The Coat & Badge, Putney, SW15

Beers from adnams & sharp's. Food available.

There were three pumps on the counter, displaying clips for Cornish Coaster; Doom Bar; and Young’s Bitter. I selected the Cornish Coaster but was told that of the three only the Young’s Bitter was ready. On the one hand I suppose it’s good that they don’t try to palm you off with ale that’s not ready for drinking, but on the other hand I would say they ought to keep the clips reversed until they are ready to sell the beer. Anyway, the young’s Bitter was OK, although not cheap at £3.40 a pint. The pub looked to be food led, with main courses around the £8 - £10 mark – e.g. cheeseburger, chips and lettuce at £9.95 – and sandwiches around the £6 mark. I didn’t eat here so can’t comment on the quality or value for money. The pub itself looks incredibly attractive from the outside, with some distinctive leaded light windows, but inside there’s nothing traditional, it being bare-boarded as these sort of places always are, and with sofas, cushions, and low tables all over the place. There’s a large outside patio area which, as a previous poster has commented, is secluded from the road outside by a high wall on one side, and tall hedges on the other two. But the lack of intrusion of the traffic noise was compensated for by the music blaring out from the outside speakers, as well as the sound of the cellar cooling system. The latter is a necessary evil, but I am always surprised that a pub finds it necessary to have outside speakers, although presumably they know their own business and must have concluded that the majority of their customers want to have music inflicted on them at all times. They do have an interesting, and most unusual, feature of a couple of large “a la Milton Keynes” models of black and white cows on the roof above the patio area. I can’t see me returning here (for some reason I am somewhat averse to forking out £3.40 for Young’s Bitter) unless Mrs R decides that it is the sort of place to which I should take her for a meal.