After a bit of a play around with new colours, I’ve landed don this beaut-
And a bit closer:
Closer still:
You can find it here:
Tag Archives: History
Mapped: Every British Brewery
I stumbled upon this incredible map of ALL the breweries in the UK. Phew, I can’t even imagine how long this took. It’s hidden on this Etsy page- https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/474870607/map-of-all-the-breweries-in-the-united?ref=shop_home_active_1
I once saw a similar map of US breweries in a London pub and wondered- why isn’t this a map of British breweries? I guess it didn’t exist back then.
Lovely detail. Even at a beer per day, it’d take years to try all the breweries I think.
Candidate #23- Café Briljant, Haarlem, The Netherlands
Haarlem is a small city to the west of Amsterdam. Far more than just a satellite town, Haarlem has an important history itself, and provided the name for the New York suburb. The heyday of beer brewing in Haarlem goes back to the 15th century, when there were no fewer than 100 breweries in the city. And it’s twinned with Derby, England, oddly.
There are a good number of cosy and warm Dutch pubs (brown bars), and a jewel in the crown is Café Briljant. They stock around 50 beers, with a heavy Dutch and Belgian prevalence, offer 5 changing taps and 29 whiskies. They also serve a real community vibe, nestled as it is in a quaint suburb. There is great window seat to watch people go by (below) or an equally appealing alcove seat at the back.
Venue: 8/10
A relaxing venue, and perfect for gathering some energy after a wander around some very pleasant, meandering, historic streets.
Beer: 7/10
A great bottle range and 5 changing taps to keep you interested.
Worthy? Maybe
The definition of a hidden gem
Candidate #22- Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalem, Nottingham, England
The oldest pub in England. Probably*.
The claim of AD 1189 is a tad too quaint: this is the same year that Richard The Lionheart became king and at the bequest of Pope Gregory VIII lead the Third Crusade to the Holy Land, but not before the jolly knights filled up here before a little Saracen slaying. Hence the name. The lower, black and white timbered exterior almost certainly dates from 1650 and was still there in 1751 to feature in the book “History of the Antiques of Nottingham”, after which the taller outcrop was added. But here’s their claim as the oldest: the caves under the castle have been used to brew beer since construction in 1067. It could well be the oldest continuously serving pub in Britain.
It is carved into the caves of Castle Rock under Nottingham Castle- that same castle where the Sherif of Nottingham lived as his land was beleaguered by the legendary Robin Hood. As you can see below, much of the pub really is in the caves. In one small room, a chimney leads vertically up and emerges into the open air outside the castle walls- this was likely the malthouse.
A few legends persist- there is a very, very dusty ship which hasn’t been cleaned for hundreds of years for fear of death (it’s cursed) and the Pregnancy Chair that helps you, well, get pregnant. In The Ward Room you can play one of the oldest pub games: baiting the bull. One must swing a bull’s nose ring through the air and hook it onto a horn. This is pretty difficult if there’s anyone else in the room.
Venue: 10/10
A real legacy pub. It may be owned by a large beer company that cares more about it’s market share and growth, but they have not at all ruined this landmark building. Old, quaint, storied and quintessential.
Beer: 7/10
A very good range of ales, and the specially brewed ‘Olde Trip’ is one of my all-time favourites. Completely standard range of bland lagers though.
Worthy? Yes
The ultimate ‘one for the road’ pub.
*Unsurprisingly, this is a fiercely contested title: in Nottingham alone, Ye Olde Salutation Inn and the Bell Inn both make such a claim. The Guinness Book of Records currently cites Ye Olde Fighting Cocks, St. Albans, as the oldest, but this is far from certain: it might not even be the oldest in St. Albans.
The debate is not helped by the confusion between oldest building and oldest continually serving premises, the lack of solid proof for the latter and whether the former makes the latter redundant: for example, the Old Ferryboat Inn, Cambridgeshire, has archeological evidence suggesting the building foundations date back to 460 AD and records that show liquor was served in 560 AD, however the building is much, much younger, and who knows what happened in-between? If one supports oldest building, then the 143 million year old caves into which Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalem is carved provide some gravitas to its’ claim.
Candidate #20- The Mermaid Inn, Rye, England
Rebuilt in 1420 with later Tudor additions, some of the cellars at The Mermaid Inn survived from 1156 and contribute to its Grade II listed status; and the ghosts- if we knock it down, where will they live?
