Pubs, Tavs, Diners and Restaurants – Page 20

Tom And Bob Drink With Coal Porters In Masquerade

A break from the maps… yet more of the rats’ warren of Georgian information online. I have no idea what I am going to do with it. Seems a bit of a waste. But then you find this, Real Life In London, Volumes I and II by one Pierce Egan. It’s an 1821 fictional exploration of London’s nightlife high and low by gentlemen cousins Tom and Bob – including a drinking session in a pub known as the Black Diamond… or Charley’s Crib wearing “tatter’d garments and slouch’d hats” to hide their identities:

…they were in a house of call for Coal Porters. Before the president (who, by way of distinction, had turned the broad flap of his coal-heaving hat forward in the fashion of a huntsman’s cap) was placed a small round table, on which stood a gallon measure of heavy wet. On his right sat a worn-out workman fast asleep, and occasionally affording his friends around him a snoring accompaniment to a roar of laughter.

As you know I enjoy seeing what is to be found in an image of pub life like this one from 1775 but the adventures of Tom and Bob go the next step and add text description to the information in the image. You can read the story yourself. It’s not much good 194 years after the fact but look at the information that’s stuck away in there:

• Drinks: They are drinking quarts of ale. Porter-pots. There is a gallon pitcher in the middle of the floor on a small table. Punch served in bowls but taken by the glass.

• Manners: hats stay on. A penny is placed in a dish for seemingly unending supply of tobacco. No credit. Singin’ and dancin’ for each other is the entertainment.

• Slang: the drinking session is a “heavy-wet”. Not sure what “blue ruin” is… no, I go – it’s gin. They all seem to have an accent with “v for “w” – why? “Quawt” for quart. “Toast” has the modern meaning.

• Space: The tables are set in a horseshoe. Candle light. Service from the middle. The text says this is a public house but it seems more like a club.

In itself, its not going to win the Nobel for literature anytime soon. But at well over 800 pages, a pretty extensive effort to describe the scene even if through the lens of two upper class twits. Hardly lines up with the stories told in the court reports from about the same time. Which is fine. That case of the ten year old getting off murder charges in 1756 after throwing a knife into the chest of mom’s abusive boyfriend was a bit much.

Session 99: A Little Mild And A Little Excitement

This month’s edition of The Session is hosted by Velky Al who asks us to consider American mild. Mild of the Americas? Pan-American mild? I am game. After all, the Western Hemisphere is the happeningist hemisphere if all.

Mild. I actually have had two glasses of the stuff over the last few months. Here in the central section of the hemispheric upper quarter. That is an upgrade from most years here in Ontario where mild is rare as… as… a very rare thing. That glass above? I had it in Toronto in early December. After the day of sitting in a strange city studying the difference between a semi-colon here and a comma there, considering whether “shall” or “must” is better placed in that sentence. Seriously. Contract drafting skills are not particularly thrilling. So, a stop at C’est What, a bar I wrote about a decade ago, was needed. The venerable basement tavern has always struck me as Toronto’s rec room and the pint or two of mild fit right in and washed away the classroom, the grammar and the concrete landscape of 90 degree angles before I jumped on the train back home.

Two months later I was in small town Ontario – Collingwood on Georgian Bay – and we stopped for a great dinner at Northwinds Brewhouse. Again, a reviving hit of malt and lush fluidity framed rather than cut but modest hopping. And under 4%, the drink didn’t hamper my ability to take on the last leg of the trip to the hotel another hour down the road. Brewmaster Bartle had three beers on under that level of strength – the mild, a grodziskie and a farmhouse ale – the details of which you can see on the chalkboard if you squint at that photo… yes, there… way in the back. Yup.

But that is it. Good news? Well, I’d like more but at least this all represents and improvement over Session #3 which was also about mild ale. Back in 2007 I really couldn’t find one. Had to post a picture of a book to find something to talk about. I was a bit naive, too. I wrote “you are never going to see a flavoured mild or an extreme mild.” AHHAAHHAHHAHAHAHHAHHAHAHA. Had I but known how stooooopid craft beer was going to get over the intervening years. What a fool I was.

