If you are lucky enough to live in Wellington I highly recommend Ortega Fish Shack for a special occasion. But I imagine you must have been there.
£8 pint
- Thread starter paulfromcamden
- Start date
If you are lucky enough to live in Wellington I highly recommend Ortega Fish Shack for a special occasion. But I imagine you must have been there.
Ponty
pfm Member
Had supper last night at a nice local hotel. It’s great because they’ll serve the restaurant quality food in a lovely cosy bar where we can take the dog. Had a pre supper pint of Hooky, lovely stuff. £4.20. Now, considering their overheads and huge inflation in energy bills alone, thought that was very reasonable.
cubastreet
Espresso Fiend
Ortega's great. I lived in Wellington but house prices rose to match craft beer prices so I bought a plot of land over the hill in the Wairarapa.
deebster
Half Man Half Biscuit
At a gig last night in the suburbs of Birmingham there was only one beer on and it was £6.10 for a pint of Neck Oil IPA. I didn't ask the price of anything else so don't know if this was the venue trying it on or just the going rate for this stuff. Didn't think much of it either way.
gintonic
50 shades of grey pussy cats
bit steep, but gig venue. Think we were paying about £5.60 in London last weekend. We really like it. Gamma Ray is better, and Lupoloid even better
Arkless Electronics
Trade: Amp design and repairs.
(Rant warning!!)
Such prices as are being discussed in this thread are a total piss take!
I rather doubt I'll win any friends on pfm for the following as no doubt 90% plus of fishies are exactly the demographic that may actually like the changes I'm about to slag off!!
I love the great British pub, real ale, the craic, with a passion but the ridiculous prices mean it's supermarket take aways and weatherspoons only for the likes of me these days. £2.29 for a pint of Abbot ale @ 5% in my local 'spoons and if you wish there is Ruddles for about £1.75. Other local pubs that were at around £2.90 a pint before covid have reopened @ £3.60 a pint!
There has been a really major paradigm shift in the milieu of UK pubs in the last ten years (and especially the last 5), one which I take great umbrage with, and that has been an all out effort to gentrify them (always a bad thing in any circumstances). The smoking ban was the thin end of the wedge with hindsight...
The great British pub was most often a working class environment (up here, by and large. Yes there's always been a few posh boozers also) where a bloke could go after work even if in a really low paid job.... and yes even if on benefits now and then if you were careful with your money. Such traditional pubs were always a bit "spit and sawdust" and full of "Mike the recently unemployed plasterer in his donkey jacket and plaster splashed jeans who smokes like a chimney and swears like a trooper" etc etc "local character" types etc.
Such boozers as this have been gradually shut down or ruined by renovations etc and the pubs we have left are all rather "designer" places for middle class tossers who would be put off by the very presence of "Mike the plasterer" and which serve all sorts of veggie fare and allow kids etc etc (yes as bad as that!).
An expensive "micro pub" in my town indeed has beers at £8+ and I've heard talk of "well it keeps the riff raff out"... ****ers!!!!
Pubs pretty much now exist for the "professional on £40K+++ a year with their own detached house and drives a beemer, possibly has a second home" demographic and actively try to keep out the "traditional working class local boozer" clientele. If you are not rich enough to think of £35 for an evenings beer consumption as "small change" then, to paraphrase "The League of Gentlemen".... "This pub is NOT for local people, there's nothing here for you"...
Weatherspoons has become the de facto replacement for ALL "local spit and sawdust pubs" up and down the country!
Yer know... come to think of it... it's a metaphor for the wider changes forced on the nation by 12 years of tory (mis)rule causing ever widening and already massive inequality! ie fish and chips was working class fairly cheap meal. Not any longer! Thirty years ago the "just managing" and even poorest of the poor could participate in life, in social activities, have the odd treat... but everything is now priced out of the realm of anyone but those with a well paid job. A decent life has been deliberately priced at a level to "keep the riff raff out" as well as just pubs!
Such prices as are being discussed in this thread are a total piss take!
I rather doubt I'll win any friends on pfm for the following as no doubt 90% plus of fishies are exactly the demographic that may actually like the changes I'm about to slag off!!
