£3.75 for a pint of lager, and £4.40 for a bottle of cider in a recent pub visit in Edinburgh. Oof!

Most city pubs are a rip off if you don’t know where to go.

In Manchester you can get a nice pint of ale in the city centre for £2.50 ish but it’s now hovering around the £3.00 mark in a lot of pubs.

In the suburbs it’s a bit cheaper, the Royal Oak in Didsbury sells ale for £2.20 a pint and Didsbury is proper posh too. 😉

However, we all know that the best pubs in Manchester are in Stockport – The Magnet and The Crown both have 14 handpumps on and are less than £2.50 a pint, plus the clientelle tend to be nicer.

£2 a pint of perfectly drinkable bitter at the Smith’s pub on St Martin’s Lane, WC2N.

Just two hundred yards from Nelson’s Column too.

£2 a pint of perfectly drinkable bitter at the Smith’s pub on St Martin’s Lane, WC2N.

I work almost opposite that pub (Im here today) but go out of my way to drink somewhere else. Cant stand Smith’s Bitter. Their lagers are OK though.

However, we all know that the best pubs in Manchester are in Stockport

Sweet Jesus GG. The reason the pubs in Manchester charge so much is due to the “it could be worse. A lot worse. You could be in Stockport” premium 😉

from Crap Towns:

Stockport is a small town in South Manchester. Much of Engels’ research for Marx’s Communist Manifesto was based on the apalling working conditions in the town’s hat mills. And to be honest it’s gone down hill ever since.

The overiding ‘look’ for Stockport’s locals is a shaven head with optional Fila cap / visor perched on top, a Reebok shell suit the legs of which are tucked into a pair of overpowering patterned socks and a pair of Rockport, Timberland or Kicker boots. Gold jewellry is popular, usually incorporating sovereigns and / or Marijuana leaf motifs. The male uniform is fairly similar.

Anyone deviating from this universally accepted look faces daily verbal and physical abuse.

Entertainment includes avoiding being glassed in one of the town’s many pubs, avoiding being stabbed on the infamous “192? bus and avoiding leaving your house as much
as possible.

Merseyway precinct is the town’s heart. If you do wish to buy anything from Woolworths, Argos or “Everything
For ?1?, avoid walking within stone’s throw of the 2nd floor balcony edge or you face a shower of gob, McDonald’s fries and of course stones from the gangs of youths above.

Such a beautiful picture you paint, Binners. 🙂

£2 a pint of perfectly drinkable bitter at the Smith’s pub on St Martin’s Lane, WC2N.

Just two hundred yards from Nelson’s Column too.

The Chandos. Nice pub, walked past it t’other night to go to the Lyceum Tavern on the Strand. Sam Smiths do run some lovely pubs; the Princess Louise up on High Holborn is beautiful. Apparently they spent £2m on restoring it to it’s original look (listed building). It gets too packed mind, speshly of a Thursday/Friday evening.

I know Stoner hates Sam Smiths pubs, but they are often very nice places to drink in, and very reasonably priced too, considering the fact you can actually get a decent pint there. As Stoner points out though, their lagers are good, better than the usual muck, and their Pure Brewed lager is excellent, how a lager should be. I like their wheat beer; healthy, tasty and nutritious.

I think the ambience of the pub is crucial. I mean, some Wetherspoons have some decent beers on tap sometimes, but they tend to be awful places devoid of any soul or decent atmosphere. They’re just cheap.

As for the clientele; some of the worst places to drink are those which attract loads of suits. Sadly many City pubs suffer this; hordes of boring, vacuous drones all desperately trying to impress each other. All Bar One and The Slug and Lettuce on Canary Wharf are two particularly bad examples of this type of place. ‘Bars’ rather than ‘pubs’. Nasty. And there’s always a certain Cocaine-fuelled menace about these places too. Avoid.

The very, very worst, however, are Whine Bars. Where you can’t even get a decent pint of anything, and where everything costs a fortune. The work of Satan. Should all be closed down immediately. They symbolise all that is wrong in the World.

Drink in the park. £10 for 15 strongbow. Sorted.

Not the best idea this time of year though…

binners – Like I said in my post, you need to know where you’re going to find the best pubs – Stockport is the nice end of Manchester in my experience. 😉

It is missing the crack dealers in Piccadilly Gardens though. They make the Manchester more homely.

Don’t worry GG; Binners is from Warrington. 🙁

Ooh, la-di-da! a member of The Cheshire Set! Well I never. 😉

I just saw a battle take place in the pagoda in Manchester’s Chinatown. Admittedly, Stockport doesn’t have a Chinatown, but if it did, I’m sure there wouldn’t be a drunken dinner-hour battle taking place. 😀 Still, it’s what makes Manchester great.

Oh, and Marx and Engels used to drink in Salford Binners – incidently there are some great pubs there, despite the fact that the place may be dropping to bits and is more run down than Stockport:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/time-marx-and-engels-please-historic-pub-under-threat-444787.html

Speaking of which, I fancy a pint now…

The Rutland Arms in Sheffield has a great and every changing line of ales, and a landlord who’s very enthusiatic about them!

The Kelham Island Tavern is also a top pub in Sheffield, not to far from Hillsborough. Will have to check out the Rutland.