East India Arms, Fenchurch Street, EC3

A smallish, single room pub in the shadow of The Gherkin, a sign outside proudly proclaims that this is run by Britain’s oldest brewery, which is apparently Shepherd Neame. It was surprisingly quiet on a recent mid-week lunchtime visit, with only a couple of other punters stood outside. Inside it’s quite traditional with much dark wood panelling on the walls, etched glass windows and a few gilded mirrors branded with brewery names which included Bass as well as the owners. Flooring was black wood and there were a few strings of hops hung up above the bar. Seating was quite limited, with the majority of the space being given over to vertical drinking, and consisted of a few bar stools around the perimeter and fitted bench in one corner. A TV was showing a news channel, but the volume was off so this was not too intrusive. A few old pictures of the locale were hung on the walls. Beers on tap were Spitfire, Spitfire Gold and Whitstable Bay, whilst a fourth pump appeared unused. The solitary cider was Symonds Founders Reserve.

A nice looking Shepherd Neame pub, Its more than adequately described in pubsignMans review below, there is actually seven hand pumps in here with four on the main frontage with a bank of three tucked away around the side, despite this only three of the range were available, Spitfire,Spitfire Gold and Whitstable Bay. Its a nice pub and was fairly busy late on Tuesday afternoon,no doubt in part due to its near proximity to Fenchurch Street station. Its a nice pub but if you dont like Sheps beers maybe its not for you, I can take or leave them and wouldn't be adverse to calling in again.

This is a quaint little traditional pub next to Fenchurch Street station, increasingly becoming a novelty among the new office developments in this part of the city. The pub has a single bar, although this appears to have been opened out from an original two bar layout. The room describes a wide U shape around a similarly shaped back wall servery. The whole place has dark floorboards, wall panels and bar fittings, but it was well lit on a Friday evening visit, so that it didn’t feel particularly gloomy. The bar has a part mirrored bar back with some decorative glass pillars supporting the hop lined canopy which had some old Shepherd Neame brewery mirrors incorporated into it. Another impressive Sheps mirror can be found on the left hand wall alongside a similarly sized Bass mirror with what I presumed was the East India Company’s coat of arms also on display. The rest of the room has been decorated with various framed photos, maps, adverts, breweriana and the like, with many of the photos depicting either the pub or various seafaring scenes. The windows have some modern, decorative obscured glass panes and the seating comprises high stools along ledges that skirt the perimeter of the room plus a couple of tables with comfier seats in the rear corners. A shelf to the left was stacked with various leaflets for local events and some vases full of dying flowers. A TV screen to the front right was showing muted rolling news coverage. This is a Shepherd Neame house and I had hoped, given the pub’s prominent location, that it would be showcasing their full range of beers, but sadly there were only two available on this visit – Whitstable Bay and Spitfire – with two more pumps sporting reversed clips. A more rounded range of Sheps beers could be found in bottled form in the fridges, but seeing as you can buy these in just about any supermarket, this didn’t seem too appealing. My pint of Whitstable Bay was pretty good and the pub has notably appeared in recent editions of the Good Beer Guide. This is quite a nice little pub of the sort that can be found throughout Central London. The lack of seating makes it a little tricky to make yourself comfortable and the beer range was a bit disappointing, but I still felt this was a good, honest boozer and I’d happily stop off here if I had a wait for a train.