The Four Candles (JD Wetherspoon), Oxford

Unremarkable, split-level 'spoons, although the oddly positioned windows in the upper seating / dining area suggest that the ground-floor ceiling has been raised at some point. OK selection of nine real ales from the two banks of five handpumps, with several local beers including the Chadlington Oxford IPA (£2.49).

Used as a meeting place for our PuG crawl, I opted for a half of Coke which cost a fortune. I tend to avoid JDW outlets so don't know if this place is good or bad for the breed...

A small spoons as described below, the beers and ciders as mentioned by BF didn't generally inspire but the stand out was the Salopian Oracle which was an excellent beer. I found the service to be rather Lackadaisical and on a couple of occassions the servee had no idea who was next despite only two people being at the bar. Apart from the convinence factor and the excellent (on the day) Salopian Oracle, I cant see a lot to recommend here.

One of the smaller 'spoons,on a street corner with a carpeted ground floor and an interesting first floor,partially ovelooking the action below.The two banks of 5 handpumps were offering on my trip the regular GK IPA,Abbott,Doom Bar as well as two real ciders,Burton Bridge Top Dog Stout,Inveralmond Lia Fail,Blindman Icarus,Brakspear Oxford Gold and a very decent Salopian Oracle.I thought that was a respectable choice,it's a neat and tidy place offering decent value and made a good starting point ,not too far from the station, for a crawl around Oxford.

This is one of two Oxford City Centre's Spoons, this one being housed in an older and nicer looking building than the other one which is all glass and steel. It's named after a joke based on word play that once you know what's coming ceases to be funny. The bar is a wide room with the bar at the back and an upstairs level that I didn't venture into. The furnishings are fairly typical. The ten hand pumps on the bar were all in use with no doubling up, no available soon and no spurious cider clips. Beers were the IPA variant of the JDW Trio Of Doom, Marston's One Is 90, Cameron's Fridge Magnet, Hook Norton Nerdherder, Great Newsome Holderness Dark, Otter Amber, Dartmoor Jail Ale and Titanic Lifeboat. All but one of the seven guests were bitters, all of them boring and all in the roughly 4.5% ABV downwards range. None of them were Locale. This may have just been bad luck but the Cameron's Fridge Magnet (£2.59 and laughingly billed as Cameron "craft") although in good condition was the epitome of a boring bitter. The plus points were it seemed to be well run, it's a pleasant venue, the prices (£2.59 for a standard guest ale) are reasonable for a city centre Spoons and despite the upper level the toilets were downstairs. It's a good Spoons but I've been to better. I would go to either of the two Oxford JDWs in preference to the expensive tourist traps that get all the undeserved publicity.

A disappointing Wetherspoon's with a selection of real ales that were not very inspiring. The inside was just the usual decor with as many tables crammed in as possible.