Fed up with formulaic watering holes? Unimpressed by yet another stapled leatherette and chipboard…read morebooth makeover by some business blokes thinking they know what you want? Ian and Kier host this cosy room with the accent on local brews and chairs. Requesting gin I was asked if I wanted Formby or Ormskirk! Who would have thought?! So the choice for botanicals is either asparagus or cabbage? This is as close to the public house concept as you can get; Small, local, locally sourced, family run, chatty clientele who have mostly walked there. Outside seating is available using barrels on the pavement with space to park your Raleigh push-iron so no excuses not get back to the essence of pub life. P.S. The best chip shop in Formby is a beer mat flick away but that's another story......

Best find on holiday ever!!…read more Set in a beautiful little village with a huge village green with loads of parking round and about (although im sure that on a mid summer sunny day parking may be somewhat difficult!). The pub has a bar area and a restaurant area - we only ever went into the bar as you could eat int here and it was really cosy (dogs are also allowed!). The staff were incredibly friendly and chatty (lets face it, Yorkshire, particularly North Yorkshire folk are possibly the most friendly on the planet - i challenge you to disprove this!). The food was INCREDIBLE. Nothing fancy pants, just really good food, VERY big portions (trust me on this, you dont need three courses - choose your weapon of starter or dessert to go alongside your main - we made the mistake one night and 1) couldnt eat it all and 2)pretty much rolled home). We spent an evening in the pub, had a meal and then sat playing card games - we felt incredibly welcome. So welcome that we ended up visiting three times in a week long holiday. You cant really get a better recommendation than that can you??

This imaginatively named pub, situated just around the corner from Freshfield station and the…read moremillionaire's row of the area, Victoria Road, is cosy and offers a great selection of guest ales to accompany the usual draught lagers. The food there is very nice and not particularly expensive and the pub itself, whilst on the small side, makes up for it in comfort and with a friendly atmosphere. They also hold regular comedy nights that are always worth attending if you fancy trying to spot the next big thing or, more realistically, you want to see someone crash and burn horribly. Another popular night is the monthly open mic night, which plays host to a number of talented musicians from around the local area. I have also attended many functions in the back room of the pub and have found it to be a very good venue for occasions such as birthdays and football dos, including use of a disco system playing all your cheesy favourites. Think cosy pint beside the fire rather than the pre-cursor to your messy night out.

The Freshfield is located, appropriately enough, in the Freshfield side of Formby which is like the…read moreBeverly Hills to the rest of the town's Compton, being home to Steven Gerrard and other footballers who I am absolutely aware of, being a manly man and all. It's a traditional little boozer, and I do mean little - it might be the smallest pub in these parts, but it's always popular and you can usually find a variety of regulars and visitors (who have come to find red squirrels down at Formby Point -a largely fruitless activity of late) sat around the selection of small tables. They serve draught lagers and ales (with a favourite, Greene King, on tap here - nice) and a small selection of wines at fairly reasonable prices, think around £15 for a round of 4-5 drinks, so far so what, eh? Well the Freshfield is a dark horse; not only does it do wonderful homemade food (the steak and ale pie, one of the finest I have ever had the pleasure to sample) but also they possess a function room at the rear of the premises that plays host to live music and comedy nights where the likes of Alan Carr and Sean Locke have played before (in their pre-primetime days, of course) - also a great place to hire out should you have a birthday or special anniversary to celebrate.

I will always remember this pub fondly as the first place I bought my first pint (legally) and I am…read moresure I am not alone in sharing this landmark with the Cross House. I guess this little story sums up the Cross House's status as a pub for special occasions for me, but never considered as a viable option for my local. The interior is interestingly decorated and the variety of different seating available is excellent, offering many comfortable areas to converse over a few pints. The food served there is nothing special - standard pub fare and priced accordingly - but whenever I have visited the atmosphere has always been warm and inviting, perfect for a birthday or other special occasion. That's the thing though; although it's a very pleasant pub, it just doesn't have the 'feel' of a local. Maybe it's something to do with the distinct lack of odd, drunken regulars (they always seem a respectable lot in there) which I see as a staple of establishments to be considered as my 'local' (is this normal for someone my age? Let's not go there). They also have a weekly quiz night, although it is probably one of the more difficult ones in Formby (only beaten by the Bay Horse) and a lovely outdoor area, perfect for a not-so-warm summer's night with a few bottles of cider.