“Selling Beer and Keeping Houses of Rendezvous”

One of the good things about being in my job is the records one comes across or co-workers with an interest in history share with you. I got this tidbit below in my email last week. That’s from the first document I came across in a larger scanned file called “Tavern Inspectors Records 1849-1853“.

To the Honourable the Municipal Council of the Township of Pittsburgh in Session aforementioned, We the Undersigned Tavern Keepers of the Village of Barriefield humbly and respectfully sheweth – whereas that there are persons residing in the said Village or premises adjoining Selling Beer and Keeping Houses of Rendezvous against the Law and to the great Desparagement of Her Majesty her [maybe “Crown”?] and Dignity seeing that we have to pay to the [?] the sum of Eight pounds with additions whereas these are paying [odd symbol for “zippo”] therefore we humbly beg your Honours will be pleased to look into the prayer of this our petition and dispell all such Houses unless they pay the same apportioned as in the City of Kingston vis [?] and we humbly beg that if such is granted that this shall be [?] for seeing that if such is not stopped we Your Petitioners will not be able to pay the Monies apportioned. But trusting that Your Honours will be pleased to looking into the prayer of this Petition and as In duty bound.

Barriefield is a small village in a largely rural township that was amalgamated into the City of Kingston in 1998. It was originally set up in the War of 1812 as an officer’s residence area associated with nearby Fort Henry. The document seems to be dated from 18 April 1850. It’s title on the back page is blurry and ink blot messy but seems to state Petition of [blah, blob, blur] for Beer Shops. It looks like the Tavern Keepers of Barriefield were not happy with the informal competition. I like the suggested threat, too: shut them down or we will maybe not pay our fees. That is the “zippo” emoticon circa 165 years ago in question up there, by the way. Click on it for a bigger bit of the document. I would also attach the whole file but it’s an 80 page pdf. Oh, what the hell. Have a look. By the way, a notation in the petition states that the matter was referred to the next Session and a bylaw was to be prepared… in case you are keeping track.

The beginning of the well regulated marketplace. What follows in those 80 pages is the licensing of all sorts of establishments in the community over the next few years. Afrirmations that the applicant is an honest, steady and sober man. The Township of Pittsburgh hadn’t been long in existence on the date of that first petition of April 1850. In the emails I was sent, there was also another file with the Minutes of the Midland District Municipal Council, a larger regional jurisdiction that was only abolished in 1849. So, one of the first things the new government has to deal with is the standardizing of licensing of the taverns and beer shops. Maybe it was just the fact of a thirsty British military base down the road. Or maybe it was the need to provide regulation as the Georgian ways of the century’s first have gave way to new Victorian expectations.

New York: Last Bar Seat, Allen Street Pub, Albany

I have to say. I didn’t expect it. Don’t get me wrong. I have known for a long time that I love neighbourhood bars in the US. I spent a great summer evening a decade ago with pals of a pal in Maine watching the All-Star game in a place down by the working wharves. The place was the shape of a cinder block and was made up entirely of cinder blocks. I drank Allagash White and then PBR before the money ran out. I love the idea of walking down the block to a place for a beer even though it does not exist in much of Canada outside of the cities where green things don’t grow. Doesn’t exist in much of any place where the planners have played a role. But there it was. And there I was, too.

The photo above is from the end of the bar at the Allen Street Pub in Albany, New York. That’s it. If I was a cheese eating school boy, I might insert some sort of pretendy disclaimer but let’s be honest – free beer is “money + alcohol” innit. Paul gave us the run of the taps though I hope the tipping went some way to match the beers poured for us. There is no avoiding the history of the western world. The bar is owned by Craig’s pal of decades. Paul. The place opened right after prohibition ended and sits among houses on a side street. A municipal planner’s nightmare. It’s filled with local memorabilia with a definite lean towards Albany’s history of military service. It’s also filled with folk from nearby having a beer. Normal. Beer in a normal place.

