Lyndon House Hotel, Walsall

The Lyndon House pulls off a neat trick by making a large hotel in the middle of Walsall look attractive and inviting and creating a bar which has the feel of a village local. I liked it here, it's traditional and welcoming and doesn't feel like a hotel bar at all. Six handpumps had on Lyndon House Bitter, Thornbridge Jaipur IPA, Deuchars IPA, Abbott, Theakstons Bitter and Holdens Mild. There's a high proportion of ubiquitous, uninspiring ales there but the Jaipur IPA was as good as I've had and I didn't need to move from it. There appears to be an active policy of offering a quality guest. This'd be my first stop in Walsall.

This is a fairly charming pub attached to a hotel on one of the main roads through town. The central bar serves a nice, cosy room which has plenty of dark wooden beams and exposed brickwork, made all the more comforting by the muted lighting. There are some interesting features dotted around, including an old stove in the rear corner and a nice fireplace nearer the front. There was a good crowd in on my Saturday lunchtime visit and the only downside I felt was the incongruous R’n’B music which was playing over the radio. My table had a very simple lunch menu on it, with all mains coming in at under a fiver, which seemed like a good deal to me. The walls were decorated with all manner of advertisements, mostly for tobacco, whiskey and Guinness. I also spotted a couple of poems about the pub’s locals framed on one of the walls. They were written by the pub’s very own in-house poet, one Michael J Bonser – perhaps a relation one of this website’s esteemed reviewers? There were six hand pumps, all on when I arrived, dispensing Lyndon House Bitter, Theakston Bitter and Mild (£2.30), Millstone True Grit, Greene King Abbot Ale and Deuchars IPA. My pint of Mild was served too cold for my liking, but the service was, at least, with a smile. A decent pub all things considered and I’m glad I included this place on my crawl around the town. I would have been happy to spend longer here if only I’d had the time.