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16-05-2017, 12:31
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https://i2.wp.com/boakandbailey.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/star_inn.jpg?resize=650%2C458 I took my parents to the Star Inn at Crowlas, our favourite pub, on two occasions last week and they were amazed at how busy it was. They are former publicans, albeit almost 40 years ago now. It didn’t work out for them — they talk about Whitbread much the same way present day campaigners talk about pubcos — and kept muttering, astonished, and jealous:*‘We’d have been happy with this on a*Saturday night, never mind a weekday*teatime!’
Everything is stacked against the Star, on paper at least. It’s way out of town, and there’s no food. It’s a handsome building but not a quaint old inn by any measure, not with the A30 running right past the front door.*Though there are campsites nearby Crowlas isn’t really a tourist destination either.
And yet, there the customers are, session after session, day after day.
https://i0.wp.com/boakandbailey.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/star_bar_feb.jpg?resize=650%2C501Mid-afternoon at the Star back in January — a relatively quiet moment. It’s tempting for us to argue that the Star’s success is down to the exemplary products of the Penzance Brewing Co, the onsite microbrewery, that dominate*the pumps, alongside exotic guest ales from the North. Certainly*that’s what gets into the Good Beer Guide*and draws in at least part of the crowd — people who might otherwise not make the trek on public transport from places like Hayle, Penzance and even St Just. That the beer is relatively cheap by Cornish standards, as well as being great, probably doesn’t hurt either.
But there’s more to it than that. It’s a proper village local*with a loyal*core of regulars attracted, we guess, by the same thing my parents particularly liked: it’s completely unpretentious, without being rough. A tightrope walk for sure.
People come in tracksuit bottoms and trainers, overalls*and work boots, tweeds and wellies, suits and ties, hiking boots and anoraks — in short, they wear whatever they like, in whatever condition they like, and no-one cares. Well-trained dogs roam about licking up pork scratching crumbs, sometimes joined by a child or two in the after-school window, drifting*quietly from parents to relatives*to family friends with pop bottles in hands.*The management sets this familial tone — informal, low-key, bluster-free.
We’re not against food in pubs, or even anti-gastropub (see the upcoming book for more on that) but my Mum was right when she observed that it made a change not to smell deep-fat frying the whole time. The lack of dining also seems to encourage friendly groups to form in what would otherwise be inconvenient places. It also leaves tables free for scattered newspaper pages or for elbows-on-the-wood*deep-level conversation. The absence of food*changes the mood, in other words. It’s certainly another blow for the received wisdom that a pub can’t thrive without a kitchen in 2017.
When we left after our trip on Wednesday my Dad, not a demonstrative bloke, turned and looked back at the door. ‘Bloody lovely pub,’ he said, sounding almost annoyed to have been so seduced by an establishment 150*miles from his house.
Disclosure (http://boakandbailey.com/samples-pr/disclosure-stuff-we-got-free/): the Penzance Brewing Co’s Peter Elvin has shouted us a few pints over the years, including a round for Dad and me last week.
A Pleasingly Busy Pub (http://boakandbailey.com/2017/05/pleasingly-busy-pub/) originally posted at Boak & Bailey's Beer Blog (http://boakandbailey.com)


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