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VERSION:2.1
N:The Royal Oak
FN:The Royal Oak
TEL;WORK;VOICE:020 7357 7173
ADR;WORK:;;44 Tabard St;SE1 4JU
URL:
NOTE:Tabard Street is most famous for having once been home to the Tabard Inn, where Chaucer's pilgrims first met before heading off to Canterbury. With a surprising lack of sentimentality, the Victorians pulled it down and a hideous brown office now squats in its stead, at the time of writing home to an 'IT Solutions' firm. Heading further down the street, its successor certainly makes up in beer what it loses in history. A rather pleasant nineteenth-century boozer known for the occasional lock-in, it is owned by the Harvey's brewery. This means that an insane cornucopia of beer is on offer: bitters, ales, milds, stouts and porters, both on tap and in bottles. I settled myself down next to a long haired, bearded man who was apparently "just leaving" (he didn't) and soon found myself trapped in a deeply scary conversation about beer. Divested of my senses by several pints of porter, I foolishly agreed to the loon's suggestion to try "Imperial Double Extra Stout", which he claimed he couldn't decide whether to like or hate. Upon asking for this at the bar, the barman dusted down and then uncorked a porcelain bottle and poured out a glass of what can only be described as radioactive sludge. This, apparently, used to be brewed for Russian soldiers to drink back in the days of the Tsars. I can only conclude that they had much, much stronger stomachs than I have. Tasting a little like alcoholic tar, I managed to force down half the bottle, at which point I grew violently nauseous and the pub began to swing around me in a most alarming manner. Despite the exhortation of the loon that I should follow this up with a glass of Elizabethan ale, I decided to leave, lurching down the street as the Sellafield sludge slurped and bubbled inside me. It would be another week before I could bear to touch alcohol again.
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