Jo and I spent the weekend just gone on a tourist jaunt to London. Which went something like this:

Saturday

Morning: Virgin Pendolino from Manchester Piccadilly, tube across town to base-camp: Fuller’s Mad Hatter, Blackfriars.

Afternoon: Quick stroll down to Borough Market. Alas, The Rake was hammered, hadn’t read Mark Dredge’s review of Brew Wharf yet, so passed that one by. Dodged a rain shower by nipping into The Wheatsheaf, situated in the cellars of the old Hop Exchange. Perfectly pleasant pint of Phoenix Arizona (I know, all the way to London to drink beer from up the road in Rochdale, eh? You can take us Northerners out of the North…)

Also wandered into Utobeer, brilliant little place (about the same size as Beer Ritz), cracking selection of fantastic beers (more on that in next New Arrivals post). They should open a branch in Manchester, definitely.

Evening: Train out to Bromley, visiting good friends Sam and Chris. Takeaway from Tamasha – ordered something that turned out to be rabbit in creamy, lightly-spiced sauce – accompanied by a couple of bottles of Westerham‘s Little Scotney Pale Ale – red-brown, deliciously malty – then a more-than generous measure of Laphroig Quarter Cask (cheers, Chris!) Got back about midnight, extremely full and happy but too late for the hotel bar. Never mind.

Sunday

Morning / Afternoon: Weekend Tourist Destination #1: Hampton Court Palace. Good few hours mooching through medieval / baroque palaces; peering into display cases, suitably impressed by the architecture, generally soaking up the culture. Almost tempted by King’s Table Ale at lunch’ but £3.50 for 4% bottled session bitter helped decide against (bit early in the day and hot weather to boot). Had ice-cream instead. Two scoops. Also almost temped by leather tankard; which smelled great, looked pretty nifty. Flipped the thing over, saw £40.00 price tag (£5 cheaper online, apparently). Sanity quickly restored.

(Also, I spotted this fella in the courtyard, perched on top of so-called “wine fountain”… but I reckon I know a happy ale-drinker when I see one:)

Evening: Train back to town, quick tube ride up to Covent Garden. Dropped in on The Porterhouse for steak dinner (served with mountain of straw chips and rather pleasant bernaise sauce). Few pints of probably the best stouts to be found in London (well, outside of Greenwich, that being Meantime territory, obviously). Jo went for Plain Porter, I sampled Oyster Stout, switched to the Wrasslers XXXX for number two, stuck with that for the duration. Thought about Brain Blasta (strong ale, 7% ABV or so), decided to remain coherent instead.

(Incidentally, the Porterhouse has the best interior decor in the world. If you’ve been there, you’ll know exactly what I mean: floor-to-ceiling cabinets filled with the most fascinating selection of bottled beers you’re likely to see in your life. Here’s a quick snapshot, which I hope I’ve been able to capture okay, given the suitable atmospheric conditions:

Love the place. Absolutely love it. They should also open a branch in Manchester, most definitely.)

Back to Mad Hatter for quick night-cap. Choice of several Fuller’s ales, went for London Pride (I fancied something with more bite than Seafarer’s Ale looked like it might deliver and I’d been disappointed by Chiswick bitter on a couple of occasions. The Pride was okay, but nothing special – honestly it really could’ve done with a sparkler to liven it up a bit, it was flat as the proverbial witch’s what-not – but perhaps I should have gone for the ESB. I’ll know better next time.)

Monday

Morning / Afternoon: Dropped suddenly-rather-heavy bags (again: next New Arrivals piece…) at Euston Left Luggage. Wandered round to Euston Square, jumped back on tube, headed down to Weekend Tourist Destination #2: Tower of London. Before joining heaving throng of tourists, headed across London bridge to Butler’s Wharf in search of food. Passed site of Anchor Brewhouse; original Courage brewery, converted to apartment block (inevitably). (There was a plaque on the wall, which I duly snapped; click for a larger, more readable version:)

Next: The Tower. Apparently 2,400,000 visitors a year. Most seemed to turned up on same day as us. Can’t blame them, weather was lovely, but queue for Crown Jewels (“royal bling” as Yeoman Warder Tour Guide put it) was quite ridiculous, likewise queue for ‘Torture in the Tower’ exhibition. Skipped those; did the medieval bits, checked out display of Royal Arms and Armour (well worth a look if you’re a bit of a medieval military buff, although the £17.00 Tower entry ticket might be understandably off-putting), stuck our heads around gift shop door, checked out tourist tat. Once again, King’s Table Ale and leather tankard both called. Once again, their allure was easily resisted.

Evening: En-route back to Euston, Jo suggested stopping at that Gunmaker’s place that I keep going on about (I was only too happy to oblige). Wandered in, eyes drawn magnetically to chalk-board menu. Curses! Food plans foiled: kitchen not open until 18.30 (apparently they allow their chef time to rest, the mad, compassionate fools). Have to get back to Euston for 20.00 train (reserved single tickets, no choice). Too close to risk it.

