The Lamb, Norwood Green, Southall

Facebook page of The Lamb - www.facebook.com

Facebook page of The Lamb - www.facebook.com

Official site of The Lamb - www.thelamb.uk

Official site of The Lamb - www.thelamb.uk

By a bridge over the Grand Union Canal near to Norwood Green is The Lamb. A whitewashed exterior leads into a small single bar pub that, with its lace curtains and dark beams still retains a reasonably traditional feel, despite evident alterations. At one end is a pool table and dart board and some banquette seating that has clearly been well used over the years. At the side of the pub, down a few steps, is a patio garden that leads down to the canal edge, but this has a rather tatty and neglected feel and, in its current state, is not a good advertisement for the pub. On my recent weekend afternoon visit, there were a dozen at most regulars watching the horse racing on a small TV high up in one corner of the room, but, apart from that, there was no one else either in the pub or outside in the “garden”. Based on my visit, the pub appears to have a rather narrow customer base. It’s the type of pub where everybody turns round to see who has come in every time the door opens, although, I must stress, not in an overtly hostile or unfriendly manner. Evidently, a former Courage pub, hidden away amongst an array of keg and lager fonts on the bar top, a solitary lonely looking hand pump had a London Pride clip attached. Upon ordering a pint, not without a degree of hesitation, the landlord promptly told me that it was in fact Spitfire but that he “didn’t always get sent the correct pump clip”. I could have explored the matter further and perhaps pointed out that a small piece of cardboard with the word “Spitfire” written on it affixed over the London Pride pump clip with some sellotape might be a good idea, but years of experience of pub going gives you a sixth sense of when this is a worthwhile route to go down. Everyone else seemed to be on either lager or Guinness and the landlord seemed genuinely surprised to have someone come in and ask for a real ale. I was feeling somewhat pessimistic at this stage, but the beer served was recognisable as Spitfire and actually tasted pretty reasonable. Notably it was only £ 2.90p as well. This pub feels slightly run down and in need of some TLC and, with an evident lack of interest in real ale, it’s not got a lot going for it at the moment in my book. It would appear to have taken a turn for the worse since the previous review below.

This small canal side pub had a great community feel on my recent weekday visit and the bloke behind the bar was very friendly and helpful. There is only a standard draught range available, but the Guinness was very good and it came in at a very reasonable price. There is a plasma screen for showing Sky Sports, a pool table and a dartboard which is used by a team which is in the local league. There is a BBQ every Saturday (weather permitting) which is held in the paved garden which backs on to the canal. There is another screen out here for watching the sport and children are more than welcome. There is a sign by the canal advertising tea and coffee to the passing barges, but although there is a gate to the tow path I didn’t spot a mooring post. I liked it in here and if I lived nearby this would probably be my local.