But Ozzy-cyp is outraged that elevators weren’t invented and properly installed into building codes 600 years ago:
“…end room with lots of steps up and down which is not suitable to have a stroller so had to carry our daughter all the time”
and thus promptly gave them a ‘terrible’ rating on Tripadvisor. One can only imagine her indignation upon discovering that no actual mermaids have stayed here.
The Giants Fireplace Bar is dominated by a hearth the size of a spacious Upper East Side studio apartment. It’s beautiful. You can find this room via a secret passage too- so secret I never noticed it.
Some of the medieval artwork comes from the renowned Slade School of Fine Art, Bloomsbury. Maybe even this one:
The Mermaid Inn was a notable alehouse in medieval times and served beer brewed on site to sailors, Rye being a member of the Confederation of Cinque Ports. Catholic Priests fleeing the Reformation in Continental Europe stayed in the 1500s; Elizabeth I was a guest and a group of notorious smugglers known as the Hawkhurst Gang called The Mermaid Inn their local in the 1700s. In the 1800s it was privately owned (selfish bastard), functioned as a club for artists in the early 20th century (including Oscar Wildes’ “Bosie”), and during the Second World War it was commandeered as a garrison for Canadian soldiers. So, some history.
One more of that fireplace:
Venue: 9.5/10
So many beams.
Beer: 6/10
Small range with a few bottles, but well kept and where else can you drink with the ghosts of the Hawkhurst Gang?
Worthy? Yes.
Just look at that fireplace.
85. Delerium Café, Brussels, Belgium
There’s a place in Belgium that thought, back in 2004, that stocking a different beer for every year since Jesus was born would be a cracking idea. It was. But it quickly became passé. So now there’s 3,162.
Breaking the record back in 2004 helped to put Delerium Café on the map. The secret is certainly out. So I feared a venue overrun by tourists or packed like a London pub at 5pm on a Friday (a quick one at The Harp, anyone?) or, worse, a business now hollowly profiteering off its fabled reputation, turning the prices up to 11 and stripping out the ancient furniture in favour of standing areas and tables with shiny lacquer surfaces for easy wiping down (I’m looking at you, Früh am Dom, Cologne).
For just over €2, I had a freshly poured glass of some wheat beer I’ve forgotten the name of. I can’t even get a schooner of Heineken for that price in Amsterdam. It was lovely too, of course.
Bent on world domination, Delerium World, as I’m calling it, has taken over the whole street and offers an absinth bar with over 400 varieties, a tequila and mezcal bar with over 500 types (because 12% beer just isn’t enough) and Little Delirium Café at the start of the street to confuse tourists. You can enjoy this alley until 4am most nights.
The entire venue, spread over three floors, is vast, so here’s a bunch of photos:
Go on, step right in:
Venue: 9/10
A benchmark in beer bar design. That it can absorb so many people and still feel intimate and cosy is praiseworthy.
Beer: 10/10
Giving a perfect score is a nervy thing- it implies perfection*. If there exists a better selection in depth, quality of choices and housekeeping, I’d happily be proved wrong. Seems unlikely any other pretender could possibly be as cheap though.
*There has to be a ten, or why not score the beer selection out of 9?
Worthy? Yes
Quite simply a beer nirvana. Spread over three floors (with satellite bars along the street), it has absorbed the tourists and thrown them in to a crucible of camaraderie.
Candidate #15- In Den Uiver Proeflokaal, Haarlem, the Netherlands.
Haarlem, thirty years older than Amsterdam, is a medium sized town less than 15 minutes to the west from Amsterdam Centraal (apparently far enough to deter most tourists). It has a long history in brewing and was a major centre in the 16th and 17th centuries: this legacy can be seen in street names, such as Brouwersvaart (Brewer’s Canal)- a waterway used to bring fresh water from the dunes to the city’s breweries. At its peak, Haarlem had roughly 100 breweries, but the Black Death ravaged the city’s population: by 1752 there were just 7 breweries left; by 1820, none.
In the 1990s the Stichting Haarlems Biergenootschap started brewing historic recipes and Jopen beer was born. The kind folk of Haarlem didn’t exactly sit around drinking water waiting for the beery Gods to brew again: Haarlem has a robust selection of good beer bars, and per capita it must be amongst the most beer bar rich town in the world. Enter: In Den Uiver Proeflokaal.
Remarkably, there are just 5 reviews on Tripadvisor, which may explain the positive reaction from staff, who seem genuinely happy to talk you through their beers and history: the snug hidden around the back was an office of the world’s oldest newspaper still in print, since 1656 (Haarlemse Dagblad), but I could believe it belonged to the Drones Club, such is the English-private-member-club-of-yesteryear feel.
