The Park Tavern, Finsbury Park

No real ale, but otherwise a very good community pub that seems to still run darts/football teams - an increasing rarity in London. Looks so-so from the outside but a comfortable, traditional local inside. Staff and locals friendly enough on my last flying visit and the Guinness is both good and quite cheap for the area. Enjoy this type of pub while they still exist.

24 Feb 2011 01:15

The Burton Arms Hotel, Manchester

Rough-and-ready locals pub set on a busy main road that also does clean, cheap accommodation. Currently under Marbury Taverns (I believe ex-Punch) this is primarily a pub that serves a regular clientele with fairly cheap lager, keg bitter and Guinness, though it has recently added a couple of handpulls to the bar, serving both very good Holt's bitter and a rotating guest from the likes of Lees and Thwaites. The breakfast is nothing too special, being a decent-sized but low quality fry-up, but the pub, if you take it at face value as a lively inner-city local, is actually not bad (be warned: it gets packed on pool league nights).

11 Nov 2010 11:18

The Old Fountain, Old Street

Lovely little pub just off the massive Old Street roundabout and across the road from the dead-undergoing-redevelopment-to-flats Three Crowns. The beer choice is excellent (generally covering the full spectrum from light 3% ale to dark, heavy porters), the quality reliably good and the atmosphere just like that of a busy-ish backstreets pub in any major city - never too loud but never all that quiet either. Clientele range from locals from the nearby estates, through offcie workers needing a couple of pints before facing the sardine-like experience of commuting to the asymmetrically-coiffeured bright young things of Hoxton and Shoreditch all, it seems, rubbing along just fine.

It seems worth noting that I've never yet found a bad pub (Wetherspoons aside)that takes the trouble to buy, look after and serve beers from the more palate-challenging microbreweries (Thornbridge, Marble, Brewdog, Darkstar). The Fountain is no exception.

10 Nov 2010 08:20