The Black Dog Beer House, Brentford

A corner pub in very much the “Alehouse” style, it has the old board floor, exposed brick, industrial lighting and old style furnishings. It also has seven pulls, three for cider and four for “ale”, I guess they change frequently but today it was one from Windsor & Eton, one Downton, a Hopback and a new one on me Disruption IS Brewing “Shadow of Darkness Stout”. The back wall has 14 keg taps and there’s a range of six keg wines. A Victorian corner pub so the classic L shape opened out to a single room with an L shaped servery and counter. A good mix of punters when I was in, merrily bouncing along. There’s a beer garden at the back but it was raining so I didn’t look. GBG listed but there’s not a huge amount of competition round these parts.

This is a cosy, street corner pub, tucked away down the quiet backstreets of Brentford. The pub has a simple layout, with the entrance taking you into a spacious, bare boarded, main seating area, whilst the bar is all the way over to the left, where the room extends a short distance along the front wall. The main space has a typical alehouse feel to it, with a dark colour scheme and plenty of exposed brick pairing well under muted lighting on my evening visit, to create quite a warm, cosy feel despite the spaciousness of the room. Banquette seating extends around much of the perimeter, whilst decent quality tables and chairs fill the rest of the room. There’s a nice brick fireplace on the back wall with an oval-shaped mirror above and some nice potted plants across the rustic looking mantlepiece. The servery has a pleasant dark wood counter and bare brick bar back, with large beer boards on the back wall, although I didn’t find these all that helpful, as I couldn’t find half of the beers I could see on the pumps in front of me, anywhere on the board. There’s more seating to the front left, including some nice, fixed benches along the end wall, although this space felt a little detached from the buzz of the main seating area. There are lots of potted plants around the room, that brighten things up a little, as do the vases of flowers on each table, whilst the walls have been decorated with plenty of obscure bits of breweriana. An easy-listening soundtrack played in the background, but was lost, more often than not, under the general hubbub from a good Saturday night crowd. On handpull, I noted Hop Back Fuggle and Citra, Downtown Solstice and Hand Brew Otto Dry Stout, but I could barely figure out what the extensive keg range comprised of, due to the difficult to decipher beer boards. A very friendly barmaid poured me a good pint of the Otto Dry Stout and only charged me a mere £3.00 for it – apparently, they had quite a bit in stock and had reduced the price to clear it out. This is a cracking little pub with what must be the most interesting ale range in Brentford, making it a must-do if you’re in the area. I thought it worked really well as a contemporary alehouse and would appeal as much to the traditionalist as it would younger beer enthusiasts. I’ve no idea why it took me so long to check this place out – it’ll be my first port of call the next time I’m out this way.