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U Jelinku, Prague

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Address: Charvátova 33/1, 110 00 Nové Město, Czechia
Nearest Square: Jungmannovo náměstí
Nearest Metro Stop: Národní třída on the B-line
Hours: 11:00 – 23:00, Saturday until 18:00, Sunday Closed
Reservations: +420 224 948 486
  • Quality and/or choice of drinks –9/10
  • Style and Decor – 9/10 
  • Character, Atmosphere and/or Local Life – 9/10 
  • Amenities, Events & Community – 6/10
  • Value for Money – 7/10
  • The Pub-Going Factor –  9/10

Even those of us committed to pub-going find it daunting (though enjoyable) to explore Prague’s enormous pub scene. Tearing oneself away from the high quality known favourites such as U Hrocha or U Cerneho Vola is difficult enough in itself; given a holiday may last only a few days, you could be forgiven for sticking to the known favourites.

However, several visits in, I am starting to chip away at the available drinking holes the city and can strongly recommend doing so for the many gems that exist outside of the most touristic areas.

However, Jelinkova Plzenska Pivnice or ‘U Jelinku’ as it is more colloquially known, was a bit of a blot on my copybook, a core old town pub I had known about since 2007 recommended in Prague Pubs as being an authentic Pilsner Urquell pub in the heart of the old town, but never visited.

By rights I ought to have paid a visit in the early days, but for one reason or another, things got in the way. This is partly down to the unconventional opening hours, quirkily being open only until 6pm on a Saturday and being closed altogether on a Sunday! Though inconvenient, it gives you a flavour already that this is a pub doing whatever it wants, to hell with the consequences.

Finally, after multiple occasions I ensured I paid a visit in December last year. Firstly, as with all the best Pilsner Urquell pubs, it is virtually impossible to leave after a single pint, the devil on your shoulder always telling you to go for one more, combined with the Czech habit of inviting you to have another the moment they spy you getting to the end of your glass.

Jelinku is a tiny pub and so when you visit don’t be surprised to find standing room only, if that. As you walk in you’ll find a square wood-panelled bar area and walls sparsely decorated with some classic Pilsner Urquell ephemera from decades past. There is an old fashioned open bar area with a sink where the tapster Bohumil Kundrt does his work.

It’s all about having a beer na stojaka, ‘on the stand’, so you greet the tapster, order the inevitable number of beers required, pay straight up (unusual for a Czech pub) and take your beer for a lean with your mates. Simplicity defined.

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It seems to be a family operation, and the main tapster’s appearance is appropriately a caricature of a pre-war central European maestro, a rotund, smartly-dressed fellow of borderline retirement age with white hair and a majestic and comically-curled moustache, helping transport you back in time to the good old days of Bohemia, which is very much where this pub would rather exist.

The site has been a pub since 1918, with the Pilsner Urquell contract drawn up 8 years later, remaining ever since.

One of the recurring features of these throwback places is treating tourists with a tolerance rather than an open arms embrace. If you can stand some-good natured jesting and accept you are in the domain of the tapster and his stamgasty, who are perched by the bar having a chat and a joke, you’re assured of a good time nevertheless.

Many of the regulars use their visit for conversation, so you may find one or two chirping up in English to get a conversation going. This is one of the hallmarks of a great pub and it is this unique environment, almost forcing people together at the bar area to drink and talk which acts as the ice-breaker, so vital for a sole travellers in a foreign country.

The Pilsner Urquell is as good as you’ll find it anywhere, and you may find the format of standing results in you drinking more of the stuff than usual – that and the nerves, I guess. At 46 crowns for a pint, it’s on the high side of pubs still catering for locals rather than tourists, but if I told you that equates to £1.50 a pint I’m sure you won’t quibble! Don’t even bother asking what else is on to drink, as there isn’t anything. You’re on Pilsner or spirits – that’s it.

