Part of our Best Pubs in London microsite. Is your local listed?
Macintosh Ales is proof that pubs can come in all shapes and sizes. Squeezed into the corner of an old stables building, this hidden away gem has some claim to the title of London's most micro micropub. Its tiny 'main' room squeezes in three or four tables, and their attendant battered stools. The rest is bar. To be fair, there is a side-room, but unless you're playing darts, there's not much reason to enter it.
Homely minimalism runs through everything at Macintosh. The pub serves just two small-batch beers, a bitter and a pale on our visit. Both are brewed on-site. The spirit selection is one gin. Food is 'crisps and nuts'. Even the website is bare-bones, with address, opening times, one photo and a sentence about each beer. That's it.
Despite the cramped interior — one that almost brings to mind the kind of real-not-quite-real boozer you find at a living museum like Beamish — there's plenty of standing room in the cobbled courtyard, and the place is truly a-buzz at weekends.
Macintosh Ales makes a fine pub-crawl pairing with the nearby Jolly Butchers. Both put a weighty emphasis on their beers, but with the former its about exquisitely crafted home brew, while the later goes for breadth. Or for a lazy pub crawl, simply pop next door to the Clarence.