Here’s the thing. Over the few hours we were there I came to the understanding that this was one of the greatest times in a bar I have ever had. It was perfect. It was so perfect that while one in our group was keen to take me on at an argument about craft beer, I realized I was sitting in a dark tiny pub in a foreign land sucking on a rosemary laced saison as Led Zep’s “Kashmir” roasted out the speakers. While, yes, dark and tiny it could serve as a test site for the Bose speakers Paul had installed. The narrow bar had five distinct spaces: cans in the rear, the cooler with its kegs and bottles, back of the bar plus the old bar top and the new one. If you look at that photo above you will see the division. Before he took it over and expanded, the tavern was just that bit at the front – maybe 18 by 30 feet tops. When we got in the place, we grabbed the back bar with its four seats. The front two-thirds of the place was already well settled by guys drinking macros or a shot or both having a good Friday night. Mere feet away I was having a pint of Black IPA with a balancing splash of brown ale handed to me. And then something else. Again, let’s be honest: I was not conflicted. I had given in. Only an idiot wouldn’t.

What did it all mean? It was more like a village pub in some place where I have family in Scotland than most places I had been in North America. Think I had only seen a place this small on this side of the Atlantic maybe in Newfoundland. No dive and not even a joint. A place in the neighbourhood. Normal. Three beer engines, too. He plans to add more. Paul is even running a cask festival in a few weeks. I expect to be in Canada when that is on. Probably in my basement watching TV. A couple of bus rides away from the next nearest good place to hang out. Thanks a lot, fifty years of urban design.

The Beer On My Path To Owen Sound And Back

I had one of those happy sad events over the weekend, a remembrance of someone two generations older than me, forty-eight years older to be exact. I won’t get into details but suffice it to say that anyone who ensured there was a good beer in the fridge was an ally as much as anything. The weekend was moderation itself with plenty of time spent listening to stories of generations past as well as seeing who might make the funniest strangest face, me or a seven year old. But there were stops and there were meals. So – as a service – I offer a few thoughts.

I will mention the last first. On the road home, we stayed off the main highways given the snow and went with the 1930s era ones, now secondary roads. Which brought us into the towns on the north shore of Lake Ontario. In Trenton, we came across Port Bistro Pub. A burger for me which I might have enjoyed more had the other plates not looked better. The picture above in the middle does not do justice to the architectural nachos consumed by the boy. The salsa was light and lime while the cabbage cole slaw was cut with shredded green apple. You wanted that intel, correct? I mean one needs to project to all parts of the theatre, no? Fine. I admit it. The reason for that all is as background to me now mentioning the one glass of milk stout I had which was made by Gateway Brewing, also of Trenton. It was good. I shall hunt it out again. I took no notes so that is about it. Sorry. Did I mention I was six hours into a none hour snowy drive? Worth a visit.

On the way up, I was more prepared. Or at least I aimed and when I found Northwinds Brewhouse, I had… a burger. But as it was a burger eaten on a Friday unaware of the one I order on the next Sunday. I shouldn’t have had two. But I should have had this one. I had a gratzer as well as a mild. I did make the mental note that it was really grodziskie. But then I noted that these were two of the three beers under 4%. And each passed a critical test, the favour of the one who doesn’t really like beer. I took away the 3.8% farmhouse ale, too. That’s the bottle shop’s chalk board up there. All extremely well made and all the beers entirely avoiding the trend of adjunct craft. No phony baloney fruit sauces in the saison, no silly “vanilla note from a vanilla note giving” bourbon barrel aging. Just that sort of well managed expert brewing that occurs when the basic ingredients meet an intelligent ambitious brewer. I like. Oh, and the chance of a fried egg on your chips. That helps, too.

What did the two places have in common. The spaces were clean, contemporary and well suited for the offerings. I particularly liked how Northwinds employed some clever sound dampening panels up in the rafters. Made what might otherwise have been a bit of an echo laden industrial space into a very strong candidate for my favourite Ontario beer house. Port Bistro? It was the wall of glass facing the river. Another faces the road. So tidy I might have felt awkward if that was an emotion I was capable of feeling.

