A Pint of Prose and a Dram of Poetry in Edinburgh’s Old-Style Pubs

~This is the first in an occasional series about my ale and whisky adventures in Scotland. Enjoy!~

Pubs and the Scottish Literary Tradition

Edinburgh’s classic pubs are legion, and most have a lyrical quality about them — hardly surprising given that Edinburgh was once an eminently literary city, home to the likes of Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson, and the bard of the barleycorn himself, Robert Burns. Burns is widely known for his Auld Lang Syne. He’s also known to a narrower circle of beer enthusiasts as the composer of a variation of a popular ballad about the suffering, death, and resurrection of the famous cereal crop that provides the lifeblood for ale and whisky.*

Edinburgh is literary to its very fibers: Even the train station is named after a novel, Scott’s Waverley. Several pubs have hosted literary and philosophical luminaries, and some of their names, like the Kennilworth or the Abbotsford Bar, recall works of literature. Until closing in early 2020, Knops brewed a Black Cork Ale, a legendary Edinburgh beer style connected via court records to the memory Deacon Brodie, the inspiration for Stevenson’s Jekyll and Hyde.

If the lanes and taverns of Edinburgh once echoed with the words of philosophy and literature, they also resonated with the sound of industry. And not only the sound, for Edinburgh’s nickname, Auld Reekie (Old Smoky), evokes both the sight and smell of the hazy pall cast over the city by the factories of the Industrial Revolution, breweries included.

Even this smoky nickname has a literary connection. “Yonder stands Auld Reekie,” proclaimed a character in Walter Scott’s The Abbott. “You may see the smoke hover over her at twenty miles’ distance.” Several decades earlier Robert Fergusson, the poet who coined the moniker for his native city, had already summed up the relationship between beer, industry, and literature with the following lines penned in the early days of the Industrial Revolution:

“Auld Reikie! thou’rt the canty [merry] hole, / A bield [refuge] for mony caldrife [cold] soul, / Wha snugly at thine ingle [hearth-fire] loll, / Baith [drink] warm and couth; / While round they gar the bicker [cup] roll / To weet their mouth.” (“The Daft Days,” 1773).

*The hero of Robert Burns’ John Barleycorn ballad suffers all manner of iniquities, including death. All of these indignities correspond to the various stages of barley cultivation, brewing, and distilling, including reaping, threshing, malting, mashing, boiling. But the ballad ends triumphantly: John Barleycorn sprouts up to bask again in the morning sunshine of spring, his rebirth redeeming all the maltheads of the world.

***

Nowadays the pall of smoke is gone, replaced on occasion by fog and mist. But many of the traditional pubs from Edinburgh’s brewing heyday remain. And what pubs they are, some as opulent as the gin houses described by Charles Dickens. Many of these pubs have preserved their elegant Victorian or Edwardian charm. And almost all of them serve cask-conditioned real ale, along with an impressive range of single-malt whiskies — perfect for that “hauf an’ a hauf,” a half pint of beer and a dram of scotch. The choice is yours: drink the scotch as a chaser for your beer or drink the beer as a long drink to tame the fiery scotch.

A Brief Note on Gantries and Snugs

Gantries and snugs are words that I had never heard until my first pint in Edinburgh. The gantry is the area behind the bar where bottles of spirits are kept for use or for display. Historically, gantries were supporting frameworks for barrels and casks. The ones that remain in Edinburgh often feature elaborate woodwork.

The snug is a tiny but fascinating space that reflects the gender and sexual mores of the British Isles during the Victorian era. A small private room or area that resembled a booth, the snug had access to the bar via a separate door and came equipped with a frosted glass window set above head height for privacy. Women could enjoy a drink in the snug in a time when it was frowned upon for women to be in a pub. And lovers would arrange trysts in these intimate spaces. But it wasn’t only women and lovers who took their pints or drams in the snug. The local police officer might duck in for a quiet pint, or the parish priest might stop by for his evening dram.

Bennets Bar

Bennets Bar is the first pub I ever visited in Scotland and occupies a special place in my heart. It’s one of those rare pubs that stays with you long after you’ve left. And no wonder. The pub is a neighbourhood fixture that has been serving characters from the stage and the street since it opened its doors next to the King’s Theatre in the nineteenth century.

