Upper Street and the surrounding roads have so far not made it on to The List as I had been waiting to go with certain members of Team List (you know who you are). I caved last Wednesday as the lineup of bars, pubs and restaurants was becoming too long to ignore, and I felt North London needed some better representation on the blog. Taro stepped up to the plate and met me at Highbury & Islington for a slow walk down to Angel.

I suggested going for food at the fairly new Fish & Chip Shop, but Taro was having none of it. Instead we headed straight for The Taproom, a popup beer bar on Upper Street that now plans to stay there for the foreseeable future.

I was excited to see Five Points Pale on as I haven't had any of their beers yet, so I went for a pint of that straight away. It lived up to my expectations - hopefully I will make it to one of their brewery open days in Hackney soon. That said, I should probably have gone for the reasonably priced flight of 3 third pints of ale for £3.90 which I spotted too late.


Taro did go for the flight, and left the barmaid to make two of the choices. He ended up with Tiny Rebel Full Nelson, London Fields Shoreditch Triangle IPA and Williams Bros Red Ale - a lovely selection, with Triangle IPA just about coming out on top. It's a really cosy place to drink, and we could have happily stayed there all evening. Tables are fairly low lit, meat and cheese boards are available, and they run a pub quiz most Tuesdays.

Fantastic selection of real ales, gins and many more liqueurs. The bar staff were friendly and happy to offer samples of the ales. There is a downstairs comedy theatre which wasn't on when we visited but it looked like a nice cosy venue and prices seemed very reasonable. I would love to revisit this bar again on a comedy night.