The Sennockian (JD Wetherspoon), Sevenoaks

Official site of The Sennockian (JD Wetherspoon) - www.jdwetherspoon.com

Official site of The Sennockian (JD Wetherspoon) - www.jdwetherspoon.com

Situated on the main road through the centre of Sevenoaks, this is a compact branch of Wetherspoons, which must rank as one of the smallest in the chain. The pub, seemingly a basic shop conversion, has a very simple, single rectangular room with a nice tiled floor bar area down the left side and seating through the rest of the carpeted room. The bar has a distinctive wood panelled counter front with a wood, white tile and mirror bar back. Lots of standard tables and chairs fill the space opposite the servery, with high tables and stools shunted under the front windows for a change. One or two bench booths down the right hand wall look like the best seats in the house, but most of this side of the room is taken up by slot machines, coffee stations etc... further down, there’s a cool little recess with a couple more tables under a brick arch fireplace and plain mirror, and at the back of the room there’s a small raised seating area next to a suntrap rear garden. The walls have mostly been painted in neutral shades with minimal decor - a few Spoons info boards here and there but not much else. TV screens showed their usual subtitled news channels and there was a decent crowd in attendance on our weekend afternoon visit. On the bar, not too much to shout about, or so I thought, with four of the 'Spoons regular ales and Oakham JHB as the sole guest. However, the JHB was in excellent condition - one of the best pints of Oakham I’ve had in years, so no need for a wide guest selection on this occasion. The staff were all very friendly and the food we ordered came quickly and was the usual no frills stuff you’ve come to expect from the chain. I didn’t have particularly high hopes for this place and felt even more unsure when I saw the handpumps, but the excellent beer quality, enthusiastic service and compact, almost cosy in places, interior, all worked in the pub’s favour. With no pubs that really stand out above the crowd in Sevenoaks, this is one that’s well worth considering if you’re in town.

This is a smaller than average Spoons that opened in 1999. It is clearly a shop conversion of some sort and is a large open room with the usual Spoons furnishings and the bar on the left. There is a garden of sorts at the rear that consists of a small patio with tables and chairs that doubles up as a smoking area. On the bar there are two sets of five pumps but the choice was not great as Doom Bore, London Pride and Vale Gravitas were all doubled up, one was unused and one had GK IPA. This left Dark Star Hophead and the International Adnam's Feral Hop Hog. I went for the Hop Hog (£2.70) which I took to the patio as on my Friday afternoon visit the place was quite busy. I found a chair that one of the pathetic nicotine addicted muppets had stubbed their cigarette on despite the ash tray a few feet away and some wall mounted ones. The other problem with the patio is that the noise from the air conditioning is quite obtrusive. The beer was in excellent nick but was 50p a pint dearer than my local Spoons in East London. For me this was a fairly average Spoons but I've been to a lot worse. One plus point is that the toilets don't involve stairs.