I love the great British pub, real ale, the craic, with a passion but the ridiculous prices mean it's supermarket take aways and weatherspoons only for the likes of me these days. £2.29 for a pint of Abbot ale @ 5% in my local 'spoons and if you wish there is Ruddles for about £1.75. Other local pubs that were at around £2.90 a pint before covid have reopened @ £3.60 a pint!
There has been a really major paradigm shift in the milieu of UK pubs in the last ten years (and especially the last 5), one which I take great umbrage with, and that has been an all out effort to gentrify them (always a bad thing in any circumstances). The smoking ban was the thin end of the wedge with hindsight...
The great British pub was most often a working class environment (up here, by and large. Yes there's always been a few posh boozers also) where a bloke could go after work even if in a really low paid job.... and yes even if on benefits now and then if you were careful with your money. Such traditional pubs were always a bit "spit and sawdust" and full of "Mike the recently unemployed plasterer in his donkey jacket and plaster splashed jeans who smokes like a chimney and swears like a trooper" etc etc "local character" types etc.
Such boozers as this have been gradually shut down or ruined by renovations etc and the pubs we have left are all rather "designer" places for middle class tossers who would be put off by the very presence of "Mike the plasterer" and which serve all sorts of veggie fare and allow kids etc etc (yes as bad as that!).
An expensive "micro pub" in my town indeed has beers at £8+ and I've heard talk of "well it keeps the riff raff out"... ****ers!!!!
Pubs pretty much now exist for the "professional on £40K+++ a year with their own detached house and drives a beemer, possibly has a second home" demographic and actively try to keep out the "traditional working class local boozer" clientele. If you are not rich enough to think of £35 for an evenings beer consumption as "small change" then, to paraphrase "The League of Gentlemen".... "This pub is NOT for local people, there's nothing here for you"...
Weatherspoons has become the de facto replacement for ALL "local spit and sawdust pubs" up and down the country!
Yer know... come to think of it... it's a metaphor for the wider changes forced on the nation by 12 years of tory (mis)rule causing ever widening and already massive inequality! ie fish and chips was working class fairly cheap meal. Not any longer! Thirty years ago the "just managing" and even poorest of the poor could participate in life, in social activities, have the odd treat... but everything is now priced out of the realm of anyone but those with a well paid job. A decent life has been deliberately priced at a level to "keep the riff raff out" as well as just pubs!
paulfromcamden
Baffled
@Arkless Electronics I don't entirely disagree but my guess is it's being driven at least partly by high rents and property values.
We used to visit a back street pub in Camden opposite our flat three or four times a week. When we moved into the road all the drinks were £2.50 (made rounds simple!). When we moved out ten years later they were all £5. The landlady was always complaining they couldn't sell enough beer to make ends meet (in Camden!) and a year later it had been turned into flats on the market for £500k+ each. Why bother dealing with drunks every night when you can cash in and pocket enough to retire on...
We used to visit a back street pub in Camden opposite our flat three or four times a week. When we moved into the road all the drinks were £2.50 (made rounds simple!). When we moved out ten years later they were all £5. The landlady was always complaining they couldn't sell enough beer to make ends meet (in Camden!) and a year later it had been turned into flats on the market for £500k+ each. Why bother dealing with drunks every night when you can cash in and pocket enough to retire on...
Arkless Electronics
Trade: Amp design and repairs.
The high rents and property prices are part and parcel of the wider tory rot!
Much the same as your story has happened around here also. Most of the cheaper "working class boozers" have been turned into flats or designer wine bar-come-eateries. The biggest town centre pub here that was always a bit rough but had live bands on at the weekend, and in fact 8 years or so back had two bands each weekend and a buskers night mid week, was owned by Punch Taverns who bled dry every tenant they had (it was several! The same sad tale played out for each wide eyed enthusiastic new tenant they had!). It's now been bought outright by a company that has gutted it and re-opened it as a posh eatery come posh pub... When a mate I hadn't seen in donkeys years came over for the weekend a while back we decided to take a look in.... and swiftly ran back out! Waiters in penguin suits carrying champers in ice buckets was the sight that met our eyes.... argh! From the looks we got I'm sure we are the very "riff raff" that it is priced to keep out! Not that the types I saw are "posh" or "upper class" in any way... not as educated etc as my pal and I I'll hazard, young nouveau riche "finally got that promotion to £40K a year I've been brown nosing and back stabbing to get" but prob think "love Island" the height of good taste types more like! BUT as they have the spons for Grey Goose and Moet & Chandon exactly the types they are trying to attract....
