put some considerable thought into these options, covering most beer styles. I’ve never seen the port infused Titanic Plum Porter, so I had to go for that. I was very tempted to get the Hard Lemonade, but the bar was quite busy for me to ask if they would sell it as a third (although I suspect that they would).

And there’s the port infused Plum Porter, a decadent and beautiful drink. The aftertaste was just a little harsh, but the beer was smooth and I liked the richness of the flavour and the port element. I was delighted to have ordered this, I’ll remember it positively.

The service was friendly and customers were all welcomed on arrival, even when it was quite busy. This is another pub where someone new to the area would likely be able to find people to talk to, the welcome seemed authentic and genuine. I liked this pub very much and if I had realised how good it was, I’d have found more time to stay there. I’m definitely delighted that this is in the Good Beer Guide and I’ve now seen that it won Leicester CAMRA pub of the year in 2018, 2019 and 2020. I’m not all surprised, this is a brilliant pub.

On my little visit to every Good Beer Guide listed pub in Leicester (and some others as well), this is the Black Horse on Foxon Street.

My heart lifted as the pub felt traditional, the staff member offered a friendly welcome and the environment seemed laid-back and comfortable. It was immediately apparent on looking at the beers offered at the bar that this is an Everard’s pub, indeed one that they’ve operated for a long time as is evident at https://pubhistoryproject.co.uk/2019/11/07/black-horse-braunstone-gate-foxon-street/. There were no dark beers available, so I went for half a pint of the Tiger from the brewery.

I struggled to get any flavour out of this, a bit too generic for me. Comparing this to the range of different options run by chains such as the Black Country Ales, the choice is very weak. I’m not convinced that offering the same three beers in nearly every pub, with no guest beers, is ideal, but I’m sure they know their customers. I’d add that the staff member did mention that they had bottles of Titanic Plum Porter in bottles, which is one of my favourite breweries, but I was looking for draft options. However, I appreciated they’d put an option on and the staff member was helpful.

In the pub’s favour, the staff member made an effort to build up a rapport with me, so the customer service was spot on. I suspect that someone moving to the area and going in here to make friends would be pleased, so on that key measure, I’m pleased to see that this pub is in the Good Beer Guide. But, if it was down just to me (which I accept it’s not), more beer options would really be very lovely.

I had high hopes for this Good Beer Guide listed pub in Leicester given that it is very well reviewed and they claim that they are the oldest brewpub in the city, having opened in 2016. Unfortunately, this was the only pub listed in the Good Beer Guide in the city that I didn’t engage with, so I’ll keep this brief and just out of sake of completeness. I am very much sold on the concept offered here though and the decor was all clean, comfortable and well presented.

As an aside, that’s not the easiest to read, but I’m sure most customers have better eyesight than I do. I couldn’t read the cans and bottles list at all, but I suspect that I would have ordered from it if I could have done. I’m slightly surprised to see that a pub is selling the not very well reviewed Adnams Kobold, I don’t see it much outside Adnams tied pubs, although to be fair it’s better than generic lagers. Also, I guess that the oatmeal stout from Anstey is the Darkroom, which is a perfectly decent beer that I had yesterday at the Ale Wagon.

There was no welcome or farewell, so I can’t comment on that. They were the only pub I visited this week not to offer that, but I will mention that they were busy (although not that busy). The pub plays music which forced the background volume up a bit, but other customers seemed to be enjoying their experience so that’s all to the good. They were serving pizzas to a few customers as the food option, which is a useful additional offering.

I’m going to have to say that the pub is going to know far more about this Car Park King beer than I do, since they brew it. All I can add is that it was served colder than I had anticipated and there was an absence of flavour, so I struggled with this a little.

I’m not going to write much more as this is clearly a local institution and I only like commenting positively and focusing on the very many decent experiences that I have. Perhaps if I visited on a different day and ordered a different beer than my experience might have been much more memorable for the right reasons. Given the clearly positive experience that most people have and the way that the pub engages with customers on social media, I’m sure that most customers enjoy their visit here greatly.

