Not the Usual Suspects
Birmingham CAMRA are doing a fine job of promoting their area's pubs. A series of "Pub Trails" in the City Centre and suburbs published on-line.
No one could accuse them of picking the obvious in their City Centre Part 2 trail of 5 pubs.
From many years of pub ticking experience, I find it best practice to avoid any pub with Railway in its name.
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| The Railway |
Quite why CAMRA would recommend this pub must be lost in the annals of time. Pubsgalore reviewers summarising why I've never previously ventured in.
I've always walked past this pub thinking what a dive it looked. It looks as if it might be dark and depressing inside, with lots of lager swilling yobs. The number of smokers hanging around outside the doors does not help with first impressions.
A cavern of a place, with TV Screen aplenty. Two cask on and my Purity Mad Goose was better than expected. Would I return? Well, you can see the New Street Wetherspoons through the window and there is a cost of living crisis.
Cherry Reds is far more like it. Has it really been open for 14 years now? This has been a Good Beer Guide regular for several years and there is something for everyone. Interesting International beers, fridges full of craft cans and local keg and cask. If beer is not your thing, there is cake. If cake is not your thing, they host regular comedy nights and live music upstairs.
I only wish I either lived closer or in a country with a functioning night time public transport system. The last train home well before the acts would finish.
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| Springtime Kolsch |
Despite living near Birmingham all my life, I had never even heard of Keg and Grill. Finding it is not as easy as you would expect. A clue from etched windows, but where exactly is the front door?
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| Its in there, somewhere |
A City Centre Desi pub - the onion bhaji's are priced £8.95 on the menu but in an interesting twist, retail at £4.95.
The details on the trail page do not correlate with reality - wheras a pub conversion is described, this looks like a conferance centre. As the only punter, the very friendly bar-man tells me how they recently moved and used to be on the other side of the queensway. Hopefully, their regulars are aware of this. There's going to be little footfall here, and any potential customers have a lot of competition around the corner.
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| In the interest of trying something new - a Bombay Bicycle IPA |
The bhaji's are excellent - a meal on their own - and fortify me for the uphill walk to The Craven Arms. A must visit Black Country Ales pub, that manages to stand isolated in the face of regeneration.
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| Hanging on to Tradition |
BCA are running their annual pub ticking promotion at the moment. A free sweatshirt for visiting any 25 of their 51 (!) pubs across the Midlands. From Herefordshire to Leicestershire. Variety, you won't achieve. But decent cobs, fine beer from breweries you're unlikely to have heard of and busy houses, you will find. The demand for tradition is there and BCAs simple formula works.
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| How pubs should look |
A theatrical finish to the day at the Victoria. Aptly enough, a C19th Victorian corner boozer, with a distinctive exterior and plush interior. A longer cocktail menu than cask offerings, as I return to where I started with a half of Mad Goose. Stuffed into a Wye Valley Nightjar glass.
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| A Theatre Pub in Birmingham |
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| Mad Goose in a Night Jar |
Not the usual suspects for a Birmingham Pub Crawl. Those are recommended in this one day to be completed trail.
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