Bennets boasts one of Edinburgh’s finest historic pub interiors, but it’s cozier and less profusely opulent than places like the Café Royal or the Guildford Arms. Instead, the pub exudes a warmer charm that’s more down to earth, starting with the mahogany wood of the Victorian fittings and the wooden chairs set across from red leather nooks. And then there’s the elegant bar counter running nearly the length of the pub and crowned by a magnificent five-bayed gantry. Look up toward the top of the gantry and you’ll see two casks stowed decoratively on each side. The gantry is said to be the last of its kind in an Edinburgh pub.

The glasswork is particularly remarkable, the appeal of its elegant advertisements for A. Usher & Co. Special & Liqueur Whisky and Bernard’s Mild & Pale Ales undiminished by the passage of a century. Other notable fixtures include two brass water taps on the bar for your whisky. Round table tops set upon wrought-iron stands have inlaid maps in case you need help finding your way home. Last but not least, the tiny snug with its stained-glass panels is a rarity.

Bennets has three handpump beers on tap, along with another eight keg taps. The establishment also presides over a collection of single malt whiskies over a hundred strong. On my first evening in Edinburgh I ducked in for a nightcap sip of Auchroisk from the Speyside region, a smooth dram with heather, spicy orange zest, and roasted nuts. One more whisky? asked the bartender. The answer to that question came easily enough.

The Guildford Arms

A stone’s throw from Waverley Station, the Guildford Arms is an ideal first (or final) venue for any decent Edinburgh pub crawl. You can’t miss the arched windows and reverse-glass blue signage beckoning you to enter beneath an elaborate pediment supported by granite columns, all of a piece with the boom in ornate pubs between 1880 and 1910. Established in 1896, the Guildford Arms features an impressive interior replete with plush velvet curtains, an arched gantry lined with spirits, mahogany as far as the eye can see, and a magnificent ceiling that presides over it all. Try to get a table in the unique mezzanine gallery with its view over the sea of drinkers below.

The Guildford Arms’ commitment to beer is serious. It hosts two annual beer festivals featuring upwards of fifty beers selected from a particular region or based on a certain theme. Ten fonts dispense cask-conditioned real ale from breweries across Scotland. I started off with a glass of Black Cork from Edinburgh’s Knops, a dark strong ale based on a legendary style brewed by Bell’s Brewery a few centuries back.* Black Cork combines the nuttiness of Oloroso sherry and the savoury earthiness of molasses with dates, licorice, vanilla, and cocoa. More focused is the wonderful Fathom, an inky brown-black ale from Jaw Brew in Glasgow. Rich and wonderfully complex, it’s the kind of liquid cookie treat that invites hours of indulgence. (Two Tankards).

*Sign up for my quarterly Beerscapes Newsletter to read a vignette about Black Cork. The first issue is due out in April!    

Café Royal

Café Royal is right around the corner from the Guildford Arms. “All is light and brilliancy here,” wrote Dickens about the magnificent gin palaces of old in his Sketches by Boz, and the same could be said about Café Royal, which took its cue from these establishments. With its opulent oval bar, elegant stained glass, brass railings, gilded cornices, sparkling shelves of spirits, glistening handpumps, and Doulton tile portraits of famous Victorian inventors and scientists, the Café Royal evokes the Edinburgh of times past.

Find a spot along the sumptuous bar or settle into one of the cozy leather booths, order up a cask-conditioned ale and maybe a dozen oysters, and party like it’s 1863. Beer choices include Greenmantle, a brown ale from Broughton in the Scottish Borders, and Dark Moor, a strong mild from Kelburn. The Greenmantle is a classic Scottish ale, right down to its brilliantly clear tobacco-amber appearance. Biscuit, bread crust, and toast envelop a beguiling green apple note, floral-spicy hops, and a nuttiness that melds nicely with the smooth bitterness. Refreshing and light, it’s a classic session beer with just enough complexity to keep things interesting.

