New Barrack Tavern, Sheffield

The New Barrack Tavern is a pub that I've been meaning to get to for a while. Situated on a busy road through Hillsborough, it has both an impressive exterior and interior. There are multiple rooms including a small room to the left as you enter, a large room to the right and just off the main bar area and two further rooms to the rear, one billed as a cider room. Opening times are fairly limited here. Whilst they are open most of the weekend, throughout the week, they only open on 4 evenings. Speaking to the humorous landlady and landlord, it seems that they have suffered more than most throughout Covid and trade has not got back to pre-pandemic levels. Hence, the reduced opening hours. The bar area itself is certainly impressive. So is the ale and cider selection. Regular cask ales are Bradfield Farmers Bitter (billed as Barrack Bitter) & Castle Rock Harvest Pale & Screech Owl. Guests were Castle Rock Oatmeal Stout, Clearwater Revival & Pheasantry Black Pheasant. Ciders were Seacider Blood Orange & Hardcore, Aston Manor Friel's First Press Vintage, Sandford Orchards Devon Scrumpy, Snail's Bank Appley Dapply & Pig Squeal & Thistly Cross Whisky Cask. Craft beers were Vocation Heart & Soul, Castle Rock Session, Uiltje Trackdown & Beavertown Gamma Ray. I do hope this pub continues to survive. Architecturally, it was the best of the 12 Sheffield pubs we tried on this crawl.

Interesting pub with an Art Deco façade and a Camra regional inventory interior. Didn't manage to explore the various rooms, but the curved counter in the lobby bar is quite impressive, as is the range of real ales and ciders on offer. I went for a quick Bradfield's Barrack Bitter (which I took to be, in effect, a house beer), but I must make an effort to make a proper return visit.

I've been making this part of my usual circuit in recent weeks - having a bus pass makes it a bit easier to get to, though it's also not a bad walk from my place via Blake Hotel, Queens Ground, New Barrack, then Gardeners Rest and/or Wellington. They always have a dark beer on these days, and told me that they do better for stouts, porters and milds than a lot of pubs this side of town. I've had a couple of Ashover beers - their Damson Porter is so much more subtle than the frequently seen Titanic Plum Porter, which is too sweet for me - and on another occasion when table service was still in operation Steph predicted to Kev behind the bar what I would be ordering: Rudgate Ruby Mild. Friendly staff and excellent beer.

Batemans XXXB, Everard's Sunchaser & Beacon, Acorn Barnsley Bitter & Burning Bails (‘the Quest for the Ashes', 4.8%, £2.80), Castle Rock Harvest Pale (£2), & Screech Owl (5.5%), Bradfield Farmers Bitter. Blackboard displays list of bottled beers and pressure draughts whose pumps make an impressive line-up (for that style) to the left of semi-circular bar, that side serving a sort of vault/snug (contradictory, I know) to left of entrance, Veltins, Leffe, Staropramen, Marstons Oyster Stout. The main curve of the bar, displaying the handpumps, is to the large entrance corridor, giving on to large open lounge opposite, cushioned wall banquettes, well spaced table/stool arrangements, huge Castle Rock mirror above fireplace with wood-burning stove, decent breweriana mirrors & prints. Another room to rear, bright, with windows to paved patio with picnic sets, dartboard. Menus here offer 2 for £8 (Mon-Wed) eg herb sausages & mash, chilli wi rice/chips, steak baguette wi mushrooms & onions, s&k pie wi chips & mushy peas. Board at bar announces Sunday carvery £7.95, today's specials: fish pie £6.95, large cod £9.95, wines £10-12 or wine of the day £6.95 btl (last week Marquis de Cantonelle, or Lutzville Chardonnay). ‘One over the eight' promotion offers accumulated discount. Comedy night 02Aug, tkts £5. It's a downhill walk from Bamforth Street tramstop, but the uphill rtn is not too painful.

On a dual carriageway section of the A61 going northwards towards Hillsborough is The New Barrack Tavern, a fine multi roomed traditional pub that is part of the Tynemill Pub Group. There has been a pub on this site for over 150 years now – indeed the pub was used as a mortuary during the famous Sheffield flood of 1864. The current building on the site dates back to the 1930’s and has a rather austere looking tiled brick exterior with a bit of an Art Deco look. Some etched windows and the entrance reveal that, in days long gone, this was a former Gilmours Windsor Ales pub. It was evidently also a multi roomed pub – note the “Billiards Room “ etched window. There’s a small cosy tap room on the left, which always appears underused, with most customers seemingly favouring the larger main bar area. It’s a traditionally furnished large room with bare boards and a fine collection of brewery posters and mirrors decorating the walls. At the front of this room, by the windows, a small raised area acts as a stage for the regular music events, for which the pub is well known. Posters dotted around advertise the various events – eg Friday night is Northern Soul Night which, we are told, is “for dancers only”. A corridor, the walls of which are adorned with old Wednesday football programmes and related memorabilia on one side and music posters on the other, leads to a further smaller room behind and a pleasant outside walled seating area at the back where we see a number of old enamel signs advertising, by way of example, the delights of Magnet Ales and Ind Coope Burton Ales. Being a Tynemill Pub, there’s the usual Castle Rock Beers available, including Harvest Pale, Preservation and Elsie Mo’s, but the 11 handpumps also offer a good selection of the usual local micros ( eg Acorn and Bradfield ) with, on my most recent visit, Bradfield Plum Ale going down pretty well. The pub is a CAMRA Good Beer Guide regular. Large blackboards above the bar tell you what is on, which include quite an extensive selection of foreign bottled beers. One corner of the bar servery is now described as “Craft Ales Corner” where, should you, for some unaccountable reason, feel like drinking something trendy and overpriced, several tall fonts offer you the opportunity to do so. On my latest visit, before the last home game of the season, for example, I could have sampled a 5.5% lager called Doggie Style from Maryland USA, but for this “priviledge”, I would have had to stump up £ 2.70p for a half pint. My experience is that, generally speaking, Northerners have not been taken in by all this craft beer nonsense, which appears to be a typically London led initiative and, on my visits to the NBT, sales of the Castle Rock real ales clearly dominate, particularly the Harvest Pale ( £ 2.60p for a whole pint ) The pub is well patronised by Wednesday fans, both pre and post match and service from the young friendly staff is always first rate, in my experience. Pleasingly, even at busy times, the staff will make first time visitors aware of the Castle Rock “one over the eight“ promotion. The pub is also home to supporters of Sheffield Eagles Rugby League Club, who play at nearby Owlerton. This is another pub well worth seeking out, but note that it doesn’t open until 5pm on Mondays and Tuesdays.