Reasons To Be Cheerful....

A first trip to Manchester of the year, and one which involved dipping into a couple of the city's suburbs plus a foray into the fringes of neighbouring Stockport. And there was much to applause as I visited a quartet of excellent places....

One of the best books I have read recently, and certainly the best involving beer, is Matthew Curtis' Manchester's Best Beer Pubs and Bars, a cracker of a guide to the city which was published in Autumn 2023. In it the author, who is a beer writer, podcaster, and joint founder of the excellent online magazine based around beer called Pellicle, gives the reader a guided tour of almost 200 pubs, bars, cafes, taprooms, bottle shops, etc. - a personal run through the best places to get a beer in Manchester and the area beyond, backed up with some excellent photographs and plenty of history and useful information for the visitor. And so I decided I would road test one or two of the places that Matthew had enthused about in his highly readable book.

Now as a frequent visitor to Manchester there are obviously plenty of places in the book that I have visited and, in some cases, very regularly over the years, so I decided that I would instead head for some that I had never been to previously. And so that is why at just before 12.15 on a Saturday lunchtime I alighted from a Crewe-bound train at Levenshulme station, a mere 6 minutes after leaving Manchester Piccadilly.

Levenshulme is a suburb in South East Manchester which shares its borders with Longsight, Fallowfield, Gorton, Burnage, and parts of Stockport. It straddles the busy A6, on which sits the high street whose shops and varied restaurants interspersed with pubs, vape shops, East European skleps, and bookies reflect the multi-national character of this once predominantly Irish suburb. Beyond the constant traffic and buzz and seductive aromas of the food on the high street are rows and rows of traditional late Victorian two up, two down, red brick terraced houses. The area is regarded nowadays as being somewhat 'up and coming' to reflect the relative availability of affordable housing, and is apparently starting to show some signs of gentrification.

And it was into the quiet terraced streets that I made my first foray of the day. A ten minute walk on Barlow Road off the main road got me there. Set slightly back from the road, just before a bend, with a small garden to the front and a car park to the right of the building, the Blue Bell Inn is an imposing roadhouse-style pub run by Samuel Smiths who have a number of pubs in the Greater Manchester area. I walked in the first door which took me into the vault but seeing no hand pumps on the small bar I retreated and re-entered via the second door, which took me into a larger room in which was housed the main bar. There I spotted a couple of hand pumps, with a clip on one of them for Old Brewery Bitter, the only cask beer brewed by Sams. A lady who was seated at a table full of paperwork to the side of the bar got up and came to serve me with a pint of OBB, for which I was charged £3.00. The lady retreated back to her paperwork; I retreated to a table facing the bar. I looked around - a very attractive interior with parquet flooring, oak-coloured wooden bar, all immaculately maintained. There was a tiny snug off to the right of the entrance, whilst to the rear of where I was sat there was a smart and carpeted lounge. It was pretty quiet at this admittedly early hour. I would have loved to have brought you some pictures but due the brewery's anti-mobile phone stance (with reminders posted at several points in the pub) I kept mine out of the way. And so I took it all in; the difficulties of planning a wedding abroad as explained by the lady who served me from behind her pile of papers to an older guy sat with a pint of lager at a neighbouring table, whilst well wishers asked after a popular regular had been rushed into Stepping Hill the other evening. It was like it used to be years ago when I'd wander into a strange pub and sit there taking in the sights and sounds around me as there were no other distractions, and you would absorb it all. It made for a relaxing half an hour. And the beer was spot on as well; a very good 3.5 on the NBSS scale. A strong start to the day; the Blue Bell is a little off the beaten track but well worth seeking out.

The Blue Bell Inn, Levenshulme

I headed back along Barlow Road, but when I got to the library I carried straight on Cromwell Grove which was a quicker route back to the bustle of the high street where, once I had got my bearings, I found the next place on my list which had literally just opened up for the day. The Station Hop is a narrow-fronted modern bar situated in a former shop unit, which sells a range of beers in both cask and keg format. The bar is in the room you enter from the high street, which has a number of bar stools and a long bench for seating, whilst there are a couple of further rooms with additional seating beyond, with brightly-decorated walls and shelves in one room with board games and beer books. The bar is nominally the taproom for the Ventile Brewery in nearby Reddish, but when I asked about it, the guy behind the bar said the brewer was having a break from brewing at the moment. No problem, there was a decent selection of beers on keg, and there was Sonoma from Track on cask, of which I ordered a pint and went to sit at the bench in front of the bar. Wow, the beer was spot on. This 3.8% session pale with its underlying bitterness, touch of sweetness, and citrus flavours is one of the best beers around and when its on form it takes some beating. Probably because there were several more beers on keg, I wasn't perhaps expecting the cask to be so good, which is a little unfair, but this was definitely worth a 4 on the NBSS scale. No problem using my phone here as I checked the train time for my next port of call, which led me to get another half before I left. The place was fairly quiet while I was there, but I can thoroughly recommend a visit to this unassuming little bar which is only a couple of minutes from the station.