Carrying on my visits around Good Beer Guide pubs in Leicester, which my friend Ross has managed to keep up with, this is the King’s Head on King Street.

I had already eaten enough, but those samosa and spring rolls for £1 looked really quite tempting. My first impressions of the pub were positive not because of the food which is hard to miss, but because there was no annoying music and instead just quiet conversation and peacefulness. Now I’ve reached 30 (just), I can’t be doing with all this raucous noise. The pub goes back a fair way and there’s also a roof terrace with extra seating, but I didn’t meander off that far.

I’ve now realised that these screens are used across Black Country Ales pubs, including the Salmon which I went to yesterday and also The Craven Arms in Birmingham where I went a few weeks ago, and the Wellington in Birmingham where I’ve been several times. Anyway, there’s a decent selection there of different beer styles and some interesting options. The staff member was also polite and helpful, all very positive.

There was only one darker beer available and it’s also my last drink of my time in Leicester, so not a bad one to finish on at all, the King Korvak’s Saga by Fownes Brewing Company. Rich, smooth and with decadent flavours of coffee, all rather lovely.

As a pub, I very much liked this one, and indeed I’m now going to look out for Black Country Ales pubs as it has taken me a while to realise that I’ve been to several and been impressed with them all. Laid-back, friendly, calm and welcoming, just what a pub should be and I’m very pleased that the King’s Head is in the Good Beer Guide.

Continuing the meander around the Good Beer Guide pubs of Leicester, this is the Ale Wagon on Rutland Street which has been listed in the book for several years. I’ll use the history from CAMRA as they’re an authoritative source:

“As part of the scheme to widen Charles Street, this corner pub was built in 1931 to replace a Victorian hotel on the adjacent corner. It has drainpipes with hop decoration. From the 1950s, it was owned by Ansells, then after several years of neglect and deterioration, was acquired by Hoskins & Oldfield as their first tied house, opening as the Ale Wagon in September 1999.”

The widening of Charles Street is more evident in this 100 year map against a recent one from OpenStreetMap, they’ve doubled the width of the road.

I accept that this isn’t the most glorious photo of a pub interior, but the bar was busy and so this will have to do. This has the feel of a pub that no-one ever quite modernised, but now it would be a shame to break the character by trying to renovate it. I quite like the whole arrangement, although it feels tired in places, especially the toilets.

The service at the bar was prompt and I felt genuinely friendly, with the staff member telling me that there were two dark beers on. She was happy to explain the options, although I decided that I’d just get a half pint of each rather than just pick one.

The Darkroom oatmeal stout from Anstey Ale Brewery, which was very drinkable.

It’s this one that I was most confused about, the Smoked Porter from Hoskins Brothers brewery. This is the first beer that I’ve had which I haven’t been able to add on Untappd, and it seems reading some of the other ratings at https://untappd.com/w/hoskins-brothers-ales/9223 that others are having difficulties. There’s a message that:

“Hoskins Brothers Ales do not brew. All beers are brewed by Tower Brewery. The brothers own the Ale Wagon pub in Leicester and this is the base for a brewery that is brewing both Hoskins ales and ales from the former Oldfield Brewery.”

But I don’t really understand this, the pump clip is named as Hoskins Brothers Ales and so I don’t much care whether it’s brewed at the pub or off-site. Anyway, the beer was excellent, one of the best examples of a smoked porter that I’ve had. It might be though that this situation has arisen as one of the Hoskins brothers who ran the pub died last year.

This was a traditional pub with some interesting beers and I’m glad that it’s in the Good Beer Guide, as it would perhaps be easy to miss. I got the impression that nearly every other customer was a local, but it wasn’t any less friendly for that.

