The Shoulder of Mutton

I went to this pub for dinner in October on the recommendation of the owner of the B&B I stayed at. Seemed a bit people sparse for a pub, and now I know why. With a great brewery in town, you would think that they would know how to serve a beer. Not much selection, but they had Hobgoblin from Wychwood, which is usually pretty good. Unfortunately, this was not ‘usually’. Tasted super old, flat and bitter, really bad. Hey, pub owner, don’t be cheap, change out your casks after, oh, I don’t know, 10 – 20 years or so.
After traipsing around York all day, I was starving, not sure where any other restaurants were in the area, so I decided to at least try the food. After all, how could they mess up that pub classic, a meat pie? They seemed a bit pricey, but I was really hungry. I am happy to report that I survived the experience, but only barely.
I was brought a long plate with three massive frou-​frou bowls on it. One had a mix of overcooked, mushy and cold broccoli and cauliflower; the next was full of cold, old and greasy chips; and the pièce de résistance, the pie itself, was topped with a massive mound of puff pastry. I tentatively used my fork to lift off said pastry, only to be hit with a smell that can only be compared to vomit. For some reason, the person responsible for this monstrosity (I will NOT call them a cook!) had placed a layer of absolutely revolting cheese (could not be identified!) in between the pastry and the meat portions of the pie. The meat in the filling had not been cooked long enough for it to become tender, and thus had the consistency and chew factor of shoe leather. After the first bite, I resorted to scraping as much of the cheese mixture to one side as I could, in order to dip the cold chips in the gravy at least. About 5 chips in, I gave up and left it all there on the table, went to the little grocery on the corner, bought some biscuits, went back to my room and had tea, biscuits and chocolate bars for dinner.
Bad, bad, bad on all counts. Avoid at all costs. At least I had some excellent beer at York Brewery earlier in the day. I can only surmise that this place is a joke played by locals on tourists based on the fact that my lodgings landlord sent me there. Or maybe he just has no tastebuds. Ick.

I heard that The Shoulder of Mutton was holding a Pork Pie and Cider festival over the bank holiday so 3 of us tagged along to see the fun. It was great loads of connoisseurs nibbling on pastry, checking the jelly, looking at the appearance and eating them to check for scoffability. Ten pies in total, all from local butchers, put together by Jack Merry and his team who had moved into the Shoulder a couple of months back. There were plenty of Ciders to be tried but I found an excellent stout called Barista to wash those pies down with. It even tempted me to go back again on the holiday Monday on the excuse of checking out who the overall pie winners were. Hey, I found I had got two of the first three prize winners marked down as leaders. Jack has a lot to do to rennovate the pub but he’s made a great start