Looking Out The Window Of A Pub

It’s one of my favorite things to do, sitting looking out the window of a pub. This was last Monday afternoon. The Bow Bar in Edinburgh. I was just getting used to the time zone and would fly out the next day. Two guys standing at the bar in the small one room space were providing the background track to the seat with a view. Apparently, the Bow Bar is packed on weekends but who sits in bar staring out the window on weekends? It’s something to do when your colleagues are at work. When you could be writing a report. Making plans. Paying bills.

Back From That Trip To Scotland That I Mentioned…

I was away for a week on a business trip to Scotland. A whole week? Well, as I am the son of two of those Scots who took to the four corners of the world, I did add a couple of days of vacation but, much to my surprise, it also took 33 hours of travel to get from where I am to where I was going and then, for unknown reasons, well over 20 hours to get back. Evil ocean. Where are the supersonic subs I was promised in comic books as a kid? So while the jet lag isn’t as bad when traveling west, I still need to put things in order. A bit of a photo travelogue, then, tonight. A slide show.

I had not sought out the Bow Bar in Edinburgh before but if there was a ticking habit in my life I feel my one pint in the corner was one big check mark on page one. I was not actually hunting it out and had it in entirely the wrong place in my mind, over at the west end of Rose Street. Probably something else wonderful that I am unaware of is over there. We found ourselves standing next to it when I was hunting out a shop to buy things made of wool. I had a pint of their 3.8% house Bowhemian Ale brewed for them by Alechemy Brewing. It was testimony to the pointlessness of beer over a certain strength. Lots of body. Refreshing in the middle of a march around the town. Interesting with plenty to think about.

The day before the goal was well understood. We headed directly to the door of the Cafe Royal near Waverley Railway Station where we had stood in the summer only to be told the kids could not come in. The laws on kids and bars in Scotland can get quite frustrating but do allow one to consider leaving them behind on another continent with the in-laws. The place is magnificent. The opposite of the study in plainness that is the Bow Bar.

That was good, having the night before been at an event at Glasgow City Chambers where I sat down to dinner with – I kid you not – a Sir, a Lord, a Lady, a High Commissioner, two Right Honourables, a Baillee and… a Baroness. Got piped in and everything. The Cafe Royal is second only to the rooms in that municipal palace for grandeur. Not a word I use often. Grandeur. Back at the Cafe Royal, I had cullen skink as well as some smoked salmon along with a couple of pints, ROK IPA as well as an Edinburgh Pale Ale. The latter was a gem. Just 3.4% with a black tea malt lingering finish there was plenty of malt in the body. The tiled art on the southern wall of the bar is quite the thing. It appears to be a selection of great moments in science’s benefits to mankind. More on those tiles here.

The Piper Bar off George Square in Glasgow and into a weird flashback into pop metal of the 1980s and ’90s. I had a couple of pints of Bitter and Twisted as we head bobbed along with the crowd to Metallica, Iron Maiden and AC/DC. It was pretty refreshing after an evening at the high table. There were airport beers, too. A 4% Camden Pale Ale at Heathrow on the way home and an 8% Wellington Imperial Stout on the way there at Toronto Pearson. The CPA was more expensive. A lunch at The Beehive Inn on Grassmarket to the south of Edinburgh Castle featured whitebait. I want whitebait all the time now. It’s like smelt. But more like smelt-lettes. French fries made of the whole body of a tiny fish. A cheery 4.2% Crofters’ Pale Ale by An Teallach Ale Company of Camusnagaul, Dundonnell, Little Loch Broom went down with that. Just enough to get me out the door and, about an hour and a half later, into the Bow Bar.

What to make of all this? Certainly that there is plenty of good beer to be found even when you are not hunting it out if you are in the right sort of community and know what to look for. No sessions. Just one here. Another there. And certainly there is plenty of good beer well under the 5% lower limit that is so common in much of North America. Think I am going to head over to my local brewery and propose a collaboration. Which is code for pushy beer writer who wants a beer he can’t get. That’s it, right? Anyway, home again. Where the houses are larger and warmer. Where the grass is not a lovely shade of green in January. Where you don’t have to tip the help because it’s your teenager.

