Breaking Beermat News In Balsall Common

I’m as eco-friendly as the next man but some changes are a step too far!   I walk to work so I’ve got a low carbon footprint, recycle any plastics and cardboard and try not to print whenever possible.

However, on a trip to London last week I was enjoying my usual expensive pint of craft murk from Seven Sisters Brewery in the Euston Tap…

…and heard some disturbing news.

This boozer, as well as having great beer, always had a beermat to go with your pint but it was napkins only on this occasion.

I spoke to the very friendly barman and he said it was something to do with saving paper and being greener meaning no more beermats!

This could make tegestology even more niche than it already is and if you go into a boozer and it is beermat free is that progressive?

Anyway, this edict from London hasn’t quite reached Balsall Common yet, as they were still on view at 406 – The Brickmakers Arms CV7 7EG.

I popped in late on a Sunday afternoon and this boozer, which is about 100 yards from The Railway Inn, has been around since the 17^th Century.

It’s got a bar, snug and lounge and food is on the agenda but it still felt to me like it always did and is a pub serving food rather than the other way round despite what the advertising says.

A group of four blokes were waxing lyrical in the bar with some great late Sunday afternoon conversations about nothing in general but somehow it seems to flow after a few beers.

(rare sighting of a beermat)

They could, of course, have been talking about the upcoming British Par 3 championships that take place at Nailcote Hall every year and is returning in August…

but they didn’t look like they were about to start a round (of golf, beer maybe)…more like 19^th hole players to me.

I had a terrific pint of BBB, (Bitter) from Lees Brewery, which I’d never seen in the West Midlands before.

The pub wasn’t packed by any stretch but there were kids outside in the beer garden, couples eating in the lounge and drinkers dotted around in the snug, bar, lounge and beer garden and it had that friendly late afternoon Sunday feel to it

…the calm after the storm.

Considering Balsall Common is relatively well to do it has a couple of excellent level of ‘pubiness’ in its two boozers near to the station.

(M&B livery!)

Another solid boozer, second to the Railway Inn IMO but in easy reach of public transport and well worth a visit