The Old Ale House, Truro

The Old Ale House has a serving counter up the left-hand wall, barrel tables with high stools up the centre and thick wooden tables up the right-hand wall. Either side of the front entrance are snuggy seating areas and there’s a barrel full of monkey nuts, the husks of which were all over the floor mixed in with some sawdust. I thought this was just a Halloween thing, but looking at Quinno’s review it would seem not. Fairly lights run across the ceiling where there are, what seemed like, hundreds of old pumps clips. I didn’t visit upstairs, but I did note the advertisement for pool, darts and a function room. Premium keg products line the bar where ten hand pumps also sit. The cask options were Bass Kerr’s Borderer, Bluntrock Brewery’s Gold, London Pride, Dynamite Valley Brewing’s Black Charge, Atlantic Brewery’s Sun Dancer, Tintagel Brewery’s Sir Lancelot, Firebrand Brewing’s West Coast Session IPA and a couple of Cornish Craft Ciders. The back bar is also lined with taps for the craft keg. I went for a pint of Pride, first in a while, and sat at one of the barrels with a pile of monkey nuts. It was comfortably busy, my visit being an hour or so before the weekly Wednesday quiz kicked off. This is a decent pub that I’ll be sure to revisit when next in town.

Yes this is the town tap pub for the Skinners Brewery and you would expect several hand pumps and cask taps on the bar dispensing their ales and beers in good condition. But was also good to see an 18 tap keg wall behind the bar with several craft and cider offerings. But had to go Skinners cask and the Betty Stoggs was superb Stripped back no frills dark wood interior with a low beamed ceiling and a solid wood floor ( with sawdust sprinkled over it to give that true ale house experience), it’s quite dark inside, but with no TV’s or fruit machines and a laid back sound track playing there is nothing to get in the way of the drinking experience.