BV London Pub of the Year 2024-25 - part two

Welcome to the second half of the 2024-25 London Pub of the Year award. 

In the first installment we revisited last years top five, and now we're going to check out five brand new entries. (Well, two of them are brand new, the other three are, in Top-of-the-Pops parlance, re-entries, but what the fucky hey.)

Let's chuffing well crack on, shall we?

BV London Pub of the Year 2024-25 - part one

Like the proverbial Renegade Master, we are 'back once again'. It's time to pick a London Pub of the Year, and I feel like a very old hand at this lark nowadays.

Will there be a surprise winner? Has the Greater London pub scene dramatically changed in the last 12 months? Am I still deeply frustrated with the quality and choice of cask ale in the capital? 

All these questions and more will be answered over the next few days and soon enough a winner will be crowned.  If you're not familiar with how the contest works (because even I have some rules to stick to!) check out the previous years. 

Now we'll crack on by revisiting each of last year's Top Five, and in a few days time we'll have the five newcomers/retreads. One of these ten pubs is going to be announced as my London Pub of the Year 2024-25. Ooh goody. Whoop-de-bloody-do. Can't fucking wait. And so on.

BV London Pub of the Year 2023-2024 - part two

Here we go then, the second part of this year's BV London Pub of the Year contest. Check out part one first if you need to, then read on. This time it's five new or returning hostelries that weren't in last years competition, so let's keep things fresh with these beertastic beauties. 

You won't want to miss this! (If you do want to miss this then feel free to miss this, obviously.)

BV London Pub of the Year 2023-24 - part one

Unbelievable though it seems, the BV London Pub of the Year award has now been going for 12 years!

It seems to come around quicker every time, with the sort of overfamiliarity that can only breed the deepest of contempt, but I keep at it, and it's now time for the latest installment.

You probably know the drill: This time we revisit the Top Five from last year's competition, and next time there will be five 'new' contenders, then finally an overall winner will be announced.

Check out some previous years contests if you need to get a handle on the scoring system. Otherwise, let's crack the fuck on...

#CaskIsBack

Last night was, it's fair to say, a bit of a good 'un. 

Technically it was of course this morning. On the stroke of Midnight the latest lockdown came - sort of - to an end, and we were allowed to drink in a pub for the first time this year. Well, outside of a pub.

That's quite a lot of caveat, but it mattered not to the assembled drinkers and gathered press outside the Kentish Belle in the small hours of the morning. We were there for one thing. A taste of freedom. And beer.

For me it was mostly about getting pints of cask ale inside me. The first - Surrey XPA from the Dorking brewery - went down in one, and by 12:02 I was on my second pint (Crafty's Loxhill Biscuit) which didn't last much longer. It's April 12 and #CaskIsBack. Oh yes.

It's back...

So, I went to the pub on Saturday. Actually I went to three.

I broke my lockdown with a few at two-time London Pub of the Year The Hope, then checked out the newly refurbished bar at the Cryer Theatre, before finishing up at Wallington's Wetherspoons.

I drank several pints over the course of the afternoon, the sky didn't cave in, nobody died, and I'm fairly confident that nobody is going to die as a result of my actions. I don't think I actually came within a metre of another human being, without there being a giant plastic shield between us.

So, the pub is back. Sort of.