There is a room around the back which receives table service (it will either be the rakishly thin lady or the more comely lady of the house who is in attendance). Access to these tables can depend on reservations and at a loss of that, good luck. Though I haven’t yet had the pleasure, it looks a truly pleasant place to be with seating facing in around the room creating that feel of conviviality you’re searching for when you try pubs like this. The format is simple and effective. Why do so many other places make genius loci seem like alchemy?

Though Prague is currently experiencing a wave in characterless craft beer bars, and has an almost bottomless trunk full of cheap but featureless macro-brewery branded drinking holes, you can’t walk far before a true pub hoves into view. The real job, as I’ve been finding, is being able to sort the wheat from the chaff, and knowing when is the best time to be there.

Jelinkova deserves a high score because it is so different from the usual, it rewards perseverance and the best time to be there is simple: when it’s open. If you’re up for a good time, not a long time, the pub is right up there as the best in the city.

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Senk Na Parkanu, Plzeň

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Veleslavínova 59/4, 301 00 Plzeň, Czechia
  • Quality and/or choice of drinks –10/10
  • Style and Decor – 7/10
  • Character, Atmosphere and/or Local Life – 7/10
  • Amenities, Events & Community – 6/10
  • Value for Money – 7/10
  • The Pub-Going Factor –  8/10

Drink unfiltered unpasteurised Pilsner Urquell delivered in barrels via horse and cart from Plzensky Prazdroj brewery up the road.

It doesn’t get much better than that for beer drinking, and despite the relative expense (cost being £1.70 rather than £1 which is the usual price for a beer in Czechia) it still represents extraordinary good value by nearly all other Western measures for supping what still is, pound for pound, the nicest beer going.

The horse and cart service also goes around a few other Pilsner Urquell pubs in Plzen on a largely ceremonial journey (though a good quantity of beer is delivered), such as U Senku and U Mansfelda,which are also worth checking out, but Na Parkanu is really the cultural epicentre, located in the bailey in the city walls and features an adjoining brewing museum which is brief, and poorly signposted but comes with a pint thrown in.

Na Parkanu itself is a shiny new pub, albeit in a traditional cookie-cutter Pivnice style, with some nice traditional features and a few little quirky concessions to the local hockey and football teams, along with reliable, absolutely conventional Czech food. You can sit down and just have a beer anywhere, much in the way you can at a chain pub in England, but there is a dedicated bar area too if you want to sit away from diners.

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In the main, Na Parkanu is a fairly by-the-by venue and in local terms a tad expensive by virtue of self-awareness of its own importance.

Why the fuss then?

The place serves a special beer that is very difficult to obtain in both unfiltered + unpasteurised form in Czechia let alone anywhere else, so there is always a tinge of excitement at the prospect of drinking at the ‘place to be’, which, outside of the Plzensky Prazdroj tap itself, this pub pretty much is, and everyone knows it, and is excited by the fact, which alone elevates the experience of drinking there.

The 12° Pilsner Urquell Nefiltrovany has that classically thicker texture and sharper flavour you get with a lager pre-filtration, but that makes it no more difficult to drink. The reviews speak for themselves. The beer slips down with alarming alacrity, while the keen-eyed servers have their eyes trained on any near-empty glass, and are only a quick nod of the head away from providing you with a replacement.

That’s enough in itself on this occasion. The venue is otherwise ‘steady’, it doesn’t really have any weak points (other than failing to fulfil my desire for it to be wonderfully old, preserved and traditional), which is hardly its fault. If they keep the layout for the next 80 years they may achieve that. It’s a solid pub you’ll find around in many a place, just one that’s blessed with something nearly every other pub doesn’t have.

If you’re feeling brave, try some of the intimidatingly greasy ‘food to go with beer’ options on the menu, and wash it down with the gorgeous beer – you’ll soon be transported into a fatty, gristly, and delicious world of true Czech pub going – halitosis central but that’s just your body trying to communicate how satisfied you are!

A trip to Plzen that doesn’t include a pint of unfiltered ‘PU’ at Na Parkanu would feel strangely hollow and lacking. This is something that I and the other Google reviewers seem to agree on. Join the throng and drink the tastiest damn beer you’re ever going to have, right from the source.

 

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