The Regent, Weston Central, Weston Super Mare

A recent opening on the site of the former Yates’s pub, it’s been extensively refurbished internally and also looks a lot more welcoming from the outside with it’s traditional green pub sign, green roller blinds and green paintwork around all the windows. In fact I’d go as far as saying it looks rather upmarket, which is certainly not at all what you would expect in Weston. I assume the ownership is the same as before though, since their new website still refers to the pub as Yates’s in a couple of places. Internally it is perhaps something of a disappointment when you find a fairly generic chain bar with little in the way of any character. It’s one single, open-plan L-shaped room with pale wood strip on the floor, walls in inoffensive shades of pale green, grey and cream whilst a couple of feature walls had patterned wallpaper and turquoise wood panelling down below. Elsewhere were various miscellaneous pictures such as old black and white photographs, one that simply had the pub’s name in colourful letters and another that just said Somerset Cider. A raised section to the right was up a couple of steps separated from the rest of the pub with pale blue balustrade, whilst the seating was mostly rather uncomfortable high chairs with very low backrests. I counted no less than 14 TV screens around the pub, many showing sports fixtures with the remainder running a continuous loop of pub advertisements. There were also a number of lighting rigs on the ceiling, and a DJ booth towards the back. Beers on tap purported to be Hobgoblin Gold and London Pride, although the latter was apparently off due to some unspecified problem with pulling it through. Even worse, although the cider choice was supposed to be Thatcher’s Gold, Strongbow and Strongbow Dark Fruit, unbelievably all three of these had run out. Thatcher’s are only based about five miles away, and from other publicans I have spoken to offer a pretty good delivery service. Overall, the investment that it must have had spent on it seems rather wasted if they can’t even stock any drinks to sell, and unsurprisingly it was very quiet on our Wednesday evening visit. The only plus point really was the bar staff who at least seemed friendly enough.

Facebook page of The Regent - www.facebook.com

Official site of The Regent - www.greatukpubs.co.uk

Facebook page of The Regent - www.facebook.com

Official site of The Regent - www.greatukpubs.co.uk

A large and fairly typical Yates’s outlet just a few yards away from the Grand Pier, I imagine this is the sort of place that must get quite busy in the holiday season, but was almost deserted on a recent Thursday evening visit with only a couple of other punters in there. This is the first place that I have seen this year with Christmas decorations up, although admittedly it was only a few crackers and such like laid out on a table to showcase their Christmas menu. It’s quite a large, open pub with a dark wood floor and a smooth plastered ceiling with recessed lighting. A large lighting rig is in the centre of the pub suggesting that there may be a disco type set up on occasions, and there was what looked like a small DJ booth off to one side. A couple of large screens were showing the football, as well as a couple of smaller TV’s with a news channel on. Food is offered, although I didn’t get the chance to study the menu as it was cleared from the table at about ten past eight. This seemed odd since the barmaid who was doing it informed us that we could order food up until 9:00pm. The solitary beer on tap was Yates130 Birthday Ale which is apparently brewed to celebrate their 130th birthday. I really had no idea they had been around that long. There was a second pump on the bar which was unused, so there may perhaps be other choices on occasions. Ciders fared somewhat better with Thatcher’s Gold, Thatcher’s Traditional and Strongbow.