Tippled Pink Review: The Perfectly-Rated Small Newcomer | A small bar with a perfect early rating – far too new to judge on the numbers, but noted honestly as a genuinely promising newcomer to watch
Camden Enterprise Review: The Hotel Bar Arbitrage, Again | A 4.5, calm, well run, and half empty – and Londoners are convinced they are not allowed in
Passyunk Review: The Cheesesteak Argument Is Genuinely Serious | Two shops on the same corner in Philadelphia, open all night, facing each other, and the city has not stopped arguing since 1966
Canvas Bar Review: 3.3 From Forty-Seven People, and It Is a Trap | The lowest score in the City, on a sample small enough to be an accident and large enough to be fatal
Be At One Monument Review: The Third One Broke the Tie | Two branches matched exactly and forced us to soften our argument. A third has arrived and it does not match at all.
Yard Review: A Yard of Ale Is a Trap | Two and a half pints in a trumpet-shaped glass, and the bulb at the end delivers the last of it all at once
Anthologist Review: An Anthology Is a Bunch of Flowers | Anthos, flower. Logia, gathering. The Greeks called a collection of poems a bouquet, and they were right.
GNH Review: The Hotel Bar Is Still the Best Arbitrage | Calm, well run, half empty – and Londoners are convinced they are not allowed in, and they are wrong
Listening Room Review: The Japanese Built Bars Where You Must Be Quiet | A kissa is a listening bar, the sound system is the point, and talking over the music is not permitted
Lyaness Review: One of the Best Bars in the World, on a Roundabout | A 4.6, a genuinely serious list, and a room that treats the ingredients as the concept rather than the decoration
Oriole Review: The Bird Is Named After the Colour Gold | Aureolus, golden. The golden oriole is one of the most beautiful birds in Europe and almost nobody in Britain has seen one.
Paradiso Review: Paradise Is a Persian Walled Garden | The word means an enclosure – a wall, with something good inside it, and everybody else on the outside
Made in Brasil Review: The Caipirinha Is a Cholera Remedy | It was invented as a medicine for the Spanish flu, and the lime and the garlic were the active ingredients
Rupert Street Review: He Invented a Glass Drop That Cannot Be Broken | Prince Rupert of the Rhine was a cavalry commander, a scientist, and the man who brought mezzotint to England
Side Hustle Review: The Phrase Should Worry You | A side hustle is a second job. We have given it a cheerful name and stopped asking why anybody needs one.
Madison Review: You Are Looking at the Dome, and the Dome Is Fake | St Paul’s has three domes. The one you see from outside is not the one you see from inside, and neither is holding anything up.
Pitch Review: The Word Does More Jobs Than Any Other in English | A pitch is tar, a throw, a field, a musical note, a sales talk and a tent – and they are not all the same word
Cocktail Club Review: The Third One, and the Curve Holds | 4.5, 4.7 and 4.4 – and the branch with the fewest reviews wins, exactly as it has every single time
Jin Bar Review: Gin Is Dutch and It Nearly Destroyed London | Jenever, genever, gin. William of Orange brought it. Parliament passed eight Acts trying to stop what happened next.
The Beauchamp Review: A French Name the English Refuse to Pronounce | It is spelled Beauchamp and said ‘Beecham’, because England imported the Normans’ words and then flattened them
Wright’s Review: A Wright Is Somebody Who Makes Things | Wheelwright, shipwright, cartwright, playwright – and it is why a play is wrought rather than written
Tangerine Review: The Fruit Named After a City | The tangerine is named after Tangier, the Moroccan port it was shipped from – a fruit carrying a city in its name
Ev Review: Ev Means Home, and It Is the Eighth Bar Selling You One | A Turkish word for house, in a railway arch, and the category has now appeared eight times in eight postcodes
Miraflores Review: The Pisco Sour Is a War That Never Ended | Peru and Chile have been arguing about who owns pisco for a century, and both governments have taken formal positions
Edge Review: A 4.7, and the Small Room Wins Again | Eight hundred people, and the one variable that has predicted a high rating in every district without exception
Slug and Lettuce Review: The Name Was Meant to Be Off-Putting | It was invented as a joke about how bad a pub name could be, and then it became a chain of forty
Black Heart Review: 4.6, and the Metal Room Is the Best Run | One of the highest-rated live music venues in London, and the crowd is the politest in the survey
Blues Kitchen Review: The Twelve-Bar Is Social Engineering | Three chords, a fixed order, and a structure so widely known that a stranger can walk in and play with people he has never met
Wandering Grapes Review: 4.9, and Vines Do Not Wander | They are rooted for a century, the good ones are stressed on purpose, and suffering is the whole method
Fitzrovia Belle Review: The Hotel Bar Is the Best Value in London and Nobody Uses It | Walk in. Sit down. Nobody will ask which room you are in, and nobody ever has.