And then it was back out on to the high street, where I couldn't resist the sight of rows of samosas, pakoras, and kebabs of various persuasions stacked in trays on the counter in one of the food places, so I called in and for the princely sum of £4.00 I got some spicy provisions to keep me going during the day. I headed down to the nearest pelican crossing to get me across the road, and then it was back to the station. Incidentally, the road on which the station is situated was until relatively recently a rare example of one which had no official name, so around 10 years ago the locals campaigned successfully to get the city council to adopt its name officially as The Street With No Name, as it was known colloquially. And so, quiz fans, if you ever get asked the question what connects a Manchester suburb, a song by U2, and a 1948 film noir, here's your answer!

I went up the steps to the platform to wait for my train, and dipped into my bag of Asian snacks, pulling out a chapli kebab. It was delicious, its warming spices most welcome as I waited in the cool air. I had visited two excellent places, with another couple of bars, Nordie and the Talleyrand for next time. Sadly two of the places mentioned in the book, Fred's Ale House and Overdraught appear to be closed, hopefully only temporarily. The train lights appeared in the distance, getting closer as I finished my kebab. And then it was a hop on board for the three minute journey, passing the back of the huge McVities biscuit factory before the train pulled into Heaton Chapel's surprisingly large station.

From there Google Maps said it was about a quarter of a mile to my target, which involved heading back towards our old friend the A6 and negotiating a number of pelican crossings. A few minutes later, after passing a parade of shops and hairdressers, I came to another, in which sat Heaton Hops, resplendent with its large awning, several tables, and stacks of brightly-coloured chairs in front of a large window with attractive graphics. 

This is one of the highlights listed in the book, so I had been eager to check it out, plus it been on my to-do list for ages (it opened back in 2015) but I had never managed to find a way to fit it in to a trip. I walked in. The bar was at the far end of a fairly small room (there is some more room downstairs). A few tables with wooden seats were to the front of the bar, whilst a number of glass-fronted fridges were in an alcove down one wall, with shelving on the opposite side. I walked up to the bar and ordered a half of Draught Bass from the smiling lady behind the bar, one of three beers on hand pump, which I took with me to the one vacant table which had just been vacated. The beer was good, but having been spoilt with my earlier two choices, I was a tad disappointed, although it was still a respectable 3 on the NBSS scale. I was soon joined at the table by a couple who politely asked if they could sit there. I had spotted a beer from the always dependable Beak on the chalkboard to the side of the bar, and so when my Bass was done, I took my empty glass back and ordered a half of Wisp, which was very nice - a 5.6% fluffy, double dry-hopped pale ale brewed with Simcoe and Mosaic for flavours of peach, grapefruit, pine, passion fruit, and berry compote, as the official description goes. To me it was typical Beak and what they are very good at: juicy, refreshing, and well-balanced beers. And as I weighed up my options as to where to go next, I went for a second one. 

I liked Heaton Hops; there was some very good beer, a really friendly atmosphere, a lovely lady behind the bar, and lovely customers. It was obvious that this is a place which means a lot to both staff and those who come here for a drink, and as a long-time target it was especially pleasing that it exceeded my expectations. If you get chance to go, make sure you do.

I had been umming and arring about where to go next because Heaton Hops was only just over a mile from the Magnet, one of the finest pubs in the country, which I could either walk to or catch the 192 bus. The alternative was a trip to another highly-acclaimed micro pub, Reasons To Be Cheerful. a taxi ride away in Burnage. In the end, I decided to head over to Burnage on the basis that I have been to the Magnet before, and I can include a visit there when I make a long overdue return trip to check out the pubs of Stockport town centre. So I called an Uber, and a few minutes later I was being whisked through the tree-lined streets of the Heatons on my way to a Manchester suburb that I couldn't ever remember visiting even in the 5 years that I lived in the city.

I got dropped off by a row of shops on Fog Lane just beyond Burnage railway station just as the drizzle started to turn up the intensity. There with its grey paintwork and a large R graphic in the window. a solitary yellow table and chairs at the front was Reasons To Be Cheerful, a cracking name for a bar if ever there was one. I walked in to a lovely little bar, attractively decorated and with a young guy serving on, the clientele a mix of older guys on their own, couples, and a few family groups with young kids who had seemingly set up camp in a room beyond the bar on the way to the toilets. There were 3 hand pumps on the bar from which I went for Salopian Oracle, which was in great condition and worthy of a 3.5 I thought, as I leant on a shelf with sight of both the bar and the back room where the odd dog was mingling with the kids. There was a really friendly atmosphere and clearly this is something of an oasis in this area of the city with few pubs.

The beer list was hung up on hooks on the wall at the side of the bar and as excellent as the Salopian had been I decided to have a half from the kegs. I went for a Summer Lemon Pale from Donzoko, a 5% beer which whilst not matching with the weather outside was nonetheless very clean and refreshing. And with 20 minutes to go before I needed to catch the train back to Piccadilly I went for a half of the London Black, a 4.4% nitro porter from Anspach & Hobday, a beer I'd last enjoyed when I had been in Hackney last year. It was a lovely beer on which to conclude my visit to what was another top micro pub, and another that I can heartily recommend.

And as I wandered back through the murky drizzle and up the stairs and walkway to the platform at Burnage station in readiness for the 9 minute journey back to Piccadilly I reflected on what had been a great afternoon in the south Manchester/Stockport borderlands. One that had given me plenty of reasons to be cheerful....

Manchester's Best Beer Pubs and Bars by Matthew Curtis is published by CAMRA Books, price £16.99

Follow me on twitter/X: @realalemusic