Crown Inn, Stockport

It is, of course, great that this pub has reopened. It has spent most of 2021 closed due to the death of the previous landlord, and has now had a bit of a refurb and a smart paint job externally, without ripping the character out of the building. Last Friday afternoon there were a few punters in which is great to see in its first week of trading. At the bar are 12 hand pulls, 10 of which were on at the time, though disappointingly these are mainly from the big national and regional breweries (Marstons, Brains, St Austell) with a few hand pulls clipped with Robinsons and JW Lees ales (two breweries that do not excite me). I went for the Rev James Original by Brains, which was OK in itself, but the whole line-up is poor compared to the interesting selection this pub used to boast which often left me spoilt for choice. As mentioned, it has only just reopened and some rooms seemed to be work in progress, the pool room had stuff piled up on the pool table for example. I believe there is an outdoor space to the rear (not investigated) that will be used for live music events - so perhaps they are shifting their focus to entertainment rather than interesting beer! The pub looks nice and smart but I was left a bit disappointed and I feel it could do better. This isn't somewhere I can see myself rushing back to when there are so many other great real ale pubs and bars in Stockport.

Paid a visit on Saturday evening. My last visit was in 2016 so I was well overdue refreshing my memory. I think I counted 11 hand pulls at the bar, which is pretty impressive, but reading some of the earlier reviews suggest there may be 16 in which case I must have missed some. Of these there were two dark beers, both milds. One was the Dark Ruby by Sarah Hughes, which was very tempting but decided to try the Velvet Mild by Naylor's instead, which was very acceptable. I love the traditional feel of this pub, down to the etched glass on the entrance door and the toilets, and its two rooms off to the left. A good pub and one I would be happy to go back to.

This pub must have one of the most dramatic settings in the UK, situated as it is, beneath the enormous Stockport viaduct, but it's worth a visit for far more than just the view. The pub has a traditional multiple room layout and aside from a few tastefully replaced fixtures and fittings, looks to have been relatively untouched over the years. You enter into the main bar which is bare boarded and has a white tiled passageway to the left which leads towards the rear of the building, passing other rooms along the way. The front bar has an L-shaped servery on the back wall with a painted counter and modern canopy which has details of the beers available on it. To the right is a rather sparsely furnished little room with minimal furnishing which appeared to be the least attractive of the four seating areas. More inviting were the two rooms to the left, both off the corridor. These have nice padded fixed benches, attractive tiled fireplaces and appropriately traditional decor. Similarly, there is a larger room behind the servery with the same seating options and its own fireplace and all of these rooms retain their old bell pushes. There was a reasonable crowd in on our Friday evening visit and a fairly mixed clientele for what is quite a traditional pub. The pub has won numerous CAMRA accolades over the years and was a national pub of the year finalist back in 2009, so I had high hopes for the beer. Thankfully, I wasn't disappointed, with a wide ale selection available including Salopian Oracle, Milk Street Funky Monkey, Oakham Moon Landing, Poynton Viaduct and Vulcan, Hoptimism Cask Beer, Banks & Taylor Extra Stout, Stockport Stock Porter, Pictish Willamette and Borough Orange County IPA. I tried the Stock Porter which turned out to be the best pint I had on a day full of outstanding beer. The only drawback to my visit was the fairly hopeless service which saw a comedy of errors play out between the staff, resulting in me being stuck at the bar for a good 10 minutes or so before I got served. Despite this drawback, I really loved this place and thought it was the pick of all the great pubs I visited in Stockport. It has a very warm, welcoming feel to it and the traditional interior is of the sort that makes you just want to settle down for a long session. Then there is the beer, which I found to be spot on and with such a wide selection to try, a longer session is really required to fully do the place justice.

First visit for me so cannot comment on its ups and downs but by my scale this visit was an up there. Firstly it’s impressive how they fit 16 pumps round that smallish bar, secondly great multi roomed traditional interior which was busy but not so busy that we couldn’t park ourselves in the smaller snug room with the green leather furniture and thirdly the beers I tried were in very good nick. I approached the bit of the bar that had the dark beers supporting the Winter Warmer festival that had just started and didn’t look any further than the B&T Brewery Edwin Taylor Extra Stout and Stockport Brewing Stock Porter which were on this part of the bar. I recall Borough Brewery Orange County Black IPA and Pictish Brewery Willamette also being on this section but no idea what was on the rest. Another one of Stockport’s finest and it was good for me on my inaugural visit.