The Falcon, SW11

Having to dust the passport off for a Sunday afternoon visit to Clapham I couldn’t resist looking this one up again. The Falcon used to regularly drag me across the river some 15 years ago when it was a shining beacon for the Nicholson’s chain and their then focus on real ale. Fortunately the wonderful CAMRA inventory listed interior, with its amazing 240 foot long central oval servery referred to below is unchanged and although only a fraction of the bar top is in use nowadays, and the time when it was festooned with over 20 ale handpumps, regularly dispensing at least ten different real ales, is long gone, I agree it’s still worth a full circumnavigation. It is still a very good pub to visit and was being well utilised yesterday lunchtime and the two banks of six pumps that are now on the working front section of the oval bar was still providing five real ales and a cider. But the current Nicholsons approach of mainstream regional brewers ( Fullers Seafarers and Pride, Harvey’s Sussex Best, TT Landlord and the house Pale Ale in this instance) really doesn’t cut the mustard for those of us who have the memories of what it was once like, and although I appreciate it is totally unrealistic to expect the highs, such as the time I entered to find seventeen different ales on offer from the Nicholsons seasonal list, it’s still a bit sad to take a look at yesterday’s mainstream offerings and then be more inclined to cross the junction to the ‘spoons opposite to see if they had anything more interesting on.

Nicholson’s corner pub that retains its old exterior with a nice old central bar.