John Harvey Tavern, Lewes

One of the 8 Good Beer Guide pubs in Lewes..... I had the ability to visit one, but did I pick wisely? 7 more visits to the town and I might be able to tell you. It certainly ticked all the boxes we needed - serves food, dog friendly and the tap room for Harvey's brewery. Hard to see where bills ends and this starts from the outside - I nearly bagged the wrong outdoor table - but on the hottest day of the year, we ventured inside. A restaurant and a narrow bar - which is where we made ourselves at home on a solid square country kitchen type table. 9 Harveys beers on - 3 on keg and the only one on gravity pour was the Sussex Best. Not my favourite method of dispense, but of course, it was a very good pint. Service was excellent, with very friendly staff.

Not realising that this was the Harvey’s brewery tap, I initially thought it may have been named after John Harvey-Jones, but no. This is a fairly modern conversion and I can’t really add anything more, but agree with Will that the beers here are really no different from those served at Lewes’s other Harvey’s cosa nostra. I went for the Armada Ale £2.85 a half and very nice. Worth a visit as part of a crawl, but I couldn’t take a prolonged stay.

This Tavern became the John Harvey Tavern in 2015 after some extensive refurbishment. The exterior hosts the traditional flint cladding which can be seen throughout Lewes. The pub has a good position on the river Ouse and is a good suntrap in the afternoons, hence so many people opting for the outdoor space. The interior is traditional in style with flagstone floors and exposed beams. The layout here is the main bar area, a single lounge to the left and a dining room upstairs. The good range of Harveys ales was on handpump across the bar, I went for the Harveys Mild Beer, which was flavourless and didn't hit the spot, in spite of their overpricing for such a basic beer.

This brewery tap in traditional buildings near Harveys brewery has been well described below. We chose it as our first pub of the day as it was one of a few that were open before midday. Looking back after drinking a few Harvey's beers in Lewes on the day, I can't say the beers on offer here were either particularly better or actually worse than in other pubs in the town.

Visited 27/09/24. Visited previously on 11/05/19. Four cask offerings from the Harvey’s stable, namely the Sisters Table Beer, Armada, Old Ale and the Dark Mild. Harvey's best is poured directly from barrels sitting on the shelf above the wine and soft drink fridges. Their keg offerings were the Wharf IPA, the Pilsner and a new one for me from them called the Pells Pale. The away team keg offerings were Guinness, Stowford Press cider, Amstel and Moretti. The venue is opposite the brewery site and is a very traditional Lewes boozer. The right-hand side, which proudly displays the John Harvey Tap Room sign over the large window opposite the bar counter against the back wall, is always a pretty busy venue where I have visited previously at weekends with live music ongoing. The floor is stone and there is a fire grate on the right most wall that seems to only offer fire via a candle array these days. The room is dark beamed, and tables and chairs are pretty traditional. A TV to the left of the large window was switched off and indeed I can’t remember ever being here when it was switched on. The left-hand room always seems somewhat more sedate and even the couple of quite large groups sitting at the two big tables in here seemed incredibly well behaved and less raucous than the crowd on the bar servery side.