Consolatory pint of Woodforde’s Wherry – a pleasant golden session beer with light, hoppy profile – then, half-way through pint of Kelham Island Pale Rider – stronger, slightly darker, much more pronounced hop-bite – legendary landlord Jeff appears from upper rooms, proceeds to win uber-Landlord Award. (He did this by catching sight of us out of the corner of his eye, stopping in mid-stride with an impressive double-take and then proceeding to remember not only the last time he spoke to me – which was just over a year ago – but also my name – which, to a bear of very little brain and even less useful memory like me, is pretty darn impressive, I can tell you. I introduced Jo, we chatted for a bit and then Jeff headed off to entertain his regulars, leaving us feeling thoroughly welcome and absolutely determined to head on back there the next time we’re in town. We’ll make damn sure we’re there when the kitchen is open, too.)

Definitely needed food before two-hour train journey home. Aforementioned regular helpfully suggested The Bree Louise. Bloody good idea. Back on the tube, off again at Euston Square, round corner to Bree Louise. Ordered 2x New Yorker chicken (fried breast fillet covered in bacon and cheese, pile of chips, just the ticket) washed down with utterly underwhelming pint of gravity-dispensed Nethergate Umbel Magna (I’ve had both gravity beers at the Bree Louise and Umbel Magna elsewhere and they’ve both been much better, but so it goes…) followed by pint of Rebellion Mild – smooth, nutty, dark, quite pleasant – for the road.

Train. Taxi. Home. Bed. Pretty much exhausted, but extremely happy.

(We’re already planning our next London jaunt: Brew Wharf, The Rake, Utobeer again, definitely The Gunmaker’s, definitely The Porterhouse, maybe a trip over to Greenwich… oh, and perhaps some more tourist stuff as well. But no leather tankards for me. Not at £40 bloody quid a pop…)

A good friend of mine came up from London on Saturday, so I thought I’d take him to the best pub in Manchester: the Marble Arch.

If you’re from round these parts then you might scoff at my casual handing out of the ‘best pub…’ accolade; I’m sure you’ll have your own favourite and I’m not intending to denigrate any of our city’s other very fine watering holes. But honestly, if there is a better pub than the Marble Arch around these parts then I haven’t found it yet (and please feel free to leave suggestions in the comments if you think you might have).

My friend (also called Darren) and I got there around four in the afternoon, and a serendipitous table vacancy opened up just as we were arriving, so we settled ourselves in for a few pints and a good catch-up. I went up to the bar and came back with two pints of golden, crystal-clear Marble Pint, one of the tastiest, freshest pale ales you’re ever likely to meet. We started talking – setting the world to rights, as you do – and soon finished off the pint of Pint and decided to move on to Marble J.P. Best; a classic best-bitter that’s not quite as hoppy as the Pint, slightly stronger on the malt and still extremely refreshing. It definitely went down a treat.

T’other Darren is a big Belgian beer fan and haunts a few of London’s Belgian brasseries when he can, so he perused the Marble’s beer menu with an expert eye, picking out a beer he’d heard of but not yet encountered down south. I forget the name now, as they were unfortunately out of stock. Instead, my eye was caught by the Phoenix Thirsty Moon, so we opted for a couple of those instead. Again, it was another quite delicious bitter, but in this one the malt had been turned up a noticeable notch; it was rich, sweet and pleasantly warming.

By now we were feeling distinctly sociable – chatting to the folks on the next table about the demonstrations in the city centre – and we decided that before Jo joined us and we ordered food, we’d have one more go at the Belgian section of the menu. Darren picked out a St Feuillien Tripel and it turned out to be a delicious and extremely drinkable golden Belgian with very rich malt flavours that weren’t at all over-powered by its 8.5% abv.

Jo arrived mid-way through our goblets and we quickly ordered food (Cornish gurnard for Jo, venison for me and the Marble burger and chips for Darren – all absolutely delicious) and then we ordered another round. The time had come for a stout and so we opted for the Marble Chocolate; a rich, warming, dark-cocoa laced beer with a great body and a gorgeous mouth-feel. It’s dangerously more-ish, too at 5.5% abv. Beautiful.

By this point Darren was declaring himself full and happy, but I’d seen one more beer I really wanted to try. Having enjoyed Acorn’s Old Moor Porter recently, I just had to have a drop of their Gorlovka Imperial Stout. It was quite different to the Marble Chocolate, with a much more pronounced coffee and liquorice flavour, but once again it was dangerously drinkable, even at 6% abv. Probably a good job I just had a half, all things considered.

As we departed the Marble Arch I cast a longing over-the-shoulder glance at the Marble Dobber pump, but I’d sampled its ample delights before and – even though it had taken the top prize the Manchester Beer Festival the day before – I knew our paths would cross again, so I was content to let it lie.

The evening wasn’t quite over yet. We headed back to our place and I cracked open one of my precious stash of BrewDog Tokyo and poured it (ever so responsibly) into two glasses. Darren made all the right appreciative noises about this truly terrific beer and then we finished off with a wee dram of cask strength Edradour, just to send us nicely on our way.

The next morning, we (I say ‘we’, I mean ‘Jo’ – I was in no fit state) drove Darren back to Piccadilly station (this time sans riot police thronging the streets), chatting about the previous evening’s beers on the way. Darren’s favourite had been the Phoenix Thirsty Moon. Mine (Tokyo aside) was probably honours even between the Marble Pint, the Thirsty Moon and the Marble Chocolate, although frankly, they were all rather excellent and I wouldn’t hesitate to re-visit any of them.

So, there you go. A pretty much perfect session at the best pub in Manchester? In my opinion, yes. Can’t wait to get back to the Marble Arch for another.