The debate for the best pub in Birmingham is never going to be straight forward. We can start by discounting a few in the conversation; Moseley’s Prince of Wales, a shadow of its halcyon days, the Victorian beauty of The Barton Arms now closed and sadly destined to be another Birmingham planning department accidental inferno, and both the Old Crown and The Actress and Bishop, both great, but less pubs and more clubs, which, having written it, sounds like a slogan Sacha Lord would have emblazoned across a van with his face on. The CAMRA lot will tell you it’s The Wellington or The Craven Arms, the unwashed will say it’s The Flapper, the beanie hats 1000 Trades, and then there is the Great Guinness Debate which surely falls down to Nortons or The Lamp Tavern. It’s Nortons by the way, they condition the glasses better. And if you think conditioning isn’t important you should probably stick to The Flapper.

Two pubs are a consistent in everyone of those chats; The Plough, my local and the only reason I moved to the road behind it, and Kings Heaths centrepiece, Hare and Hounds. Two very different places, both absolutely-fucking-brilliant at what they do. The Plough does hospitality and excellent food, whilst the Hare is all good times and some of the most iconic gigs this city has seen. These are in my top three (the other spot is The Old Moseley Arms), and if you haven’t guessed by the title at the top, the reason for this piece. They’ve combined powers, like Buda and Pest in 1883, or Undertaker and Kane in ‘98, with The Plough going into the Kitchen of Hare and Hounds. Unsurprisingly, it works.

I’ve been quite a few times, mostly before gigs, the last time before Blondshell played upstairs. If you’re familiar with The Plough you’ll know the menu minus the pizzas. There’s burgers, one with two layers of fried chicken coated in a buffalo sauce anywhere in NYC would be proud to serve, and another with a beef patty under a flow of beef chilli spiked with jalapeño and cumin. We get the same chilli on fries with soured cream, and triangles of deep fried macaroni that ooze cheesey béchamel. They have to be eaten to be believed. Eat them.

And then there’s the cubanos, so popular they’ve opened a separate business – Deathrow Sandwich – to just focus on their sandwich game. I always order the same; the spicy pulled chicken, an orgy of animal, cheese, and pickled chillis, topped-and-tailed with toasted tinned loaf until the natural sugars in the dough caramelise and the insides merge into a cheesey, spicy mess. On the last visit we tried a special of chicken Kyiv, a beast of a portion chock-a-block with garlic butter. It’s better than the version at Bob Bob Ricard for roughly half the price.

Service is Plough-style brilliant, managed by the excellent fellow Harbonite, Jake, and the bill significantly less for being in Kings Heath. The options on York Rd were already good, yet this partnership opens up another option for something new, something casual, something consistently excellent. It’s all the more of a bonus that it happens to be in the kitchen of one of Birminghams great pubs.

9/10

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