We finally got to the pub last week, it seems we don’t get out as much these days! This time we headed over to Hammersmith and the Craft Beer Company in the Broadway for one of our friend’s birthday and this is what we found…
The Craft Beer Company took over the old Abbot Ale pub at the end of the shopping centre, near to the Apollo Theatre, just as the first Lockdown kicked in and held out, waiting for normality to return, now the pub seems to be doing a fair trade, although it clearly fluctuates in numbers dependant on the Apollo’s curtain calls. When we arrived it was packed to the rafters with Keith Urban’s fan base and then at 7.55pm the placed cleared out, leaving our group of 6 the only ones in the entire place. So it would be good to check the Apollo’s website to know what is one and when if you plan to drink at the CBC.
So what’s it like? Well the interior certainly has changed from that old pub, the large amounts of bevelled glass and mirrors and old red cord seats, the typical pub interior. Instead we entered under the neon sign through the glazed tile exterior and in to find a mass of Hexagonal Mirror tiles across the top of the bar and ceiling, more green tiles and a funky inlaid tiles floor, all in all a rather funky look and way better than the Ikea knock-off showroom of the Covent Garden Branch.
We got a table in the corner (the first one to become available when the Keith Urban Crowd left). A large square table with comfy seats, we avoided the pink and green pastel Sherbet bar stools!
So the important part – What Beers did we have:
Dig Brew – Cherry & Lime Smoothie Sour Ale – 5% – £5.25 1/2 pint
As always a controversial choice and one that Bob is usually alone in within our group. To the rest of us it is a glass of vomit, but to Bob it was delicious
Vocation Marshmallow Stout – 5% – £6.00 a pint Ash’s choice and this proved popular among our group with two others drinking it in pints and halves.
One other had the Thornbridge Market Porter – 4.5% – £6 pint
And of course someone had to commit sacrilege and order a rum and coke! There was no menu as is the usual and there was a real lack of stouts and sours, most of the range was just IPA’s DIPA’s etc.
The drinks were pretty expensive, that pint of sour came to over £10 and they didn’t tell us the price until it was already poured and the other sour was just a can.
Old Street Brewery Blackberry Sour
The choices were limited and so we stuck to the same drinks mostly.
We stayed for two drinks each, then headed out to find somewhere with a little bit of atmosphere and a cheaper round (the second round cost £38 for 6 drinks) and we ended up in a whetherspoon’s instead, where the round came to about £14
In all a Mhh! Kind of experience, it’s still too quiet most of the time and the cost of beers are pretty high and this time round the choices were pretty slim, in the past there have been better choices but more recently the CBC has been catering to the mainstream and sticking to the IPA Crowd and so us Stouts and Sour drinkers are suffering a bit and paying for it too!. We are sure we will however return the next time we are in Hammersmith, but we’ll take out a loan in order to buy a round!
Climbing Moss 