'M&B looks to sell 50 pubs'

Harvester restaurant and Toby Carvery owner Mitchells & Butlers (M&B) has put 53 pubs on the market in the latest phase of its £500m-plus sell-off programme. M&B is looking to withdraw from the drinks-led market to concentrate on food-centred pubs. John Lovering, the former chairman at retail giant Debenhams, announced this refocus of M&B in March. The pubs are known as the "franchise portfolio", though this is slightly misleading as they are in fact tenanted properties that are not part of an easily identifiable chain. M&B hopes to have sold them by the start of next year, though they will not necessarily go in a single transaction. - Independent​

A naked exotic dancer who attacked a pub landlord and landlady with her stiletto shoe after they accused her of being drunk has walked free from court. Holly Jaswal, 23, was contracted to perform on behalf an agency run by Dragon's Den contestant Dawn Pugsley. A jury at Guildford crown court heard a brawl broke out at the Crown Pub, in Knaphill, Surrey, after staff said Ms Jaswal was too drunk to put her shoes on. - Daily Mirror​

"Trust Greene King to launch a very special tribute to mark the 200th anniversary of the opening of the first curry house in Britain. The Bury St Edmunds brewers have gone and named a, 7.5 per cent ABV ultra-premium beer that goes splendidly well with a Rogan Josh as the Very Special India Pale Ale. The result of a collaboration between John Bexon, Greene King's head brewer, and ale expert Roger Protz, the pair put in painstaking research into the styles, ingredients and recipes of the time when IPA was shipped to India at the height of trading relations in the 19th Century." - Rob Leigh, writing in the Daily Mirror​