Castle Hotel, Manchester

Vast improvement on the last time we called in been refurbed and money spent on it but needs friendly bar staff

The small bar of the Castle Hotel is found at the front where there is also an old standalone jukebox that was generating some background music. There is a premium draught range available from the bar that also supports ten hand pumps. I can’t remember what I had, but it was perfectly acceptable. Behind the bar is a separate room full of seating and beyond here is another separate area that had a band setting up in it. Advertisements around the pub highlight the fact that there is live entertainment almost every day of the week. Out the back is a small enclosed seating area for smokers that can stand the stench of the rotten drains. This place seemed to be popular with students during my recent Thursday afternoon visit, many of them talking themselves up. Oh how to be young and full of it again! There may be a good selection of beers, but this place isn’t very comfortable so I wouldn’t go out of my way to visit again.

One of the best pubs in the Northern Quarter. Usually around 7 or 8 beers on and a belting jukebox, and friendly punters. A little beer terrace out back which gets the sun on approximately 11 hours of the year.

I'm not sure if this is a recommendation at all. Er... clean on the outside (which is very good for Oldham Street), my pint was in reasonable nick and the lady that served me was lovely. Inside was busy, dirty and dark. Whoever runs this place must have very good contacts or exceptional marketing skills, this place appeals to a very weird crowd of people who talk and spend money in one way and dress and act like they are pretending to be working class Mancunians??? The venue takes itself far too seriously, I had my pint and left. The gents toilets were not immaculate, but city center pub toilets seldom are. Bring your own loo roll though.

Cant add much to all the fine earlier reviews apart from that there are now 2 Craft beers on tap that have been added to the 9 cask and a cider already on.There is Budvar Dark Lager(4.7abv)at 4.50p a pint and Blue Moon Wheat beer(5.4abv)at 4.80 a pint,although i opted for the Trings Colleys Dog which was on top form. The Gents toilets are now immaculate

In Manchester’s Northern Quarter, in a street full of trendy bars, eateries and nightclubs, is The Castle Hotel, still the only pub in the City Centre that is owned by the Stockport based Robinsons Brewery. After a long period of closure, the pub has now reopened, having had a significant restoration and spruce up. It’s structurally unchanged, but, perhaps inevitably, some of the scruffy individuality and character that I remember from previous visits seems to have disappeared. A fine small brown tiled frontage leads into a small front bar with a fine curved marble bar counter and attractive bar back. Note the Castle Hotel mosaic floor as you enter. On the door we see a prominent sign telling us that “no football colours are permitted under any circumstances”. With this in mind, it is perhaps not surprising that the football memorabilia on the wall indicating that the pub was once twinned with a pub in Czechoslovakia, which I remember from my earlier visit, has now gone. The walls have been painted in a rather dark gastro pub style colour, but it appears that, whilst there is now an extensive wine and craft beer menu, food is limited to snacks. The clientele appears to have changed somewhat, the hard drinking characters in the front bar replaced by studenty types. There’s also one of those horrible hissing coffee machines, which I doubt was there last time. Behind this front bar is a Bar Parlour ( as indicated by the etched glass in the door ). This is a rather dark room with banquettes, copper topped tables and original bell pushes. Here there is also a piano. A longish corridor, the walls of which are decorated with music posters, leads to a lighter large back room – the former games room - with a high ceiling, wooden skylight and a small stage and it is clear that it is here that the advertised regular live music (seemingly most nights ) is performed. Those who remember the pub’s previous toilets with the seemingly permanent wet floor will be pleased with the newer more improved version. On my recent early evening visit, the 10 handpumps in the front bar were serving 5 Robinsons/ Hartleys beers ( but no Old Tom ) together with 4 guests – Black Sheep Riggwelter, Brecon Brewery Genesis, Saltaire Triple Chocoholic and Elgoods Snake Slayer. One pump was serving Rosie’s cider. The pub is listed in the 2012 CAMRA Good Beer Guide. This is now very much a rock music orientated pub – the loud juke box in the front bar makes this clear the moment you walk in. Disappointingly, there’s speakers in the Bar Parlour, so there’s no respite there. Despite the wider beer range that the pub now offers, I won’t be rushing back here next time I’m in Manchester.

The clean up has brought out the detail of this pub's victorian/edwardian interior, nice tiled bar counter, a mosaic entrance, and a handsome barback all looking pretty good in the front bar. Eight pulls at work, one with old Rosie the others with a wide range of Robinsons including the Young and Old Toms and a Hartley s badged beer. There are a couple of T bars and a ceramic fount at one end of the counter. Décor is mainly advertising for forthcoming bands and a few PC generated notices about football colours and noise. Furnishing is traditional benches, stools and Britannia tables. Behind the servery is a cosy, dark,small sitting room and further down the corridor the room with the stage and a few tables and chairs, both still looking “lived in”. The gents has been upgraded with smart new tiling, no smell but a little graffiti on the hand dryer, at the end of the corridor is a tiny yard.