Real Ale Way, West Wickham

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The newest venue in this small chain of micropubs (see also: Hayes and Westeram), this is a typically compact, single room affair, with a decent location between West Wickham High Street and station. The pub occupies a nice old shop unit with a great little entrance porch with art-deco style front doors and a pleasant mosaic tile entrance step. Inside, things are a little blander, with the decor taking a leaf straight out of the Hayes’ branch’s book. There are exposed floorboards throughout, broken by a few strange strips of carpet here and there, plain painted walls decorated with slightly more contemporary-styled paintings, photos and the like, some of which were for sale, and a decent servery to the rear. The bar has a nice dark wood counter, perhaps salvaged from another pub, and a simple mirrored bar back on a red painted wall with beer boards to the right. The room is of a decent enough size and can accommodate a good deal of seating in the form of high tables and drinking ledges with bar stools through the centre and to the left, some upholstered benches in the front window and a mix of basic tables with chairs and low stools elsewhere. The front window has a frosted pane with the pub’s name picked out across it and the whole feel of the place was of a traditional pub shrunk down to micropub proportions. There was a good sized mid-week crowd in too, with only one unoccupied table remaining when I arrived, which I quickly took advantage of.
As with its sister pub, there is a good selection of cask ales available on gravity from the temperature controlled taproom behind the bar. The selection on this visit was Tonbridge Traditional Ale (a house beer) and Coppernob, Larkins Pale and Porter, Wantsum Imperium and Fortitude, and Mad Cat Golden Ale. The beer boards also indicated no less than thirteen real ciders were available to choose from as well! I gave the Porter a try, served to me by an efficient and cheery hipster barman, and thought it was in great shape.
This is a really good micropub that serves a neighbourhood devoid of any serious beer options and relatively under-pubbed for its size. The place seems to have won over plenty of people and with the prospect of some interesting Kentish ales kept in tip-top condition, I’d say this was worth making a bit of effort to seek out.

On 15^th February 2022 - rating: 8
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