Charles XII, York

A Stonegate pub with a long single room the full width of the building at the front narrowing for the counter and a brick lump opposite then broadening for seating, screens and toilets. Various brick pillars and arches are dotted about probably marking a disappeared central corridor. Six pulls with a lacklustre Carlsberg Marstons / Molson Coors line up of three (Atlantic, Doombar, Wainwright) plus one from Pennine and Lillie’s mango cider. There’s a range of solos and two T-bars with various national brands. Low dining tables and chairs at the front with tall tables and stools from mid way back, a tartan carpet, machines and lots of screens complete the ensemble. The sign suggests it’s named after a racehorse rather than the Swedish king, but as it’s near the university who knows? A bit more studenty or perhaps down market than the other pub in the pretty old village part of Heslington.

Official site of Charles XII - www.greatukpubs.co.uk

Official site of Charles XII - www.greatukpubs.co.uk

A seemingly small village pub that has been extended back and opened out, making it a large open plan room with the bar counter on the left. Some tables were reserved, and there was a bunch of four students, or ex-students, at the bar doing their best to confuse the one server by adding different tequilas to their lunch order and then asking for the bill to be split four ways. As she was on her own I began to despair, but the licensee had been in the cellar and returned to serve the equally desperate guy who was in front of me at the bar, and then me. She noticed my interest in the beers (six hand pumps, one with cider and three real ales) and told me that there was also Fullers London Pride ready for pulling through if I wanted to wait. I thanked her but said I was happy with my original choice of Ainsty Bantam Best, and on taking it to my table in the front window, for a good view of the heavy rain, I was pleased to find that it was very good (NBSS 3.5). It's not all students here, with several people of my generation among the busy lunchtime crowd. There's still a cheap deal on cask beers on a Tuesday (see Alex's review from 2016) but it's gone up from £2.25 to £2.80 - not a price you see so much these days, so if I ever return to Heslington I'll make sure it's a Tuesday.

I first visited this pub the day before mothers day and was very dissapointed to see eight hand pulls with no beer and no food available. Little did i know that the very next day it closed for three weeks and a £160,000 refurbishment so I suppose I can let them off. On a recent visit the layout has remained unchanged with a nice lick of paint and influx of new tables and bar fronts etc. There are now only six hand pumps and on my visit they were dispensing Roosters Yankee, Black sheep bitter, Great Yorkshire brewery yorkshire pale, Sonnet 43 bourbon milk stout (now re branded as Raven bourbon milk stout) with one pump turned around and another unclipped. The Black sheep bitter was nicely kept and the raven, one of my favourite stouts was ok but far too cold to be enjoyable. I paid £2.25 a pint as this is a deal they do on a tuesday for cask ale which is very reasonable but on other days i think the beer is still reasonably priced being a student heavy pub. This is a student heaven being the closest pub to the university so expect it to be busy on most nights. The pub also does a large amount of food deals most nights of the week which adds to its popularity. Not everyones cup of tea but i was happy to have a few drinks in here and would be happy to return as it is very wallet friendly (on most drinks, some are randomly very expensive compared with the normal price around here so be wary before ordering).