To carry on from my last post a bit, I guess the main point I'm trying to make is that not that long ago in the big scheme of things even someone on a fairly low wage could participate in life's pleasures, go to the pub a few times a week, have a sit down meal at an Indian or a pizzeria, buy their own home even if it was a two up two down terraced house, go on holiday once a year etc etc.... But in today's dog eat dog tory UK you are pretty much in one of two categories; You have a well paid job, enough so you can afford today's property prices, and are therefore allowed to participate in UK 2022....or you are "a nobody, a nothing" who cannot afford even going to the pub or fish and chips anymore and are personae non gratis in general
Tony L
Administrator
I’d prefer to pay £8 a pint forever than drink in the local Moon Under Farage or whatever the local Wetherspoons is called! My boycott of that Brexiter twunt’s pubs is permanent! That said the price is nothing like that around here and we have a couple of very nice pubs with an interesting and diverse selection of craft beers etc. To be honest I’m really not very good at drinking beer at all (I hate the physical volume). Never have been, so I far prefer a half of something nice than a pint of dishwater. Two of the local pubs even have Leffe on draft, and that is fine with me!
Darth Vader
From the Dark Side
"You have a well paid job, enough so you can afford today's property prices, and are therefore allowed to participate in UK 2022"
This alas is a sign of the times. The World has moved on and there are a lot of job vacancies that unfortunately half the population are unable to do as they are highly technical and demanding in technology of one sort or another. That leaves half of society performing lower paid work and you are seeing the result. You yourself have on pfm told us that you refuse to move into digital technology and alas that leaves you in a yesteryear limbo.
I don't know the answer and I see it as a big problem for the whole planet in years to come.
DV
This alas is a sign of the times. The World has moved on and there are a lot of job vacancies that unfortunately half the population are unable to do as they are highly technical and demanding in technology of one sort or another. That leaves half of society performing lower paid work and you are seeing the result. You yourself have on pfm told us that you refuse to move into digital technology and alas that leaves you in a yesteryear limbo.
I don't know the answer and I see it as a big problem for the whole planet in years to come.
DV
Darth Vader
From the Dark Side
Thats a good beer! You may like to try Tynt Meadow Trappist Ale - its English and around £2.50 a bottle. You can get much better but you'll be paying over £4 a bottle but its worth it!
DV
S-Man
StrivingON
Well I live in an area such as you describe (although you wouldn't catch me dead in the ultimate ****ers machine!).
Our local pub is full of tradesmen working on the houses owned by the professionals you dislike - who probably pay a disproportionate amount of the tax in this country.
So I would say "Pubs pretty much now exist for the tradesman on £60K+++ a year with their own attached house and drives a van or a gigantic "FU" pickup.
Tony L
Administrator
@Marchbanks is the one to quiz here, he gave me some incredible Trappist beer, I forget the name off the top of my head, but the #1 stuff. I do love this kind of beer and I’ll certainly keep an eye out for the Tynt Meadow.
PS Brew Dog is fairly local and I like their beers a lot too. It amuses me that they created a Small Scale Experimental Beer Machine (Wikipedia), which is named in tribute to the SSEM (Wikipedia). I am a member of the volunteer team of the latter, though sadly not the former.
paulfromcamden
Baffled
I quite like their beer too (and sorry for the downer) but they've been dogged by complaints of a toxic workplace culture. No shortage of other craft beer producers.
P.S. Your post has me hankering for a trip to Amsterdam where the supermarket shelves are laden with EUR 2 bottles of Trappist goodness and the record shops are full of jazz vinyl!
Bob McC
Living the life of Riley
I will never drink in one. They are full of riff raff moaning about everything.