Brick Brewery, Peckham Rye, SE15

Fairly characterless brewery bar underneath the Peckham Rye railway arches. For some reason, the local hipsters were all drinking in an outdoor courtyard leaving all of the indoor seating to me. Only one other guy was inside, being stood at the bar chatting with staff. Three real ales were available, all from Brick Brewery - Peckham Pale, Milk Stout & Extra Special Bitter. Craft beers dominate however, with Brick Peckham Pils, Peckham Pale, Peckham Session, Peckham Helles, Peckham Rye, Blackhorse Milk Stout, Hop, Redcurrant & Blackberry, Plum Sour & Berry Sour, Brick x Wiper Summer Somewhere, Brick x Wild Horse NEIPA, Drop Project Drip, Wiper & True Meadowland & North City of Trees. I could see no sign of real cider. Very much a trendy kind of place that seems to be quite popular in the capital these days. Plenty of choice is good. But the drinking environment felt a bit too depressing.

Just a short distance from Peckham Rye station, this is an outdoor bar in a small lot next to the Brick Brewery, which operates out of a railway arch behind the bar. The lot is a self contained space with a corrugated iron perimeter, a plastic sheeting roof, decked flooring and a jerry built shack to the rear housing the servery, staff area and toilets. The place isn't that easy to find, especially in the hours of darkness, as there is no obvious external signage. You enter through some heavy front gates and pass the food station which is in the front left corner of the lot and was being run by Slow Richie's, who offer slow cooked roasts, burgers, pork belly and veggie dishes. The main bulk of the space is filled with low bench seating serving grubby tables made from old pallets, with a few nicer proper garden tables quickly snapped up by earlier customers. A couple of drinking ledges have been created by stacking two Brick Brewery kegs on top of each other and nailing a circular piece of wood on top. Two big patio heaters helped combat the cold, but despite now providing shelter in the form of the plastic sheeting, there is no escaping the fact that this is an outdoor venue and it can be very cold. The servery has been painted red and has a hatch which can be lowered at the end of the day and hangs precariously over your head when ordering. Blackboards on the bar back list the draught and bottled beer options which is very helpful. Given the ropey nature of the servery, seemingly made from random ply-wood off-cuts, they have gone to the effort of fitting that craft beer bar standard - the white tiled bar back with keg taps protruding. A good indie soundtrack played throughout my stay and there was a steady stream of customers despite the winter temperatures. There were two cask ales available - Brick Sir Thomas Gardyner and Kindle Bitter. The latter was decent value at £3.40 a pint plus a quid deposit for the branded glass. Six more Brick beers were available on keg dispense as well as a lone cider option, but these were notably more expensive. I noticed a few beers were coming out remarkably murky and my pint of Kindle Bitter didn't look too good either but thankfully drank fairly well. This is quite a nice little brewery bar that benefits from it's outdoor setting as it provides a USP that sets it aside from London's many other railway arch based breweries. Obviously the place is better visited in warmer months, but the handy location and beer straight from the source mean that this place should work well as part of any crawl around Peckham's ever improving pub scene.

Tap for the eponymous brewery located under the adjacent railway arches, with a compact outside bar located in a metal shipping container and rustic wooden tables and benches on the front 'patio'. Pop-up outlets offering food at times (but not when I stopped by). Three real ales on handpump: Kinsale, Sir Thomas Gardyner (£3.80) and Blenheim Black. Table Beer, Peckham Pale, Pioneer IPA, Wheat Beer and Saison plus two ciders available from the keg taps at the back. Now open until 21:30 on Thursdays and to 22:00 on Fridays and Saturdays.

Official site of Brick Brewery - www.brickbrewery.co.uk

Official site of Brick Brewery - www.brickbrewery.co.uk

This is a new (circa 6 months old) brewery in the shadow of Peckham Rye Station. Inside the brewery you have all the brewing tanks, etc, on the left, with a very small bar counter in a corner on the right. There was only one handpump with a clip on it, for Kinsale Bitter (£3.40 a pint), although a couple or so keg taps were clipped. There was no sign of any food. The brewery tap, if you can call it that, currently opens only on Saturday, from noon until 9.0 PM, but I was told that it is planned to shortly open it on Thursdays and Fridays. As far as I could tell the only seating is outside in the small yard, and consists of cheap and cheerful stuff - it makes Antic furnishings seem the height of elegance - like rough hewn wooden benches and tables and an old pallet resting on four (presumably empty) beer casks. It was doing a good trade on Saturday afternoon with all the benches occupied by young drinkers. I'm not sure what they will do when the weather turns, or during the winter. Perhaps they'll move the benches inside to in front of the brewing apparatus. My pint of Kinsale was in tip top condition (and of course so it should be in the brewery tap) so it gets the thumbs up from me. But it's not a sense in the purist sense, but as you can walk in and buy a pint of excellent real ale, and then sit down in their courtyard and drink it it gets my vote as a pub.