Barley Mow, Basingstoke

A pleasant looking country pub with a decent sized car park attached. The main drinking room is of good size with a second room tagged on to the side. It seems to have had a lick of paint since Quinnos review but the carpet didn't look particularly new. The TV was annoyingly on playing music from Kerrang, the only other customers in were a couple that had just picked their kids up from school, said kids were then allowed to run around screaming unsupervised. On the plus side there were a couple of decent beers on In Red Cat Scratch and Red Cat Mosaic Palem there was also Doom Bar for those that way inclined, the fourth pump handle was unoccupied. This is quite a nice pub that would be better without the TV and the Kids.

Attractive building with lots of external flora. Interior is long and flat, with a wonky ceiling, aged pub carpet and a rather naff mushroom shade of paint. Good-sized function room/lounge bar/part-time Thai restaurant through a door to the right. To the pub’s rear, past the car park, is what’s best described as a ‘menagerie beer garden’. Quite a community feel in the pub and a good atmosphere with dogs welcome. Noted a sit-down arcade machine and TV football advertised. Four ales on; Flowerpots Goodens Gold (good nick), Doom Bar, Hobgoblin Gold, a football-themed Caledonian beer on a reducer. I rather liked it here, though a few quid on a freshening-up mightn’t go amiss.