Royal Oak (London, UK)

12/31/06

Checking out the Royal Oak was very rushed—unfortunately, I needed to move on after an hour or so to meet Gloria at The Black Friar and get a place for the NYE fireworks by the London Eye. But still, my stop was memorable. The other reviewers give a good description of the Royal Oak, so I won't duplicate the information.

It is a bit hard to find, but worth the effort. I got here at all thanks to Jim sitting beside me at Market Porter. Walked into the local neighborhood snugly situated around the bar and side tables, or so it felt. It may have helped that Jim waved me over right when I walked in. One afternoon in London and I felt at home drinking in a local pub.  Not too busy on a Saturday afternoon, but I'm not sure how long they were going to be open on New Year's Eve yet.

 I went on the recom of Royal Oak being a Harvey's tied house. I had cask pours of Armada, Christmas, and Old Ale. Christmas was by far my favorite and a real treat drinking it on cask. Harvey's is hard to get in Minnesota, and the occasional bottle can be expensive. I needed some food to go with my quickly downed ales, so I ordered bread pudding which was rich, creamy and buttery. I grew up with bread pudding, but being of Dutch heritage, my family's version of bread pudding evidently isn't the same as the Brit's. A nice treat to go with my beer stop.

One of Jim's friends was Richard, who had a grey beard like a lion's main.  We chatted about the Great British Beer Festival as he had worked at it with CAMRA for years.  Richard also poured a bottle of St. Sylvestre 3 Monts for the bar, including his new American friend.  This beer camaraderie quickly led to interesting conversation about CAMRA, double IPAs and their purpose, Bunker Bierhall (sadly, he was the distributor for the beer I couldn't finish), and more that added a warm layer over my whole experience at the Royal Oak.

Just wish I had more time...