The Abbotsford Bar & Restaurant

Built by Edinburgh department store owner Charles Jenner in 1902 and named after Sir Walter Scott’s country house, the Abbotsford has long been a meeting place for actors, journalists, and writers. Its splendid mahogany island bar is what CAMRA’s pub guide calls “perhaps the finest example of typically Scottish island-style servery.” A red, white, and gold-leafed ceiling sparkles overhead, bench seats along the walls are perfect for people watching, and red velvet curtains add an extra touch of class.

I had what was one of my favourite real ales of my Scotland trip at the Abbotsford: Vital Spark Dark Ale from Fyne Ales in Argyle, an intriguingly hoppy ale occupying a liminal space between stout, porter, and mild. Creamy and smooth, it’s a bit like blackberry jam on toast with a dusting of cocoa. Vital Spark is hopped with Cascade and Amarillo, but you’d never know it, such is the subtlety with which the hops intertwine with the malt. (Two Tankards). The food here is fab, too: haggis bon-bons with a whisky chutney. If that doesn’t say Scotland, I don’t know what does.

The Kenilworth

Like the Abbotsford up the road, the Kenilworth has a literary connection as well. It takes its name from a novel by Sir Walter Scott, whose portrait graces the sign outside. And like the Abbotsford, it’s furnished with an ornate mahogany circle bar that commands your attention with its finely wrought gantry. The building itself dates to around 1780, but the current interior was designed around the turn of the twentieth century for a wine and spirit merchant. And what a vibrantly colourful interior it is, with blue and white Minton tiles lining the walls and an impressive orange and mint green ceiling adding cheer. The Kenilworth offers a range of hand-pumped cask ales, craft beer, and whisky.

The White Hart Inn

Home to the city’s cattle market from the fifteenth century right into the early twentieth century, the Grassmarket has long been the focal point of the Old Town. Once the city’s main execution site, this broad, open square just south of the Royal Mile is now ringed with restaurants and pubs.

One of those is the White Hart Inn, founded in 1516 and named after “that rarest of Highland creatures,” which appears out of the misty glens “no more than once in a century.” (You’ve got to hand it to the White Hart Inn: They have one of the most evocative door plaques for miles around.) The proprietors claim that the pub is “the city of Edinburgh’s most ancient tavern.” The White Hart’s low-slung ceiling and rustic beams don’t dispute the fact. And those ceiling beams, more recently inscribed with literary snippets, leave little doubt that this was once a redoubt of writers. Robbie Burns is said to have penned his “Ae Fond Kiss” here in 1791, and William Wordsworth occasionally graced the inn with his presence.

The White Hart Inn is now part of the Belhaven pub group, so you can be rest assured that the tasty White Hart Ale on tap is brewed by a decent brewery. This pleasantly bitter session sipper leads off with biscuit and raisin, finishing on a refreshing note. If you’re hungry, the Wee Haggis with Neeps and Tatties and Whisky Sauce is a divine accompaniment to pints and drams.

With more than seventy whiskies on the menu, the White Hart Inn is also a fine place for a hauf ‘n a hauf. I started off my ale and scotch adventures with an Auchentoshan 18 Year Old Lowland whisky, a bracing dram reminiscent of Manzanilla sherry with a twist of lime and a zing of ginger smoothed by honey and shortbread. My next dram, a Dalmore Cigar Malt replete with notes of shortbread, crème brûlée, banana custard, bourbon vanilla, hazelnuts, luscious chocolate, and sandalwood, was in a completely different whisky universe. Mighty fine stuff.

One last thing: Like many other places around town, the White Hart Inn is allegedly home to many spirits, and not just the kinds behind the bar. So keep an eye on your dram lest a thirsty ghost perform a sleight of hand while you’re trying to read the lines of literature on the beams overhead.

Till next time, everyone! Sláinte, and stay safe out there!

*While you’re here, don’t forget to sign up for my brand-new Beerscapes Newsletter! The first issue will hit virtual newsstands in April.

Sources

Geoff Brandwood, Britain’s Best Real Heritage Pubs: Pub Interiors of Outstanding Historic Interest, 2^nd ed. (CAMRA Books, 2016).

Special thanks to Simon of Bennets Bar for getting me up to speed on all those pub terms I had never managed to encounter in several decades of drinking. You learn something new every day.

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