Ontario: Bar Hop, 391 King St W, Toronto

Being in the Big Smoke for proper reasons, I took the chance to let Jordan pick someplace that I hadn’t been to before. He chose Bar Hop. Over a couple of hours we talked about writing books, the neat and younger crowd, the beers and other gossipy things like who has the unpaid social media interns.

Standing at the bar as we waited for a table, I was handed a pint of County Durham Session Ale. It was in very good form at 4.4%, $6.95. I say pint as it was thankfully in a nonic but I noticed later that the pour was called 18 oz. Which is open and fair and transparent. It also was what most other pubs would serve as a full pour. Soon we sat in the dark and sorta noisy back of the bar. An unidentical pint of the County Durham Session Ale was then placed before me. Jordan leafed through the menu and picked out favourite. A rye saison was very nice. Sawdust City made it. My beer turned out to be another lovely lighter sort of beer but not cask at all, not what I thought I had asked for… or as I saw later was billed for. Nutty, nitro head even… perhaps. It was also quite nice.

The nonic emptied over a half an hour, We had starters. Jordan had almost half a pint of olives placed before him. I had cod cakes. He had a lot of olive. I had just enough cod cake. Then I had a gose. Very light at 3.8% was a slightly salty Sunny D but in an OK way… sorta… he said politely. I mentioned that Toronto seems to like a fruit flavoured core to a beer judging by this and my last trip. Jordan recommended a beer by a very reputable brewer that tasted like bubblegum dissolved in an IPA to me. I handed the rest to him. Sometimes it’s an added ingredient, some sauce. Sometimes it’s that heavy hand with the mango flavoured hop. I prefer beer to have graininess of one sort or another. A beer where the ingredients come together to make flavours composed of them but not of any one of them. Not a fully popular view apparently in Toronto these days but it’s a blip.

We then both got into our main meals, flank steak with salad for me, and both tucked into Kingston’s Stone City wheat ale called Sons of Sydenham. Seeing as Lord Sydenham had, we are told, a pretty debauched life during his short term as Governor General of the newly United Canada of the 1840s, it seemed an odd name for such an evening of light beers. It was, however, clearly the best. You could taste all the beeriness of the beer. It’s was intended in fact to taste of beer which is handy in, you know, a beer. Made the night along with the service, the food, the hum of the room and the strange table manners of the neighbours.

We left Bar Hop and talked some more as we walked. About the impending crisis which could not quite be defined. About the need to have a car. The architect behind that church facade. The idea of having unpaid social media interns.

So That’s Us Back From Scotland. Did I Learn Anything?

The Golfer’s Rest in North Berwick, East Lothian. When we sat down on the bay window sofa cushions, I said to the kids “now, this is a pub” by which I meant a space that had the feel of a shared public rec room combined with a well managed courteous corner store. With beer. There are analogies to North American spaces but they don’t always have strong drink. The nearest comparison in Canada is more the Tim Horton’s coffee shop in a small town than a bar. Places where all sorts of people meet. The guys at the bar were discussing their latest golf games as well as great golf moments. No different than a bunch of rec leaguers anywhere. I wish I had a pub like this in my life.

A bit of a photo essay. To help me think about the things I liked on the trip as well as the things I thought about. This being a family vacation centered on visiting more family, there was not all that much bouncing around my brain about beer, frankly, but there was a bit. I can’t get over how good it is to have flavorful reasonably bodied hop-shy beers of under 4% readily available. For me, the only measure of strength is milliliters of pure alcohol in the glass or bottle in front of me. Having the option of a 500 ml or pint of roughly 20 ml strength beer is a treat. Deuchars IPA at 3.8% kept my attention a couple of times as did the lowly rated EPA I had with my Balmoral chicken at a pub on Rose Street in Edinburgh called 1780. It was great to have a glass of beer then continue with the unending march that was the holiday. Made me wonder if the current US trend towards low alcohol high hop beers is a last ditch effort to avoid the difficulty of making the lighter UK style beers that more people would likely find attractive.