This micro-pub was recommended to me by the helpful barman at the Two-Tailed Lion. It’s a bit of a walk out of the city centre, but such is the sacrifice that I must make to find quality.

And that blackboard oozed quality, there were seven beers on there that I wanted to try and hadn’t had before, although I limited myself to just three. I can’t see any beer that I would consider as being average or generic on there, some really decent options and most beer styles are covered as well.

We sat in the Headmaster’s Study room at the rear, with the pub having an education theme as the owners worked as secondary school teachers before deciding this pub thing seemed to be a better idea.

The pub is small as it’s a conversion from a shop (it was a computer shop and then a clothes shop), with one front room, one rear room (the study one) and until recently that was it other than for some seats outside. They’ve now though expanded into the garden at the rear to give them some more seating options. As a micro-pub, it was the first in Leicester.

This is the Somewhere Within from Cloudwater, that’s about as good as an IPA as I can imagine getting. Smooth, full of tropical fruit flavour and with a slightly orangey aftertaste. Really rather lovely, and perhaps quite decadent even.

The Too Many Steves from Shiny Brewing, a small micro-brewery in Little Eaton in Derbyshire. More tropical fruit flavours here, to the point where I wonder whether I’m being a little too healthy.

I felt the need to have a dark beer as well, and there were several options on the menu which surprised and delighted me. This is the very decent Post Impact Porter from Staggeringly Good brewery who are based in Portsmouth.

As for the service, it was friendly, engaging and conversational. The pub was spotlessly clean, it felt on-trend without trying to be and there was clear enthusiasm from the staff about the beers that were being offered.

The pub also notes on their web-site that:

“Prior to buying we also check all of our beers via Untappd; to guarantee we offer the best available beer to you, our drinkers.”

I genuinely slightly despair at pubs who don’t do this, although I understand that some pubs are tied or restricted in their options. It might prevent some of the average dross getting through and I won’t mention any brewers in particular, although I obviously include Greene King in that.

Passionate, authentic and absolutely as good as a micro-pub could realistically get, all really rather lovely. It’s also listed in the Good Beer Guide, and it would be a travesty if it wasn’t.

Working through the Good Beer Guide, CAMRA note that this pub has been operated by Everard’s since 1901. It’s an interesting survivor on Jarrom Street, as there was once a row of houses here, but only the pub has survived.

This photo is from Jarrom Street in the 1960s (taken by a forward-thinking photographer named Dennis Calow who recorded Leicester housing before it was pulled down), so I’m guessing that there was some slum clearance going on.

There was a friendly welcome at the bar from the staff member and it was evident that there was plenty of character in the pub. Interesting and quirky decor, there felt like some heritage here. There was an element of it feeling like a locals’ pub, but in a positive sense and the atmosphere was laid-back. There’s one large room at the front, that was once divided, with a courtyard area to the rear.

They don’t tend to name pubs after Prime Ministers any more, but here’s Robert Peel.

This was the Harvest Pale from Castle Rock Brewery, which in my opinion was a bloody dreadful beer and I struggled to get any flavour of anything out of it. The nearest taste I could claim this had was to water. Completely pointless as far as I was concerned, although it seemed to be well-kept. For me this was an appalling beer, although I’m sure others might have a very different experience of it. I thought back to the decadent and exciting choices that I’d had at the Real Ale Classroom a few hours before, a more joyous list of beer options.

I felt the need to have a beer from Titanic to balance things up a bit, and the stout tasted as it should. This is one of the few beers that I’d rather not have as a keg version, which was what was available here, the cask to me has a richer flavour. This was a happier experience.

The choice of beers here wasn’t really what I was looking for, there was a nod towards the generic and bland as far as my taste is concerned. I think that is evident when looking at the Untappd ratings for the pub, there are a relatively low number. There’s nothing wrong with the pub though, it was clean, the staff were welcoming and there was a choice of different real ales, so I can see why it’s been listed in the Good Beer Guide.