New European Food: The Eagle

Welcome to The Eagle

Outside, academics continue...

Note the well scorched ceiling in the RAF Bar

A corner of wartime memories

Steak 'n Kidney Pie, with chips and peas

Let the world roll by, while...

You enjoy your pint

Let’s talk about England. Wait a sec, let’s get more specific and talk about Cambridge. No use stopping there; let’s get down to the basics of life and talk about The Eagle, one of England’s and Cambridge’s finest pubs. Matter of fact, we can talk about The Eagle and the basics of life in one breath, but we’ll get to that later.

Everybody know about The University of Cambridge? I didn’t think so. It’s only one of England’s, and the world’s most famous universities, another being Oxford. Matter of fact The University of Cambridge is a spawn of Oxford, germinating when a group of disgruntled Oxfordsonians (my own clever word) left the older institution in disgust in 1209. Don’t know what the arguments were. Who can truly penetrate the snide and foggy brains of academicians (not my own clever word)? In 1231, King Henry III granted the new university a charter.

Not organized at all like most American universities, Cambridge is a collection of 31 colleges and over 150 departments. With a university this ancient, you’d never guess that the last association to be granted college status was Homerton College in 2010. Google it to read more about its lineage.

Colleges accept their own students, hire their own staff, own their own property and receive their own income. Students of a particular college live and eat there, and also meet for small group teaching sessions, known as supervisions. Thereafter, the academic landscape broadens and students from one college may attend classes in all the colleges. The University of Cambridge awards degrees.

Kinda cool. Students not only end up taking classes at many colleges, but are also encouraged to attend lectures outside their fields of study, giving them glimpses of multitudinous subjects they would never have encountered in an American style institution. Boys and girls, this is called education and you probably didn’t encounter it unless you were Ivy League.

By the way, Harvard and MIT rank right up there with Oxford and Cambridge in study after study of the world’s best.

But, enough about expanding your brain and b-o-r-i-n-g stuff like that. Who needs it when there’s a neat place to drink beer?

I refer, of course to a quaint spot, nestled right around the corner from the city’s bustling market square. The Eagle pub.

Bustling is not an idle handle. The churn of the market, the buzz of the voices, the rattle of trucks and stream of bicycles permeates the city center. Hard to distinguish whether you’re in the city or the university. They mingle like strands of a rope. The streets run from broad and open, to narrow and tangled, as though a horse-drawn plow had run amuck. Cars creep through this warren of streets and alleys, but pedestrians beware. People in flowing robes ride their bikes where they damn well please.

As I was saying, near the market square sits a pub called The Eagle. Some call it a living shrine to all that college drinking establishments should be. Two whiskey-stained bars. Lots of scarred-top tables. Lots of centuries-old timber, and memorabilia galore. Also, lots to know about The Eagle besides that they serve some of the best bitter this side of heaven, an observation I don’t plan to test anytime soon.

In 1525, the site was bequeathed to Corpus Christi College and by 1667 (a year after the great fire of London) there was a tavern in the same place, called The Eagle & Child. Don’t know what happened to the Child.

Remember I said The Eagle and the basics of life are intertwined? The Eagle is where, in the 1950’s, the discoverers of DNA, Watson and Crick, often huddled over a pint or two.

But, that’s not all that’s special about The Eagle. In the back is the ‘RAF Bar,’ where amid the tumult and death of the Second World War, RAF and American aircrews downed their pints, sweaty and bruised from battle. For some it was their last pint.

The walls are plastered with aircraft photos and squadron plaques, but the real show is on the ceiling. Blackened with the carbon from candles and cigarette lighters, you can clearly read the names and squadron numbers and aircraft types. Mute testimony to those who, despite great odds and the constant reality of death, held the weight of our civilization on their shoulders for six long years.

The food isn’t half bad either. The usual pub grub, but surprisingly tasty.

Just remember, when you order your first pint, The Eagle is a place to throw care and time to the winds. Linger much longer than you’d planned. Bring a book, or sit calmly in the courtyard and watch the unfortunates, who don’t have a brew in their hand, stroll past. There’ll be plenty of time later to wind your way through the serene, cold stone of college courtyards and visit the fabulous Cambridge bookshops, like Heffers on Trinity Street, or stop off in ‘Chocolat Chocolat’ for chocolate as you’ve never had it.

For right now, just sit back, enjoy the company of academics and tourists and the silent ghosts of aircrews who never returned. While you’re at it, order another pint in honor of the gallant aviators!