This is pub I went to on my eighteenth birthday. It wasn't the first place I ever drank - I won't…read morename and shame the pub that served me when I was sixteen - but it was the first place I legally drank. It's a nice pub too, smokefree before it became the law (strange to think there was ever a time when you might come home from a pub stinking of tobacco) and with a gastopub-leaning menu before gastropub really existed (a pub with asparagus on the menu, even if it was a Formby specialty, was unheard of) It has the sort of unpracticed sort of charm, with mismatched furniture and low beams, that only an authentic pub really does, the sort of authentic pub-charm that various branches of Wetherspoons and Slug & Lettuce try to emulate. They have old speckled hen on tap occasional live music and the pub quiz is easily the best to be found in Formby. It's a shame that we hardly seem to go anymore, I'll have to start reliving my eighteenth birthday.

Fantastic food, great specials board a really great British pub, sadly too few about nowread more

AMAZING!!! As far as I remember this place has won pub food…read moreof the year ever year since Ive lived in the area. Super tasty quality food, I noticed that on the menu it even tells you which farm the meat came from, or where the ice cream was made etc. The Greek Lamb and the Gammon are both brilliant. The portions are huge and I'm always left with enough food for another meal but save room for the Holly Bush sundae because you wont ever have a such a selection of tasty locally made ice cream :) The prices are great too, last time I went it was around 30quid for the 2 of us.

Unlike my fellow yelper Matt, I am rather fond of a good carvery (I've found it to be a very…read moresatisfying hangover cure actually) so as you might guess, The Bay Horse in Formby rates quite highly on my list of pubs-that-I-would-eat-in-but-probably-not-get-pissed-in. The presence of the carvery means that whenever you go in there it always smells like food, but in a really nice way, and the carvery itself represents good value for money due to its generous portions at a reasonable price. It is also one of the cheapest places to drink in Formby, which is obviously a big plus point however due to the nature of the pub, the clientele it attracts are usually middle-aged men or families, so it's not really the place to go before embarking on a night out. There is also a weekly quiz night which includes a free buffet for all participants, which is perhaps there to soften the blow of the quiz being ridiculously difficult (you couldn't even Google some of the questions for answers last time I was there, they were that obscure). Still, despite its bad points, The Bay Horse is definitely one of the better places in Formby to go for a good pub scran.

I'm not a huge fan of the carvery, so straight away I am at odds with the basic tenants of the Bay…read moreHorse. I just don't really like the idea of warmed through roast meat - for me a roast is either piping hot out of the oven or it's cold and eaten the next day straight out of the fridge. Also every time I've come here to drink I've not found anywhere to sit, which is another black mark against its name. Location-wise it's neither here nor there, being neither in Freshfield nor really on the Formby village pub/bar route. In The Bay Horse's favour, it serves the cheapest pints in Formby - with Carlsberg only just tipping the £2 mark - a decently sized beer garden (which unfortunately faces out to a fairly busy main road) and those little saucy seaside postcards framed up around the place, which I probably shouldn't like but really do.

My local, for which it suffers and is praised accordingly. On the one hand they do serve hand…read morepulled ales (with a personal favourite Timothy Taylor's Landlord always on tap) and decent grub - thick steak burgers, hearty sandwiches with chunky mustard mayo, surprisingly delicately flavoured curries. But, on the other hand it suffers from familiarity - I know which chairs are unevenly legged, which tables will get oppressively warm once the place fills up, exactly what time they will dim the lights and turn up the music 'for the evening crowd'. It's simply hard for me to get very excited about The Railway - but then, the more I think about it this is probably the best thing about the pub, it's absolute consistency. The beer garden has a nice atmosphere in the summer too, with people sloshing glasses of increasingly odd-flavoured ciders into their faces and taking advantage of the few hundred hours of sunshine we manage each year. Lovely stuff.