Another nod to the local history is the plethora of aeronautical memorabilia to celebrate the Haarlemmer Anthony Fokker, an aviation pioneer whose Douglas DC-2 (the eponymous ‘Uiver’) won its class in the 1934 Melbourne Race.
In the summer, get there early and enjoy a seat outside and look over one corner of the stunning market square and Grote Kerk. Some reviewers on Tripadvisor claim that the market square is ‘Nothing to write home about”- what else is in your life? Because I want some of that.
Venue: 8/10
Cosy and ‘gezellig’ in the winter, great outdoor in the summer.
Beer: 7/10
Decent enough: 10 taps, 15 bottles.
Worthy? Yes
You can’t invent history.
Mapped: The Best Beer Bars in the USA.
According to some people, these are the best beer bars in the contiguous USA. Granted, I took this list from a 2010 publication of Beer Magazine (I think), so it may be a bit dated, but you can’t manufacture historical whimsy, so at least some of these must still be right. I have only visited those with a blue label, so there’s much to look forward too.
134. The Bell, Aldworth, Berkshire, England
Some people just can’t let things go. Like pubs; The Bell Inn has been in the same family for five generations: more than 250 years. Take that, inheritance tax.
Many British pubs look quaint and akin to a film set from the outside, but are all too often trashed by tasteless interior renovations that currently seem to involve painting the walls ivory or mauve and filling two-thirds of the place with shiny mass produced furniture and calling it a ‘restaurant’. The Bell doesn’t subscribe to this nonsense. The interior seems to be vaguely centred around a wooden cubicle of sorts, from which the staff serve you through a window; the menu is a series of paper notes haphazardly affixed to the walls.
The Bell is the proud winner of the 1997 Best Sandwich Pub Award (which is a thing, apparently). For a mere £3.50, you can chose a warmed roll stuffed with a doorstop of goats cheese and a side of olives, or a hearty handmade soup.
Aldworth, the village which The Bell serves, has approximately 8 houses. I visited for the lunchtime opening slot (it closes in the afternoon, just like in yore) and every single resident and their friends must have stopped by since it was bustling. The next nearest village has four houses, and the local ‘town’ (maybe 100 houses and a Post Office) is over an hour walk away. There are no busses. No phone signal, and a phone box that doesn’t take cash but gladly accepts BT Phonecards, whatever they are. So just quite where all these people came from I don’t know. The 1940s, probably.
Half of the pub is the old tap room and features a set of long benches for packing in large groups and making new (old) friends. The best seat (above photo) is in a recess that used to be the fireplace.
Best stay inside.
The Gents toilets are worth a mention: one literally relieves oneself on the wall outside, exposed to the elements, only a wooden fence separating your back from the car park. Efficient use of space.
Venue: 10/10
The definition of ‘real pub’.
Beer: 7.5/10
Small range, but still diverse and, of course, well-kept.
Worthy? Yes
Stands out amongst even the top tier.
Candidate #13- The Free Press, Cambridge, UK.
The Free Press is the pub that Cambridge deserves. This college town is both cosy and strikingly imposing. After walking the grounds of Trinity College and gawking at the cathedral of Kings College, it’d be a real shame to have to refresh yourself at Wetherspoons.
The Free Press is not a proud, lonely bastion either. Cambridge has a bunch of great pubs, if you know where to look: even one famous for the discovery of the DNA double helix (beer makes you smart). But I always end up here at some point.
Hogwarts Academy for the Wealthy and Privileged.
It’s cosy and dark, so in wintertime it excels. There is a little section of the pub mostly screened-off and large enough for just one table, which you will be lucky to find free, and the roof of this dominion is pasted with old newspaper clippings from monumental events in history: Royal weddings, State funerals.
The range of ales is more than a sessions worth, unless you are really committed, and even the pumps look cool. The service has been great whenever I’ve visited too. Without being uncomfortably busy, this place is no secret, so even lunchtimes can be generally full. If you want a quiet pint, go for the mid-afternoon lull.
Venue: 8/10
Plenty of rustic, old-England charm, just a short walk through quaint Cambridge suburbs from the centre and colleges.
Beer: 8.5/10
Well kept, well-poured; hard to stop.
Worthy? A good call.
It’s hard not to just choose 150 British pubs, if they’re your thing.
Perfect Beers 