Rose & Thistle, Reading

Back street local near Reading West station, a Greene King pub, it has a dominating position at the top of a hill at the end of a street visible to passers by on the Oxford Road. It looks like a series of makeovers have left it with one of those strange interior layouts, open plan but an awkward shape. A long room across the front which extends on one side to the back broadening out past the bar counter into an area with pool table, a raised area for eating and a patio, there is also a patio at the front. Decorated in the traditional pub colours of cream walls, brown wood and red floral carpets it has the usual big screens, machines and retains a dart board. A sea of T Bars lines the counter with two handpumps serving GK's beers of middling quality. Customers were mainly men between 20 and 50 when I called in, with a few couples eating. It was apparently voted the “Pride of Reading” pub of the year in 2006.