Bird In Hand, Forest Hill, SE23

The Bird in Hand is a decent looking corner pub situated at the end of a row of shops. Once inside there is a single room which runs to the rear,the bar is on the left side,the room is part carpeted and bare boarded,the seating is comfy bench seating and chairs,the rear area is up two steps,there is a pool table here plus some more bench seating and a large screen showing the Derby v Hull playoff game. There were three real ales on the bar,i had a drink of Brains Phonics which went down well,the other beers were London Pride and Doom Bar. The pub was fairly busy on my Saturday dinner visit. I was quite happy having a drink in this pub. Pub visited 14/5/2016

This is a Smith & Jones pub, not that that means very much to me. But they did have a March special offer on for drinks, with Doom Bar and Bombardier both at £1.99 a pint, and Morlands Original at £1.69. These really are very competitive prices. I didn’t see any sign of food or menus, and to be honest this didn’t seem like the sort of pub that would do food. With such cheap beer on offer it’s not surprising that this is a drinker’s pub; when I was in at Saturday lunchtime the clientele was entirely male, drinking and watching the QPR match. The pub itself is nothing special, with a well worn carpet, furnished mainly with normal tables and chairs but with one or two tall tables/stools, and with a raised area up a couple of stairs at the back containing a pool table. The decor on the walls at the front of the pub consisted only of adverts, but there were a few prints on the wall at the back near the pool table. This really is a no frills pub. But the beer was cheap, and the locals seemed friendly enough. It didn’t have the traditional pub character that you occasionally find in pubs, but it was OK for a swift pint.

I thought that the landlady in here was nice enough and the mix of plasma screen, TV and projector make it ideal for watching the football. There is a pool table at the rear of the pub and I had no problems with any of the other customers. There are four hand pumps, but two of these were off and the other two were dispensing Courage Best. There is only a standard draught menu available alongside the ale, but I had a decent Guinness. As I mentioned before, this place is good if some sport is on, but I wouldn't bother if there was not.