County Hotel, Chelmsford

Having arrived about an hour too early for a family celebration at this hotel, there was clearly time for a sneaky couple of pints before something called "afternoon tea" that we were booked for. It looks like what it is - an hotel bar. It's split in two halves, with what looks to be the drinking area having only low tables, banquette seating and low chairs. Through an arch is an area that looks like somewhere to have bar snacks, and has mainly normal tables and chairs. A snack bar menu was on all the tables, with reasonably priced snacks on offer. Now for the important stuff. There were three handpumps; one unclipped, with the other two dispensing Harvey's Old Ale, and Skinner's Lushington Pale Ale. These are two very different beers of course. The Old Ale was pretty lifeless and clearly past its best, whereas the Lushington was in good shape. Both were £4 as I recall. Mrs R and her sister had something called a "cafetiere (?)" of coffee, which gave them a cup each for £2.75 which they deemed to be good value. This is what it says on the tin - a hotel bar. But it did do a couple of (normally) decent beers, even if one of them wasn't really up to scratch on the day.