Until fairly recently I frequented The Railway often, going there at least once or twice a week,…read moremore if we were going on a night out. Recently though, with the emergence of The Grapes as a popular pub in Formby, The Railway has somewhat lost its charm. I guess the thing about The Railway is its reliability and familiarity - it doesn't really change, the same people are in there every week - and whilst it is its steadiness that makes it so comfortable, it is also its downfall. Despite this, I still find The Railway one of the better pubs to go for a drink in Formby, although it is quite expensive for drinks (even the cheapest pint is about £2.50). The pub itself is fairly large and has a vast array of seating, including a lovely outdoor area with heating lamps for those who choose to brave those colder evenings. The food there is also very good, with weekly curry and steak nights that are very popular. I would also recommend the Monday night quiz for those of you who prefer your quizzes a bit easier (not that I've ever won it, mind) but avoid the confusing Wednesday night one, which is a normal quiz mixed with bingo style rules. A good, reliable pub that will still be around long after the others have fallen from popularity.

We were staying in a caravan park just down the road and needed a place to eat in the evening. We…read morecame across this delightful pub within a few minutes of searching. We spent the remainder of our holidays here, every evening. Nestling by a brook full of eels. The pubs dog, Jasper, loved to just stand in the cooling water on the hot evenings that we experienced this July. Sufficient room to sit outside with plenty of tables. Service is second to none. Professional, efficient and, more to the point, friendly. Great selection of real ales, my favourite was the Cromwell. Now to the reason for frequenting this hostelry, the food. A reasonable menu taking into account the position of this pub. A good varied choice of fresh seafood, burgers, curries and steaks. We tried most of them and they all were extremely tasty. All cooked to order. Great mussels in white wine. Behind the bar is a blackboard describing their Naga 'Viper' curry made with, 'officially', the hottest chilli pepper. Underneath is written 'Curries ordered 528, curries eaten 400' LOL. I love hot curries but, even I, would not attempt it. We hope to make a return visit next year. Many thanks to the 'guvner', his wife, the staff (especially the chef and kitchen staff) for making our short holiday break a total delight. See you again.

This place is awesome! If you are looking for an authentic British pub with alot of character and…read moregood ale you gotta come here.

Very impressed. The food was excellent, the service was quick and friendly even though they were…read morevery busy. Reasonably priced. Friendly atmosphere. Child friendly, including having a selection of board games to borrow. We'll be going back!

This cosy little café/bar is carefully hidden away down a side street in the middle of Formby…read morevillage so could be easily missed. In the daytime, it is your typical little café, offering cappuccinos, lattes, various panninis and the like. However, it is of an evening when Café D'Art comes alive, as Formby residents flock there long after the other local drinking establishments close (they have late opening hours, ideal for those poor souls craving a replacement for Shorrock's Hill, Europe's number 1 hotspot). The drinks there aren't very cheap but by the time you get there you're usually too pissed to care, plus the beer they have there is pretty good compared to your usual pub draughts. The only negative is its size, meaning it can be full without really being that busy, which usually results in the action spilling out onto the alley and round the corner into the village but if you don't mind the squeeze then I highly recommend Café D'Art as a place to drink through to the early hours.

There is a distinctly French theme to Formby's backstreet eat-and-drinkeries, well to two of them -…read moreCafe des Crepes and this little establishment. Its quiches, soups, pizzas and paninis all round here; mostly homemade (or at least constructed on site) and with judicious use of sundried tomatoes and oil. Dessert-wise it's spongy cakes, teacakes and sticky tarts - great stuff. Of an evening the little place goes full-on wine bar and serves a selection of beers, wines and spirits in a brassiere style. Of a weekend there can be a real throng of locals in here dissecting the week's events over a vodka tonic or a petite glass of beer. The walls of the establishment are hung with local art, usually of a surprisingly high quality and in a variety of styles, all of which is available for purchase. Definitely one of the best destinations in Formby for a drink, some light lunch or some art-gazing. Fantastic.