I am not sure that I like sparkers all that much but it was not a strong impression for me. I have come to think that I don’t really yearn for more Wetherspoon experience. The rules were too much for me. The numbered tables. Maybe my brief experience was not representative so consider that should you actually ever make the mistake of relying on my view. I did learn I like Timothy Taylor. I had three pints over the time I was there. I passed up a very good glass of Côtes du Rhône Villages to have another pint with my lamb chops. Yet, I also had a very good pint of Carling. I was so surprised I had another and confirmed my impression. Was it the company of my cousin-in-law Jim and the chat with his pal the owner at the Ye Olde Anchor, built in 1707 in my mother’s hometown? Who knows? It was a rich experience walking around the streets, seeing pubs like the one grandfather barred my cousin from taking my brother to in 1977. And the one that was the start and finishing place of a majestic 14 hour bender with another cousin in 1986. Or was it just the fact that in all these settings the beer was not the primary function of what was going on. I did, after all, see BrewDog in Edinburgh and passed it by – not out of disinterest as the fact that, as was often the case, there was likely another better thing to do. In that case, The Holyrood 9A was the better thing.

If you like the sort of holiday that gets you familiar with a small patch with lots to do – like, say, Montreal – I can’t recommend Edinburgh and the Lothian area more highly. Even for almost two weeks. It’s not just about the golf, either. We spent three hours in the Scottish National Museum in the early section and had to explain to the kids that in all that time we had not really seen anything related to the clan given that we only came to Scotland in 1250 AD. The city during the Fringe Festival was as animated as I have seen in a community. One real treat was the trip out to Bass Rock on the boat run by the Scottish Seabird Centre. And, as you can see, there was beer, Puffin Best Bitter. A good low strength tasty pint that in no way interfered with the rest of the day’s to do list. A beer that functioned exactly like a cup of tea. It refreshed and set one up for whatever was next. Who knew? It made me realize how little I like the idea of “session beer” with all due respect as I wanted one of these when I was not having a session. It’s not like there’s a need to label something session tea.

What did I learn? I learned that I might want to change a few things but that I come from people from a great place and also that I am lucky that my parents decided to make the jump across the ocean, too. I also learned that it’s only twelve hours door to door. A taxi, a plane, another plane, a bus, a train, a bus and a half a block’s walk in fact. Thinking already about a repeat soon.

If This Is Monday Is That Longniddry?

By the second week, I’ve given up on most places listed in the guides like The Malt Shovel as there are rules against kids even in their mid-teens coming into some pubs that have me befuddled. I never inquired so I might be entirely wrong about the place. Some pubs like The Ship Inn in North Berwick are good for families until 8 pm. Others like The Abbotsford on Rose Street in Edinburgh are fine with the family upstairs in the restaurant but not downstairs in the bar. One Wetherspoons had so many rules (give the man your table number and your pint may arrive in twenty minutes… but only if you are in that room with the 14 year old) that I thanked them and left. Fortunately common sense reigns at the Old Clubhouse in Gullane where Timothy Taylor flows even if through a sparkler. Up there with The Holyrood 9A as best stops so far.

The Ship Inn was all sparklers, too. The pub sat in a dark red sandstone building on corner a few blocks back from the shore, tenament style, apartments upstairs, established 1895. Big windows and a few picnic tables out front under shady tree… well, shady when it’s not raining. Inside, dark wood and comfortable leather benches and arm chairs. Friendly service but they appeared to have never conceived of hot chocolate and Baileys. It was, you know, raining. It was remarked upon a few times by the staff. Said they would add it to the drinks list. Being Canadian seems a natural thing, having eight months of winter and all. Three hand pulls of local beers along with ten or so taps, mainly from larger breweries. Large selection of bottles, mirrored shelves. Open central space by bar. Tip jar. Tipping is interesting. Neither encouraged or refused. Asked in a few places and consensus is 10% is appreciated but not expected or demanded. Uncle and I both agreed upon the Broughton IPA – which came in at 5.5% even if on sparkler. Creamy mouthfeel, pronounced chewy hops.

That’s all for now. The train is approaching the sunny Clyde the noo.