The Jolly Crispin, Dudley

On the main road down from Sedgley to Dudley is The Jolly Crispin, a small double gabled cottage style old looking building that is something of a contrast with more recently built buildings nearby. We later learn that this is the oldest pub in Upper Gornal. Pleasingly, and something that should definitely be encouraged, opening hours are prominently displayed in the window, telling us that the pub doesn’t open until 4pm from Monday through till Thursday. More encouragingly, we see small print telling us that the pub is the home of Fownes Brewery and promising us “a festival of beer every day” A small bar, slightly below street level, at the front is traditionally furnished, featuring black beams and pillars and is effectively split into two distinct areas by a dart board on a wall on the right hand side. A fine fireplace on the far right hand wall catches the eye, along with a fine collection of brass artefacts. A bare stone walled corridor leads through to a much larger, cosy, carpeted, smarter lounge at the rear with black ceiling beams. Again, this room is traditionally furnished and decorated. A large stone archway with another impressive fireplace and stone chimney breast divides this lounge into two separate areas. A collection of pumpclips decorate some of the beams in this room. A laminated card – “The Crispin News” – on each table provides relevant pub news for customers, from which we learn, for example, that there would be a cider festival on 10 October and, rather less interestingly, that 7 December would be “Choir Day”. We learn that Fownes Brewery won the Champion Beer Award at Wolverhampton Beer Festival for the 2nd year in a row, but, rather oddly, it doesn’t say which Fownes beer it was. Above a fireplace is a framed potted history of the pub and a list of licensees since 1820. We learn that it was a former Simpkiss house ( Older drinkers may remember that Simpkiss brewed just down the road from The Bull and Bladder in Brierley Hill ), who were eventually bought out by Greenall Whitley. The pub was formerly called The Crispin – the word “jolly” being added sometime in the 1830’s. The pub sign at the front shows a cobbler mending shoes and we learn that the premises formerly housed a shoemaker. Saint Crispin was apparently the patron saint of shoemakers Out at the back is the brewery plus a surprisingly large car park. On the real ales front, if I was being picky, I could complain that I only counted 8 real ales on and not the advertised and promised 9. Beers on, when I called in, one late September afternoon, were Kinver Half Centurion, Ossett Silver King, Crouch Vale Brewers Gold, Castle Rock Harvest Pale Ale, Ossett Excelsior, Salopian Hop Twister, Kinver Black Ram plus, from the on site brewery, Fownes Crispin Ommer. I found the latter to be an enjoyable, typically light coloured pale ale which, so we keep being told, is how people like their beers around here, although, much against the trend, it did have a noticeable bitterness to it. I was disappointed, and rather surprised, that only the one in house beer was on, but, in fairness, the fact that they brew on site is not heavily promoted, so perhaps expectations are being deliberately managed. Gravities are detailed on a board behind the bar, but there’s no tasting notes. It’s been a CAMRA Good Beer Guide regular in recent years. I found this to be a likeable and welcoming place which appears to attract a good cross section of customers. This is going on my ever lengthening list of pubs to revisit sometime, hopefully in the not too distant future.

This is another great old pub and the associated Fownes brewery is just the icing on the cake. You enter into a cramped bar area but there is an area to the right with a dart board and more seating and a lounge bar round the back which was quiet. There is a garden and car park to the rear of the lounge bar. Beers noted were Fownes Crispin's Ommer, Fownes Troll Hunter, Oakham Bishop's Farewell, Thornbridge Jaipur IPA, Moor Porter, Saltaire Cascade Pale, Salopian Darwin's Origin and one that came on while I was there was Fownes Gunhild. I may have missed one or two here. I went for the Fownes Crispin Ommer (£2.60), Fownes Troll Hunter (£3.10) and the Saltaire Cascade Pale (£3.00). An "Ommer" is a hammer as the geezer from Yorkshire behind the bar kindly explained to me (Noddy Holder has a lot to answer for). All beers were in great nick. When I return to visit the Holden's Mill nearby this is one I will definitely return to,