The High Cross (JD Wetherspoon), Leicester

The High Cross is a Wetherspoons that was rammed during a recent Wednesday evening visit. The interior is L-shaped with a raised seating are to the left of the entrance and a bar counter along the left-hand wall. This faces a line of high tables that run down the centre of the pub and standard tables and chairs that run under the windows of the right-hand wall. In the right rear of the pub is a sunken seating area and in the left rear is open plan seating. It was very busy in here during a recent Wednesday evening visit, well the bar area was, the rear area not so much. Thankfully the good people of Leicester don’t seem to be bar hoggers so I was able to note that the two banks of six hand pumps were drawing Charrington IPA, Cairngorm Wildcat, Brains St David’s Ale, Sharp’s Doom Bar, GK Abbot Ale, Ruddles and Grainstore’s Rutland Osprey. Standard keg was also available alongside San Miguel. The service was polite and I thought this was a decent Spoons.

Standard Spoons with the bar to the left. Usual selection of Spoons ales. The place opens out to the left at the rear. Toilets on the ground floor!

As well described below this is a fairly standard JDW consisting of a large single room. The twelve hand pumps had a decent choice with two unused, the JDW Trio Of Doom, Wild Weather Choppy Waters, Milestone Classic Dark Mild, Everard's International Defender, Marston's One Is 90, Vale Gravitas, Oakham Scarlet Moon and Grainstore Metatarsal. I went for the Choppy Waters (£2.65) which was in first class condition. I thought this was a good Spoons. The service was OK and the beer choice and quality was good. For me it's the best of the three Leicester JDWs.

This large city centre Wetherspoons pub takes its name from a cross that used to stand roughly where the pub is today – marking the centre of medieval Leicester and the site of the former Market House. The pub is a fairly standard shop conversion and rather boxy and featureless as a result. The ground floor has a roughly L-shaped layout with front and corner entrances leading you into the large main bar area with the servery positioned along the rear wall. This space is carpeted throughout and has half panelled walls, neutral colours on the walls and some fairly run-of-the-mill stained glass partitioning screens. To the left there is a slightly raised seating area under the large windows that run down this side of the room, whilst over to the front right there is a slightly sunken space under front windows which give a good view out to the shopping street and square beyond. There is a fireplace on the end wall and a few gargoyle heads on show as well as the usual local interest information boards and photos, but otherwise, décor is fairly unremarkable and the seating is almost exclusively in the form of regular tables and chairs. The room extends a small way back to the rear right, where a cosier space can be found with full dark wood panelling. Beyond this is an unexpected conservatory-style space with lots more seating under bare brick walls decorated with old photos. This is a fairly bland space, but not a bad option to have if you want a change from the usual ‘Spoons vista. The toilets, in a pleasant change from most Wetherspoons outlets, were located on the ground floor. Half of the twelve hand pumps had been dedicated to guest ales, with just two ‘Spoons regulars, although this did mean that there were four pumps out of action. I enjoyed a particularly good pint of Oakham Inferno which took a little while to find its way to me as I patiently waited in line during a busy pre-match period prior to a fixture at Leicester City’s stadium. I found this to be a fairly unremarkable pub straight off the well-worn Wetherspoons production line and in many ways indistinguishable from a great many of their other pubs. It did have some good beer on though and it’s a very safe option to pad out a city centre crawl, but I doubt this visit will last long in the memory.

I much prefer this Spoons to the Plantagenet as it's not as dated. Also they had a Falstaff ale on handpump, which seems to be a regular visitor, from reading Gills notes. Service here was also better.

Called in here for breakfast on both days of my stay in Leicester and the service was quick and efficient. I also called in for a beer early on Wednesday evening when it was reasonably busy and again on Thursday night when it was packed. Service was good on both occasions as well, well done guys. A decent range of 4 guest ales available alongside the usual suspects and both the pints I had were in good condition. It is a pretty featureless conversion, but the conservatory type area at the rear is unusual. I thought it was alright in here.

High Cross page at the JD Wetherspoon site - www.jdwetherspoon.co.uk

Despite the fairly attractive exterior with nice mouldings, this is a mid-size JDW with their classic mid-90’s open-plan faux-Victoriana interior just like a hundred others, utterly lacking charisma. It has an L-shaped interior with an unusual external covered patio. There was a good array of local and guest ales and my Nottingham was in good shape. Given what else LE1 has to offer I can hardly ring a huge endorsement here but at least it’s not the Last Plantagenet.