Here Comes Bod

Not so far back in the long-ago railway catering was the stuff of comedy, the merest mention of wilted ham rolls on a BR buffet could wrong a laugh from even the toughest audience.

Even after the last dining car had been shunted into the sidings rail travel seldom involved a voyage of culinary discovery. The larger stations offered a parade of fast food chains, the smallest a kiosk flogging family size bars of chocolate at the sort of prices you charge when you have access to a captive audience.

How things have changed. Now even provincial stations are home to burger joints that can use the word gourmet in their name with irony coming into play.

They are increasingly home to their own 'tap' too, marking a renaissance for the old platform bars that used to be the haunt of stag parties and seedy salesmen. A prime example of such a venue is this excellent little watering hole that opened at Stoke Station a year or so ago.

The bar is part of s new chain opened by local brewery Titanic and is designed to appeal to a more metropolitan clientele than their real ale orientated pubs. The décor had the shabby chic look you'd expect but done well enough for it not to look like it's come out of a box.

The important thing, the beer, is up to their usual high standard and there is a small, but we'll curated menu of spirits. Remarkably for a place that bye to its purpose to cater for an almost exclusively passing trade the bar had a friendlier atmosphere than I have found in many, so called, community pubs.

Quite why Titanic have chosen to name this new brand after an obscure character from seventies children's television eludes me. It is something I shall ponder over on frequent return visits.

Bod
Stoke-on-Trent Railway Station
Station Road
Stoke-on-Trent
ST4 2AA
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